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The worst of Craigslist

If anyone were to give you a horse, would you peer all the way past its teeth to check for, I don't know, human heads?

I only ask because a site called ItemNotAsDescribed.com (tagline: Free is a Four-Letter Word) has dedicated itself to examining some of the free offers on Craigslist. Specifically, the site exists to expose the worst of the free in the Land of the Free.

For example, from Tucson's Craigslist come some book shelves, which have seen better days but clearly can't remember them. The ad for the shelves declares: "in the … Read more

eBay auction upgrader

AlienFiles wants to help users improve the image of their eBay auctions. With a simple set of tools, users can make their pages look more professional.

This program lets users make a new listing with a simple white and gray page that is lined with tabs for all of the customization options your eBay auction needs. All you do is enter the auction description and standard information into a traditional word processing screen. Images are then easily added with a simple screen that uses a file tree to help download photos. AlienFiles really comes together with its tab for creating … Read more

Clear duplicate files from Outlook the free and easy way

Sometimes I wish I was one of those people who manages to keep their e-mail inbox empty by assigning the messages they need to keep appropriately named folders and deleting the mail they don't need.

Most of my inboxes have thousands of entries dating back years. And since I've combined my ISP's POP mail account with my Gmail account, the inbox-overflow problem has gotten out of hand.

Rather than spending half a day manually removing the duplicates, I installed Vaita's free Outlook Duplicate Items Remover. The program places an "ODIR" entry on Outlook's … Read more

Customize your list of recent documents in XP and Vista

Windows XP's Documents list (a.k.a. "My Recent Documents") and Vista's Recent Items are useful Start menu shortcuts that I'm always forgetting about.

Yesterday I described how to change the number of recently opened files that appear in Microsoft Office 2003 and 2007. But it's even quicker to reopen a file you've worked on recently and its application with a single click of the file's shortcut on the Start menu.

If you don't see My Recent Documents on XP's Start menu, right-click the Start button and choose Properties. Click … Read more

Which fast-growing NYC start-up is getting some googly love?

Peter Kafka at Silicon Alley Insider has started a little guessing game: which anonymous New York tech start-up is getting backed by influential ex-Googler Chris Sacca, who left his job as head of special initiatives to become an angel investor?

On Sunday, Sacca wrote on his blog that he's looking for a "Web geek" for an "edgy little content company" based in Gotham, which "needs its first full-time tech lead."

This is a big deal, because powerful ex-Google executive muscle would mean both great press and deep-pocketed connections for the start-up in question. … Read more