NewSearch Engine

Mahalo

The look of the search engine is a refreshing change from the Google and Yahoo! we are used to. The first thing I noticed was that on the main page, they give you several categorized links to popular searches. In the main search results, the links were categorized according to music and MP3 links, lyrics, tour dates, photos, videos and so on. It certainly did save me a lot of time scrolling through the links. Since all these pages are “hand written,” the neat organization is apparent. Similarly, when I searched for the New York Yankees baseball team, I was presented with the Yankees roster, stats, time line and even a list of Yankees rivals. It's refreshing to find something you want so easily!

the bottom line is that if you are searching for a relatively popular keyword, Mahalo is a great tool. However, you will still have to resort to Google if you want information on obscure things. The fact that they censor a lot of the content also makes it safer for the use of young people and my guess is that people who find it tiring to sort through the Google results will find Mahalo very handy. So, go give it a spin and form your own opinion!

Check Mahalo out for yourself right here.

Bugnosis

I have talked about Web bugs in other tips before, but to get everyone up to speed, Web bugs are small gifs (usually) that are hidden in certain Web sites (in banners and other graphics) or HTML e-mails. Like cookies, Web bugs are placed in your browser and they track you, but Web bugs also share your information with other bugs that you may run into while surfing the Web. They can use this information to possibly send you spam or worse, depending on the bug you've run across. You can take measures to protect yourself from these bugs by getting some ad blocking software and creating tougher settings in your Internet browser (such as a prompt for Internet cookies). Also, when you get done with your Internet session, you should clean out your temp Internet files and cookies. have gone out and found a program that will actually search for bugs as you surf the Web. It's called Bugnosis and it will tell you when a Web site has an embedded Web bug. It will even show you where it is on the site with a “cute” little bug graphic. In addition to this, Bugnosis will bring up a detail pane at the bottom of your browser when it detects a suspicious graphic. Bugnosis doesn't have the ability to stop Web bugs. You need ad blocking software for that to happen or stricter browser settings may do the trick. What the program does do though is alarm you of a Web bug presence and it gives you a heads up to definitely clean out your browser temp files. You will be surprised at the Web sites that come up with a lot of Web bugs

You can download Bugnosis for yourself here

Virtual Volunteering Resource Guide Find the many different projects you can volunteer to do.