SquirrelNet

Google makes airline flight searches easier

Google has just integrated into their regular search the ability to search for airline flights.  Just type in the name of 2 cities you wish to travel to.  Google will then prompt you with a simple box for travel dates and give you a choice of searching on Expedia, Hotwire or Orbitz.  The interface is very simple and easy to use.

You can see it in action here.

Cool Site: A free whiteboard you can use online with your friends

GE has released a really cool free online whiteboard that allows friends to work together on a project, even if they live halfway around the world - just invite them by email or IM while you're drawing.  With this feature, a grandparent can doodle with their grandchildren, regardless of where they live.

GE's online whiteboard offers some really useful drawing tools that are much better than the clumsy tools you likely used in Paint.  Some of the tools offer fun effects, so I recommend experimenting.

One of the coolest features is that you can email the product of your drawing to others.  When you do, your viewers will be treated to some really cool animation, since the whiteboard literally re-draws what you drew.  It's fun!

Typepad apologizes for recent blog speed issues

Some of you may have noticed that SquirrelNet's blog has been running a bit slow over the past few weeks.  Our hosting company Typepad reports that they've corrected the problem.  They host 10 million blogs so the performance issue impacted millions of people.

As an interesting aside, you may want to read about the history of Typepad, which was founded by Mena Trott in 2001 with the help of a Japanese investor.  Here's a quote from that page.

For me, Dollarshort (her first blog), was a creative outlet, a place for me to tell anecdotes about my childhood, attempt to illustrate humorous accounts of our daily lives, and keep a traditional weblog with links to sites I found interesting.

Animated version of Star Wars

The following "animated GIF" summarizes Star Wars in about a minute - and it's basically the size of a Word document.  Click on the thumbnail pic to view.  Cool!

Hat tip to Digg

SquirrelNet's Best Search Engines for Kids

We have just released our Best Search Engines for Kids list after reviewing dozens of kids search engines.  Our favorite search engines for kids are Google Safe Search for Kids, Yahooligans!, Ask Jeeves for Kids, and Net Nanny.

Find locations for flu shots

If you live in America, the Asthma and Allergy Foundation website is providing a search function that lets you find flu shots near your zip code.

Hat tip to ResearchBuzz

Narnia's Aslan: sneak pics + Liam Neeson to do voice

For those of you looking forward to Disney's The Chronicles of Narnia: The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe, here are 3 sneak pics of a computer graphics test done with Aslan.  Rumors have it that a test audience was concerned about the girls' safety; but of course it was only a computer-generated Aslan.  Wow!  Also, it was apparently confirmed this week that Liam Neeson will be the voice of Aslan.

   

   

(Update:  Here's the new Narnia trailer.)

EPIC 2014

Here's an interesting, entertaining and well-done Shockwave movie that hypothesizes on the future of the internet, especially how the future will further impacted by Google even more than happens today.  See EPIC 2014. 

Since I'm a futurist myself, I believe firmly that any prediction that is at least 50% right is a good prediction.  For reference, see Google's Future? GBrowser, GooglePC, Google NetPC and Google ISP and my follow-up article Looking back on Google predictions made in May 2005.

While I disagree with many of the individual predictions (such as Google buys Amazon.com), I agree with the overall direction that Google's influence will become greater and greater and that within 10 years Google will be embedded in how most of us access information and entertainment.

Compare eBay and Amazon prices side-by-side

aytozon (as in eBay and Amazon) is a site that allows users to compare eBay and Amazon.com prices side-by-side.  It's an interesting site to visit in case you use either of this two sites and like to look for bargains.  Sometime the results aren't very readable since items may appear to cost $0.01 on eBay until higher bids are made (and likewise until higher bids are made).

Hat tip to ResearchBuzz

SquirrelNet's 3 Step Guide to Conducting Better Searches

We've just modernized our 3 Step Guide to Searching tutorial, which provides you with a simple and concise 3 step guide on how to conduct better searches.   Step one is "Finding quality in your search".  Step two is "The idiot's guide to difficult searches".  Finally, step three is "What to do if all else fails?"

Our original tutorial was written 5 years ago.  Since then, Google has been crowned king of search so an update was definitely in order.  This 3 Step Guide to Searching tutorial will help you make better use of Google and suggests other search engines for the few times when Google fails you.