Jim Gray is a missing computer scientist who has not been seen since last Sunday after sailing off of Northern California. Amazon.com has enlisted the help of its Mechanical Turk service to pour over high res satellite images of the area Gray is reported to have been located last.
Head over there with your Amazon account and see if you can help with rescue efforts.
Blingo is a search engine that rewards you for searching the internet. A random times are selected every day for a prize to awarded. Search during that time, and you win. Prizes range from iPods, PSP’s, Visa gift certificates, and movie tickets. The best part about it is that it really works. I personally have one six times, five of those times due to referrals.
That’s the beauty of Blingo. Refer your friends, and if they win, you win that prize too. The more friends you refer, the more chances you have to win.
Blingo uses the same search technology as Google so it’s a no brainer to use it if you rely on Google for your search needs already. Simply set Blingo as your home page, or install a neat toolbar for Internet Explorer or a search box for Firefox.
Why I Should Care:
Everyone likes to win prizes. Everyone (mostly) uses Google to search the internet. This brings the best of both together. Sign up today (via my referral of course) and start winning!
Yes, I know “Web 2.0″ is a hackneyed term. Today starts a feature a day on the up and coming pioneers of what some are calling the revenge of the “Dot-Com” bubble. I’ll attempt to explore a new company a day (or as often as I can) and figure out why we should care (or not) about said company.
Today’s Web 2.0 darling is Technorati. Technorati is the self proclaimed authority on the world of weblogs. The service allows you to keep track of your favorite “blogs” via real-time update of content posted to these sites. Basically, it expands upon the idea of search engine relevance - determining a site’s importance based upon the number of other sites that link to it - by placing added importance to hyperlinks between blogs. Comments and links between blog authors adds a sense of a conversation-like exchange across sites. These exchanges, tracked by Technorati, determine the relevance of blogs in a real time fashion. Site authors can choose to notify Technorati (and other services) automatically every time they post an article to their site.
Why I Should Care:
Technorati is currently tracking almost Thirty Thousand Million sites. So chances are, if you are interested in a topic, you can find a weblog post about it. Integrated search, innovative use of “tags”, and useful site tools allow you to dive into the wide array of personal and topical weblogs, also known as the “Blogosphere” (Gah!).
