PC Magazine NoteWhen 2

As a past user of real 3M PostIt Notes and the PostIt Notes software I didn't think there would be a better substitute any time soon. Then I found PC Magazine's NoteWhen 2 software. The magazine offers Other utilities for adding functionality, managing and monitoring your PC, etc., all available for a minimal price or within the annual subscription fee of $19.97 on the annual utility signup page.

The program is a little like using real PostIt Notes but is software based and sits on your PC's desktop. Whenever you want to create a new note just click on the icon on the bottom taskbar area and then type in the new note. The new note pops up on your screen set to the same size and color as the previous note. You can then change various settings for the new note or go with how it was created. You can change the note color, size (it stretches), font and position on the screen. The program remembers settings as you make them and new notes will be similar until you change the settings again.

PC Magazine's annual utility membership is a steal and you get unlimited access for all utilities released during that year. Usually any one of them is worth the cost of the annual membership.

Give it a try! You will find the utilities provide some of the missing features you might wish for and will find they almost always provide a very useful add-on to your library of PC tools.

Proposed new search engine - making internet searches more precise

Jimmy Wales, the person that brought you Wikipedia, is talking about building a new internet search engine. The idea is to create a search engine "whose output is continually refined by user participation, just as Wikipedia theoretically gets better as users spot and correct errors".

If you haven't looked at Wikipedia, it's an internet based dynamic encyclopedia that allows users world wide to add and refine content in real time and theoretically gets better continuously. You can find most any topic in Wikipedia and generally the information is on target and kept up to date by the user base. It is self policed by the users and content that is unclear or erroneous gets corrected by the user base.

Read the article on the proposed new search engine...

News and Observer
March 21, 2007
Paul Gilster

Making searches more precise

Jimmy Wales, the man responsible for the Wikipedia collaborative encyclopedia, is talking about building a better search engine.

Wales' company, Wikia (www.wikia.com), uses many of Wikipedia's user-involved techniques to host publishing sites on a wide range of topics. What he seems to have in mind is a search engine whose output is continually refined by user participation, just as Wikipedia theoretically gets better as users spot and correct errors.

Just how this will play out is unclear, because Wikipedia remains controversial. Unlike the Encyclopedia Britannica, which draws on the work of experts, Wikipedia is open to contributions from anyone on the Net. Read more...