Small Business Fighting Big Spam - New York Times
Small businesses can have just as much unsolicited junk mail clogging their mail servers as do larger corporations, but often lack the human and software resources of the bigger companies to fight it as effectively. But there are some options for fighting back.

From Ars Technica: "A new salvo has been fired in the perennial war over Wikipedia's accuracy. Thomas Chesney, a Lecturer in Information Systems at the Nottingham University Business School, published the results of his own Wikipedia study in the most recent edition of the online journal First Monday, and he came up with a surprising conclusion: experts rate the articles more highly than do non-experts."

Experts rate Wikipedia's accuracy higher than non-experts

Not Familiar with Wikipedia yet? Read my blog post about Wikipedia.

Attention Mac Lovers… a site called macappaday.com is giving away a free application for Mac's each day during the month of December. The value of each app will be between $5 and $60… can't wait to see what they come up with.

visit macappaday.com

How do you sign your emails?  "Best,"?  "Warmly,"? "xoxoxo,"?  According to an article in the New York Times today, those little words you choose to use above your name at the closing of an email have a lot of weight.

NYT: 'Yours Truly', the E-Variations

Check out the wikipedia article detailing Google's line of products and services. For those who think Google is just a place to go to search for websites, guess again. There are many products that Google offers that most people aren't aware of. Some of my favorites happen to be:

• Google Earth (maps and satellite imaging)
• Picasa (photo library application)
• Google Reader (rss news reader)
• Google Calendar (an excellent online calendar)
• Google News (a great news search engine)
• Google SMS (text message a search to Google from your cell phone)

See a complete list of Google products here.

This is part of an ongoing series from Engadget about holiday gift shopping for the tech hungry.

Engadget: Holiday Gift Guide for Him

Check out www.giveawayoftheday.com, they're giving away free software daily.  This is software that is normally sold commercially, but is released free for one day only through the site.  In order to use the software, you have to download it on the day it is offered and install it that very same day.  You just may find something useful-

It's that time of year again- time to start galloping from store to store searching for those holiday gifts.  If you start early (how about now?), you can save yourself some time, money, and a perfume-counter migraine.  Comparison shopping sites on the Internet can help you find the best deal buy searching thousands of different retailers for whatever product you're into.

My favorite comparison shopping sites:

• Froogle.com (by google)
• TheFind.com (Great also for getting ideas- know a Scrabble nut?  Type in "Scrabble" and see what develops)
• Shopper.com (by CNet- good for electronics and tech gadgets)
• UGenie.com (for books, movies, music, and games)
• Dealtime.com (this site has been around the block a long time)

Almost all of these sites are mentioned in a recent New York Times article:

NYT: How to Find Those Gifts in a Flash 

An interesting article from the New York Times that raises important questions about how consumers can be better informed in determining if their ISP's are ripping them off. DSL and Cable internet providers often advertise their blazing speeds, but do consumers ever see the speeds advertised? Apparently, not very often.

NYT: Not Always Full Speed Ahead

A great article in the New York Times that absolutely speaks for itself. If you are a small business owner with a website, this is a must-read.

NYT: How to Make Your Website Sing for You