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Published: 02 January 2014

By Andy Ross

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Inspiration for a New Year

We all need to be inspired. Here are twelve links for the coming year, some old and some new. Long live inspiration!

1. Elegance in mathematics

For those of us who love the order and beauty of maths, here is a short video all about the mathematics that underlies our everyday lives. This is why we love it so...

2. The magic of Fibonacci

Centuries after they were discovered, this sequence of numbers is continuing to astonish, amaze and inspire.

3. A murmuration of starlings

Here is a wonderful video that happened by a lucky accident, or maybe it was serendipity?

4. Poems about singing

Singers love words. This is a selection of poems about singing.

5. Sigur Ros' music video experiment

The band's celebrated experiment which gave fourteen directors a modest budget to create work inspired by an album. Creative and brilliant.

6. A crochet coral reef

The crochet coral reef project continues to grow across the world, bringing people together through science, arts and mathematics. Anyone can join in.

7. An animation of the life of the naturalist, Wallace

Alfred Russell Wallace is not as well-known as his contemporary Charles Darwin but his story is just as intriguing and important. Here it is (a third the way down the page as a vimeo video), told in paper and puppetry.

8. The Sagrada Familia

Guidi's unfinished cathedral in Barcelona could look like this in 2026. Now, that really is long-term planning.

9. Endangered languages

Each day the world loses a little bit of linguistic diversity. This project aims to preserve and maybe even reinvigorate them. Fantabulosa! (Polari - UK)

10. Space for free

NASA's website has some beautiful pictures of space - planets, moons, stars and the people who explore them. Wonder-ful.

11. The Christmas lectures

The Royal Institution has a wealth of Christmas lectures available to watch. One of my favourite, looking-forward-to things of the festive season, now we can watch them year-round. That's my winter sorted!

12. Commander Chris Hadfield sings a classic in space.

This is a YouTube video that hit the Web in May last year and was immediately watched nearly 2 million people. You can see why!