Monthly Archives: February 2005

The World’s Biggest, But is it Useful

This entry was posted in Google Information Internet Technology on by

The folks at Web’s Biggest say that they are “The World’s Biggest Directory Search Engine.” Last week Internetweek reported that:

A Web search engine that uses the “whois” database said Friday that it searches more Web sites than any other search engine, including Google, which crawls the Web in a different manner for its search results. ….
“Other search engines missed from a third to more than half of the Web sites [included] in the Web’s Biggest search results,” the firm stated.
Always on the outlook for better information sources I headed right over and entered a search that has pointed a few visitors to Modulator: live strong bands. The results were 3 references that appeared to be paid adds and they were preceded by this message:
Important: We suggest you make your search LESS specific. Please remember you are not searching the contents of web pages like you do at Google or Yahoo. You are searching one paragraph website descriptions. Furthermore, you will only find websites that contain EACH of your keywords in their description. Web’s Biggest is designed to find websites devoted to what you are looking for, not web pages that happen to contain those words.
On the other hand a search for Lance Armstrong generated quite a few results.
Want to find the text of the state of the union speech? Well, it is #2 on Google and the Web’s Biggest responds with the above “be less specific” message and no links of any kind. And it was a bit slow doing that.
Lesson: use your preferred traditional search service first. In fact, I’m still puzzling over why I’d use them at all…

The Two Happiest Places on Earth?

This entry was posted in Culture on by

According to Hefner:

Hefner, accompanied by four blonde girlfriends, said he had another purpose for his visit to the park. It was a belated birthday gift to one of his companions, Holly Madison, who sported a small Mickey doll on her hip.
“All the girls are Disney fans,” Hefner said. “But Holly is obsessed.”
As for the world’s most famous bachelor, it’s all about staying young.
“What has never left me, quite frankly, is the boy himself,” Hefner said. “It is the connection to childhood. There are two ‘Happiest Places on Earth’: One is Disney, and the other is the Playboy Mansion.”

Via The Disney Blog.

This is the Freedom People are Dying For?

This entry was posted in Drug Laws on by

The drug thugs have been active in Baltimore and gonzales will probably not be prosecuting the murderers:

Just before 5 a.m., officers from the Baltimore County Police Tactical Unit were serving a search and seizure warrant related to a narcotics investigation at a home in the 8100 block of Del Haven Road when two officers approached the bedroom door on the second floor, according to police spokesman Ofc. Shawn Vinson.
When they opened the door, the officers allegedly were met by Cheryl Noel, 44, who was pointing a handgun at them, Vinson said.
Fearing for his life, one officer fired three shots, according to Vinson, striking and killing Noel.

Pete Guither comments:

Of course, the raid was pre-dawn (before 5 am). So you’re sound asleep, and suddenly awakened by explosions, crashing sounds, feet tramping upstairs, and a lot of people yelling. How clear is your mind going to be? Can you distinguish that they’re identifying themselves as police officers? When the door to your bedroom opens and there’s two men dressed in black wearing ski masks pointing guns at you? Imagine yourself in that scenario. How would you react? What if you had a gun by your bed?
So why would they raid the house in this way?

Why, indeed:

All of this for less than a half ounce of marijuana, paraphernalia and possession of black powder (gunpowder) used for muzzle load hunting.

We need to clean our own yard and then, maybe, there will be an example that does not require gang violence to spread.
Via Avedon.

Map your Music

This entry was posted in Music on by

Fill in the musician or band and Music Plasma will show you related groups. Note, they are not complete and you might scratch your head a bit about relationships they do and do not show.
Flash required.