So you need to find out about something? You've heard the internet is a great place for research or to look for information, but how do you go about it? It's so confusing ... not because there is too little information, but because there is a completely overwhelming amount of data to be found.

I typically start my searches from the best search engine on the internet - Google. The advantage of Google is it easily has the largest index of all of the search engines. This advantage is also it's primary  disadvantage - there is so much data to be found that it can be a daunting experience.

Other good general search engines are Altavista, Excite, Google, Northern Lights, Hotbot and Lycos. When looking for something it is always a good idea to try each of the general search engines as they can return some excellent matches.

One fact to remember when searching is you can improve your odds by using search expressions, enclosing phrases in quotes, using plural or singular (clown verses clowns), and synonyms and so forth. You can also expand your search if it is too narrow. For example, if clowns does not give you what you want you can look for circuses or comedy acts.

Once you've used up the major search engines, be sure and look at Yahoo and DMOZ. These are the two major internet directories and they will often return good results. The difference between a search engine and a directory is simple: search engines are maintained by special software called robots and directories are maintained by humans.

Now you might narrow your focus a bit and look in more specific, smaller search engines. Simply set your browser to the Yahoo Search Engine page and the DMOZ search engine page. These will present you with a list of some of the smaller, but still very useful, search engines.

Don't forget about AskJeeves - this is one of the very best places to search for information. The really cool thing about this site is you can enter English-language queries like "where can I find clown outlook stationary?" or "How old is heather locklear?". The site will give you a list of matches which might answer your question.

Okay, if you still cannot find what you want you can try asking some real human beings by surfing to Ask.Com. Here you simply enter your question. A few hours or days later, someone may return the answer to you. It's slower than the search engines and directories, but it often yields better results. This works best for questions which have specific answers, such as "Why is the ocean blue?"

Don't forget about the encyclopedias. The best and largest is, of course, the Britannica, but there are many others. Check out Yahoo's encyclopedia page for a reasonably good listing. DMOZ also has a good reference page which may be useful to you.

One of the absolute best places to look for information is the web site of a university. As usual, Yahoo has a great list of the universities available in the United States.

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