I volunteered to organize my family reunion in 2006. I need to research various web sites that offer suggestions of planning and organizing a family reunion. I performed my search using the key words “family reunions and “planning a family reunion.”

YAHOO -
I usually begin all of my searches with Yahoo. Initially, I did my search by simply typing the words family reunion. I got 9,480,000 hits. I went back and did an advanced search with the words “family reunion” being in any part of the part and the exact words “planning a family reunion” being in any page of the page and I wanted only pages in English and I got 23,600 hits. I compared the first 30 hits on both searches and the same web sites were listed. The first hit on both was family-reunion.com. I found that site to very useful to my needs. I furthered my search my using the terms family reunion and planning and I got 1,390,000 hits. I am thinking about having the reunion in Virginia Beach, Virginia. Finally, I did a search using “family reunion” and “planning” and “Virginia Beach”. There are got only 1,350 hits and none of them were helpful. In addition the sponsored links are on the right side of the page but none of them I found to be useful.

GOOGLE -
I used the search term family reunion and I received 6,600,000 which is about 3 million last than with Yahoo!. That is pretty interesting; the top hits were the same for both Google and Yahoo. I did an advanced search there were 8,850 hits I loved the Froogle search. I did a search for family reunion t-shirts and I got links too many different types of shirts that are available. Finally, I did a search using “family reunion” and “planning” and “Virginia Beach”. Only 6,100 hits. Google interface is a lot cleaner than Yahoo. The sponsored links are on the right side of the page, similar to Yahoo. Again, none were useful.

ASK JEEVES -
I asked the question, “How do I plan a family reunion?” I got 278,400 hits, The sponsored web results were listed first and none of them were useful. However, the web results were wonderful and very relevant to want I was looking for. The related topics on the left were also very helpful. I was very excited about that information I found using Ask Jeeves. Family-reunion.com was the first hit again. I was a little surprised that some of the earlier hits were links to sites about planning class reunions when I specifically asked the question about family reunions. Also, several of the links were sites that are invalid or the pages had expired. Finally, I looked at some of the other hits and some websites that I felt contained useful information that listed 25 and beyond.

JUX2 -
I chose this search engine since my subject matter is pretty broad. I used the keywords “family reunions.” This search engine searched simultaneously Google, Yahoo and Ask Jeeves and it delayed the overlaps for the search. The one result that was common for all three search engines was family-reunion.com. It also states the number where the site appears on the three other search engines. I think that option tremendously cuts down a lot of multiple searches on different search engines especially if you use Yahoo and Google. I even went back and did a search on “planning a family reunion” and this time I clicked on “What am I missing?” This search lead me to unique web sites that were on Yahoo that not in Google and subsequently, it did the same for site that were from Ask Jeeves and not in Google or Yahoo. I love this site.

ZAPMETA -
I searched for “family reunions” and “planning a family reunion.” Both searches pretty much led me to the same web sites. Family-reunion.com was the top pick. This search engine is very unique because you can take a quick view of the web site while not closing your search page. If you like the page, you have the option to maximize the page or book mark it. Very cool. You can also, view a snapshot of the web site during your search.

ANALYSIS OF SEARCHES -
I pretty much used the same search terms for all of my searches. Since my subject is very broad and general, at times, I had to go back and do advanced searches so cut down on the numbers of hits I received. Ask Jeeves was the only time I asked a direct question and I received many common websites. Yahoo was the only search engine that had a unique interface. The other search engines looked like Google. However, I use a great deal of Yahoo! other services such as Yahoo Mail, Music and Yahoo Messenger so I love having all of those features at my finger tips and I don’t find these features to interfere or distract me from performing my search. Google is nice. I really like the feature, Froogle because I shop frequently on the web. Ask Jeeves was okay. I probably would not use this web site to perform my only search because too many of the hits were not related to planning a family reunion but planning class reunions and books written on the subject on reunion planning. Nonetheless, the related topics that are listed I thought they are invaluable when it comes to organizing or planning an event. I would definitely use those resources when the time comes to plan the actual reunion. JUX2 is definitely a search engine that I will use over and over. JUX2 allows you to see more relevant sites on the web. You also save time and get much better search results because I can still search my favorite engine, Yahoo and my back up search engine, Google at the same time. Finally, the search engine I used was ZAPMETA. Zapmeta also allows you to search simultaneously search multiple search engines under one interface. Again, this feature allows users to save time and effort from having to individually visit multiple search engines. As aforementioned, I also found the feature very useful to be able to quickly take a view of the website without having to go back to the search results. Overall, I was delighted with the searches and I was able to find new and different methods to search the web for information of importance to me. Not only did I receive confirmation that I really like Yahoo but I also learned not to limit myself to one search engine.