As you browse the internet, there’s always that moment in time, everyday, when we want to know about particular stuffs. Searching in Google or Yahoo is probably the way we usually do it. But are there any other places we can search? Wikipedia, collaborated with SearchMe, now has its own search engine called WikiSeek, built based on its contents.

WikiSeek is the newest search engine (officially launched today) that indexes only Wikipedia sites, plus those sites which are being referenced within Wikipedia. In case you don’t know, Wikipedia is an online free-content encyclopedia that anyone can edit. Overall posts’ contents are being monitored by a lot of people / contributors, so therefore, the level of accuracy of the posts can be maintained. As any articles are editable in Wikipedia, WikiSeek hopes to have a better and very little spam chances. Developed by SearchMe, Inc., WikiSeek utilizes SearchMe’s category refinement technology, providing suggested search refinements based on user tagging and categorization within Wikipedia. Search results include a tag cloud on top of the page, which contains Wikipedia categories containing your search term. You can filter the results further by clicking the appropriate tag (if any). You can help spread WikiSeek to others by embedding the search engine to your sites. According to WikiSeek (available on the footer side):

The majority of the revenue generated by WikiSeek advertising will be donated to the Wikimedia Foundation

To show our online support, we are adding the embedded search engine below. You can do so in your website by visiting HERE for the code!

Overall, WikiSeek provide a nicer way of searching terms by making the world’s biggest collaborative encyclopedia as its source. Unlike Yahoo or Google, WikiSeek is not the place to find key words in the internet, nor it’s a place to gain web popularity. Rather, it’s a place where you can find specific contents / posts / articles that you REALLY want to find. WikiSeek is a search engine where results are being created and edited by the people around the world.

Recording our relatives can be hard at times. How far can we go in remembering our ancestors? It’s a question of how we are related to each other. Family trees are important, and precious at the same time, in which we can learn our past and record our future. If only there’s an online application that can help you maintain and record your family tree. Fortunately for you, there’s Geni.

Geni is a web2.0 ajax-based online service that allows families to collaboratively build their family tree. Simply click the arrow of an existing relative in the direction you want to add new relatives, define your relationship and add their names. When you add a relative’s email address, he or she will be invited to join your tree. That relative can then add other relatives, and so on. Your tree will continue to grow as relatives invite other relatives. Each family member has a profile which can be viewed by clicking their name in the tree. This helps family members learn more about each other and stay in touch. Family members can also share information and work together to build profiles for common ancestors. Below is the screenshot of the mock-up Geni family tree that I’ve built. It’s a made up data for review purposes only.

Overall, Geni offers the easiest interface we’ve found so far. Built heavily using Ajax, everything can be added by simple clicks. Another added advantage, Geni is a private network, so you can maintain your family’s and your privacy, as well. Only people in your tree can see your tree and profile. Creating your family tree does not require you to fill in any registration form. When you first start creating your tree, Geni will email you a temporary password, which you can change to a permanent one once you’ve logged in for the first time. Still in its beta phase, we are very impressed on what Geni can do. The bottom line is, Geni is perfect for you to collaboratively create and maintain your family tree. So be sure to try it out and create your very own family tree!

Ever felt confuse how to plan and prepare your parties? Confuse how you can spread the words? Parties need a lot to prepare. From picking a date, sending invitations, to purchasing / renting party supplies and equipment, party planning can be a daunting and time-consuming task. And it usually isn’t much fun. Fortunately for you, there’s MyPunchBowl now.

MyPunchBowl is a new web2.0 ajax-based service (just launched for Public from its Beta phase) that allows you to plan, create, and send out online invitations for parties or similar events. With MyPunchBowl, you can create customized invitations page, import your contact email addresses (AOL, Hotmail, Yahoo Mail, Google Mail, Outlook/Outlook Express, Plaxo, and other contact managers), send your page to family and friends, socialize with your invitees using the party message board, and create an after-party photo gallery or forum. If your invitees want to bring out their friends, they can simply forward their email invitation to their friends. The friends will then need to click the link that says “I’m not [original guest]” to add their name to the guest list. As a host, you can identify these guests in your Guest List by the blank “Date sent” column.

Overall, MyPunchBowl offers a very easy to use interface to create, customize, and send your party invitations. In fact, we couldn’t find a web service in the similar niche that does it better than MyPunchBowl. Unfortunately, images and pictures can only be shared using Flickr. WorldTechLogic has reviewed another similar service in the past, called EventWax. EventWax is more suitable for events that requires tickets, while MyPunchBowl is excellent for party invitations. Although in a different niche, compare to EventWax, MyPunchBowl has better templates and interface. EventWax’s strength lies in their ability to create our own CSS (suitable for more advanced users). At this time, for its ease of use, we would recommend MyPunchBowl to create and send out your party invitations.

To signup for a MyPunchBowl account, you can go to their website and click on the “SIGN UP NOW” badge.

Have you ever browsed a website where you are just dying to give out comments on the page? Have you ever feel like sharing your thoughts with others as well? With web2.0, online interaction has become more and more advanced these days. Users are given the chance to contribute and gain more on their browsing experience. Creating and sharing your comments on websites are now becoming easier with Fleck.

Fleck is a web2.0 annotation service that allows you to add notes and bullets to webpages and share these annotated pages with friends. With Fleck, you can interact with pages on the web just as if it were pages in a magazine. You can save your annotated page for yourself, send it to friends or colleagues or use it in your blog. You can start using Fleck right away without anything to install. Simply add Fleck to your Bookmark Toolbar and you can start to use it immediately. To annotate a page, just click on the Fleck link in your Bookmark Toolbar and it will create a new layer for you to put your annotations on. You can also put your Fleck page in your WordPress blog (other blog services will be added soon), share your annotated page via emails, see your history, and save the annotation to your Fleck account. To start annotating our page right away, please click on the below button, made by us (you can use it freely, but please do make the appropriate credit and link to us):

Overall, Fleck is a very cool web application and provide an easier media for us to share our thoughts and comments on websites. As an added info, you don’t need an account to use Fleck. You might want to signup for an account if you want to access your personal page from another computer. Also, to share your pages to others via email, you will need to verify your email address for anti-spam purposes (thanks to Patrick for pointing that out). Fleck does add a new meaning of web interaction. WorldTechLogic has reviewed a similar service in the past, called TrailFire. TrailFire allows you to do the same thing as Fleck, but it needs to install an extension to your browser. The fact that Fleck doesn’t need to install anything has made us pick Fleck over TrailFire.

To signup for a Fleck account (optional), you can click HERE!

Have you ever wanted to view historical documents online? Ever wonder how you can view the historical cases (1901-1921) of the Bureau of Investigation (later known as the FBI)? Or perhaps pictures of the Civil War? Those historical documents (and many many others) are available only in the National Archives, and they cannot be found anywhere on the internet. Fortunately, those days will be over as there is FootNote now.

FootNote is a web2.0 ajax-based archiving service that allows you to find millions of images of original source documents (many of which have never been available online before). You can find Papers of the Continental Congress, Constitutional Convention Records, Mathew B. Brady Collection of Civil War Photographs, Civil War Pension Index and many many more. You might be wondering how they are able to do that. Well, in January 10, 2007, FootNote had made an agreement with the National Archives to digitize and store historic documents (4.5 million pages so far) which permits them to publish the documents on the net. With FootNote, you can view and enlarge documents to add or discover hidden annotations (People, Places, Dates, and Text - which then become searchable), print documents, add documents to your scrapbooks, save document images to your FootNote Gallery, and upload any image from your computer that you want to share with others. FootNote also gives you an opportunity to share your story, ideas or research with others by creating your own “Member Pages”, a place where you can share your knowledge and research with others. You can write what you know, attach original sources that support your story and invite others to collaborate and contribute. You can also embed your own FootNote member card to your website, blog, or external web account(s). Simply copy and paste the code generated by FootNote and embed it to your website. Below is ours.

Overall, FootNote provides an easy to use interface as well as an extensive collection of documents. Unfortunately, not all documents can be freely viewed. Unlimited access to all documents is available only with the paid accounts. The monthly fee is currently $ 9.99 and the annual fee is $ 99.99. You can also opt to pay for only $ 1.99 per premium document image viewing. I believe what FootNote and the National Archives are doing is a noble cause. Papers don’t last forever, and it’s imperative that our descendants have access to these documents in years to come. As an added info, by February 6, the digitized materials will also be available at no charge in National Archives research rooms in Washington D.C. and regional facilities across the country.

To signup for a FootNote account, you can click HERE!

Ever had that urge to show off your best work, but confuse on where you can publish your portfolio? Sometimes it is not easy for us to create and maintain our own online portfolio. Especially if you’re on a tight schedule for a meeting, and have to come up with a fast one. Fortunately for you, there’s CarbonMade now.

CarbonMade is a web2.0 ajax-based Portfolio creator that allows you to create your portfolio and publish it on the web. With CarbonMade, you can add projects, pictures, Flash files, add captions, add a Google Analytics code and provide feeds your project listings. You can also create project categories, choose how your portfolio page will be displayed in the Settings Section (background color and fonts), choose how your thumbnails will be shown (1,2 or 3 thumbnails project per row, no thumbnails, horizontal, vertical or a list view) and set your project to be visible or hidden. In the “About” section, you can create your profile, add image profile, set your portfolio as “Available for Freelance” if you want to do some freelancing work, and add Tags for both your projects and Skills. Your portfolio will be published at anythingyouwant.carbonmade.com. Check out our simple portfolio HERE!

Overall, CarbonMade is a simple and powerful portfolio tool. Built extensively using Ajax, CarbonMade is fast and easy to use. There are currently two version of CarbonMade which you can choose from: The free version (or the “meh” version) which allows you to have up to 5 projects and 35 images, and the paid version (called the “Whoo!” - $12/month) which allows you to have up to 50 projects, 500 images and 10 videos. Pretty nice. If you want to publish your portfolio on the net, CarbonMade is the perfect place for you.

To signup for a CarbonMade account, you can click HERE!

Online chat has become more and more popular these days. With the many Instant Messaging (IM) software that we have today, chatting has become easier. Now how can we integrate that into our website? Chatting with our web visitors? Now that’s interesting. How can we make that work so that it’s convenient for us? Fortunately for us, there’s Plugoo.

Plugoo is a web2.0 embeddable flash online instant messaging widget. Plugoo allows you to have a direct chat from your Instant Messenger (IM) software (Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, AIM, GoogleTalk, Jabber or ICQ) with any visitor of your blog or personal website without having them install anything. All they have to do is use your Plugoo IM widget in your site. Signing up with Plugoo is very simple. Just choose any type of IM that you usually use, type in your Instant Messaging Account username, provide an email address (can be any email addresses), type in any password for your Plugoo account (not your IM password), and validate the email from your email account. You can then personalize your IM from your Plugoo account. You can change colors, title of your Plugoo, and visitors can choose your own nickname. A code will then be generated so you can use it to embed it in any site / account that you have. Try out our widget on the right!

Overall, Plugoo offers a unique and an easy way to get in touch with you from your blog or website. It’s cool to have a media to chat with your visitors, and even cooler doing so with the IM software you are using everyday. WorldTechLogic has posted several online chat service before, MeeboMe, AliTalk, Interaction, Snimmer, RadiusIM, Lingr, Zoho Chat, E-Buddy and Imeem, but only MeeboMe has the same embeddable capability of Plugoo. Most of the online chat mentioned above have cross IM capability, but no embeddable widget. However, compare to MeeboMe, Plugoo has the advantage of using the IM software that we’re already using, while MeeboMe doesn’t.

For its convenience and with its ability to chat with visitors from the IM software that we are already using, along with its embeddable widget, clearly, Plugoo is the best online chat widget we’ve seen so far.

Managing time for school work are sometimes difficult for students. “When is the time to study, and when is the time to play” is probably a basic question that most students found asking themselves. As if that isn’t enough, students sometimes miss homeworks, due dates, quizzes, etc because of they just can’t keep up with their scheduling. Now, those students are getting help from GradeFix.

GradeFix is a web2.0 time management application designed to help students manage their workload and do better in school. GradeFix organizes and prioritizes all of your homework so you are always on top of it. With GradeFix, you can add courses’ tasks (homeworks, quizzes, test or reading) and set the due dates for each one of them. GradeFix will then calculate your schedule for you, taking into account your various classes and deadlines. You can also set to your ideal study times by using the Schedule Adjustor box in the very bottom left using the + or – buttons or just type the time you want. If you feel that reading for 30 (or 180) minutes is ideal to you, you can set GradeFix to schedule for that. You can use the Search Filters box to select the date range of tasks, the class you want to see, and the type of task you want to view. You can also use the Filters to just see when tasks are due, by clicking the due box. To get reminder emails on your tasks, just click the email reminders box and choose how often you want to get them.

Overall, GradeFix offers a very simple way to manage your school work and time. GradeFix is currently available in two versions: The free version allows up to 10 tasks at a time, and the premium package allows unlimited scheduling for $5 per month (with 30-day trial). WorldTechLogic has posted several school work applications before, such as: Stu.dicio.us, MyNoteIT, ChalkSite, and NoteCentric. All four are similar with GradeFix, yet different in some ways. The similarity ends with the fact that all applications are targeted to students. In my opinion, however, note sharing (found in all four) and grade calculations / records (found in Stu.dicio.us, ChalkSite, and MyNoteIT) are as essential for students as school work time management which GradeFix might want to consider having. It would be nicer to have those features to know if we’re on the right track or not. Adding the features (especially the grade calculations / keeping feature) would probably increases GradeFix‘ popularity and usability. Anyway, that’s just my opinion. Nonetheless, it seems GradeFix has still a lot of catching up to do.

To signup for a GradeFix account, you can click HERE!