Free Resource | NationMaster

Found this via Multimedia & Internet@Schools Magazine.

A handy little reference tool for your patrons needing comparative data on countries, NationMaster. From the about page

So I decided to put together a website that allowed users to generate graphs based on numerical data extracted from the Factbook. The next (rather obvious) realisation was that there's no reason I couldn't take in data from other sources. Why shouldn't the net have a central location that allows you to compare countries on any statistic you like?

But why did I do it? To promote education and understanding about the world. To make it easy to engage with the indicators that shape global commerce, health, politics and ecology. To make the facts easily accessible and meaningful. To bring the works of academics, public agencies and private researchers to a wider audience.

How is this useful -- well for my next vacation I now know which countries to visit that have the highest library books per capita -- (it does rate it out to #81)

Rank	Countries	Amount (top to bottom)
#1	Georgia	16,335.3 per 1,000 people
#2	Monaco	9,781.23 per 1,000 people
#3	Liechtenstein	4,968.06 per 1,000 people
#4	San Marino	3,704.99 per 1,000 people
#5	Iceland	2,831.3 per 1,000 people
#6	Armenia	2,295.34 per 1,000 people
#7	Estonia	1,714.01 per 1,000 people
#8	Luxembourg	1,707.32 per 1,000 people
#9	Lithuania	1,601.61 per 1,000 people
#10	Macedonia, The Former Yugoslav Republic of	1,458.68 per 1,000 people