Products
Product: EasyBib.com
1/4/2011 By:
Retail price: Basic edition, free; school edition starts at $150 annually; EasyBib’s
Free MyBib Pro service provides MLA formatting
By MaryAnn Karre
EasyBib.com is a Web site that
helps students quickly and simply
collect, format, and alphabetize
lists of works cited and teaches
them to credit the sources of
their information correctly.
Quality and Effectiveness:
EasyBib is the right name for
this product, as it makes complete
and accurate bibliographies
a snap. With Autocite, it’s
as simple as entering an ISBN,
URL, keyword, or part of a title
to generate a complete citation
for books, databases, and
as many as 58 types of sources
including cartoons, music, and
public performances. It took
only seconds to create a list
that consisted of a book, an
article from a technical journal, a YouTube video, and a
software program. For sources that are not provided by
EasyBib automatically, manual citations are just as easy, since every field on EasyBib’s citation
forms includes detailed help.
The Citation Guide will help show
students where they can find the various
pieces of information they need for their
bibliography, not simply what they need.
Though the free basic edition is a wonderfully
time-saving and supportive tool,
the school and MyBib Pro editions allow
students to easily switch between APA,
MLA , and Chicago or Turabian styles;
they also include parenthetical and footnote
formatting, database importing,
IP authentication, and a Web-site quality
check, and they are free of ads. All
versions can cite 58 types of sources
through the use of Autocite, all export to
Word and RTF , and all have citation management.
Ease of Use: Students need only log in to access their
lists. Because the Web site is so intuitive and quick, they
can focus on using reliable sources and documenting them
properly instead of worrying about formatting the citations
correctly. The parenthetical citation wizard creates a citation
instantly when the page number that is cited is entered,
and the footnotes wizard formats a footnote or endnote
on the fly. When they use the student and Pro editions,
students can even import citations from commonly used
databases, such as JSTOR, EBSCO, and ProQuest.
Creative Use of Technology: EasyBib is more than a
citation tool, especially since it has partnered with Credo
Reference, WorldCat, and YoLink to help students start
research immediately upon accessing the EasyBib site.
Top Features
¦ EasyBib.com is just as
valuable a tool for the
beginning researcher as for
the university student.
¦ By collecting information
on sources as the student
researches, EasyBib lets
the student concentrate on
addressing the topic instead
of on the details and format of
the citations.
¦ Providing step-by-step help,
EasyBib teaches students to
properly credit their sources
in the style that they will
use from elementary school
through college.
Overall Rating
EasyBib.com is equally at home at all academic levels,
from elementary school to university, since it can format
citations in MLA, APA, or Chicago or Turabian styles and
assist with parenthetical citations and footnotes, which
can be copied and pasted easily.