A Solution for if Google is Creeping You Out (And if it Isn't, Why it Should Be)

My homepage and default search engine is now Duck Duck Go. Unlike Google, it makes it a selling point that it doesn't track your searches, or "bubble" you - and if you aren't concerned with those things then you should click on the "track" and "bubble" links on the main page for a very clear explanation (it's even worse than the concerns I express in my old entry on web privacy)

https://duckduckgo.com/

I've been using it for about a week now, and for pure search the results are at least 80% as good as Google's - it almost always gives me what I'm looking for in the first few results. It doesn't have as slickly dovetailed features as Google, especially the integration of Google image, news, etc, but there's a search syntax that makes it easy to conduct the same search on Google. And it has a couple of nifty touches of its own.

I feel more at ease knowing that my searches during this period are not contributing to the giant database of intimate knowledge Google has assembled about me. Of course I have no independent confirmation of the claims that Duck Duck Go makes for its privacy measures, but I find the slight homemade quality of the site and the earnestness of their privacy essays encouraging on that front. And at least we now have a way as consumers to say to Google, "being creepy will cost you hits."

Freedom from Internet Self-Distraction

If you have a mac, and struggle with internet self-distraction like I do
("I just don't think I can write another word until I find out what
Phoebe Cates has been up to lately") there's a beautifully simple
application that might help you called Freedom. It blocks your
computer's internet connectivity until a predetermined number of minutes
has passed, or you restart - which is nice as a barrier high enough to
stop me cheating, but low enough enough that I'm not terribly
inconvenienced in an emergency.
http://macfreedom.com/
For some reason the idea of becoming too dependent on it makes me uneasy
(shouldn't I learn some self-control eventually?) but used like
caffeine, as some extra mojo to power through something once in a while,
it's awesome.