I'm thinking of getting a new homepage. For years--really, ever since I started using the Internet--my homepage has been good old Yahoo! (don't you love company names that require you to include crazy punctuation or capitalization?). I got an account with Yahoo! Mail in 1997 and I always figured Yahoo! was the best homepage portal for me, so I could readily a) perform a web search on the search engine, or b) click on the Mail icon to check my mail.

All that has changed now, thanks to the cyber-behemoth that is Google (which, although it doesn't include crazy punctuation, is--I believe--based on the number represented by 1 with 100 zeroes after it. That number is called "googol." The company has spelled it wrong. Of course, maybe they're not trying to say "Look at the gigantic NUMBER of search results we produce!" but rather "LOOK at the gigantic number of search results we produce!" You know, look with "googly-eyes" or something. I don't know. All I know is "google" isn't a word. At least "yahoo" is a word.). First, there's a fabulous new gizmo called the Google Toolbar, which everyone should get. It's just a nice little toolbar that sits at the top of your browser and allows you to Google something at any time, no matter what page you're looking at. No more need to go to Google.com, or for that matter, Yahoo.com to perform a search. Plus, it blocks pop-up ads! Secondly, I got G-mail, which is infinitely cooler than Yahoo! Mail, as it's more logically organized and about a googol times bigger (contact me at "mattastle-at-gmail-dot-com" if you want a G-mail account; I have a couple to give out).

All that is to say: I never ever do anything on Yahoo! anymore when I open my browser and see it. Occasionally, I'll look at the news headlines on the side and click one of them. But I get most of my news from other sources. I don't need Yahoo! as my homepage anymore.

So I need suggestions on what a good new homepage would be. What do I need to look at every time I open my browser? I don't really want to just set it to one of the sites I end up looking at every day, because sometimes I want to pick and choose the order I look at them in, or if I'm trying to do serious work and don't want distractions, it wouldn't be a good idea to have espn.com/nba popping up to tempt me.

I've thought about some sort of "aggregator" (I learned that term in school yesterday)--something like My Yahoo! that pulls up news and columns and features that are specific to my individual interests. I've never tried anything like that. Have you? What's the best way to go? What do you guys use for homepages? Please use the comments feature to start a long, drawn-out debate string.

And thanks a googol for your advice.