Yahoo launches Alpha search engine

"Taking a page from Google's Searchmash experiment, the Yahoo Alpha search engine provides neatly organized results from the web, Flickr, Yahoo Answers and other sources. Alpha generates a dynamic search-results page with modules that can expand or collapse."

Pretty interesting. Not sure how practical these mashed search sites are at this moment but if we were allowed personalize the layout maybe.. what's w/ these cryptic names though.. alpha (which is still in beta) and searchmash... they wanna keep it low-profile for whatever the reason, is that what they are trying to do?



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Hanami - Yoyogi Park

Hanami - Yoyogi Park
Originally uploaded by stonetako920.

Went to the Yoyogi Park today for a Hanami get together. Hanami, a Japanese tradition whose original purpose was to get together and "watch the blossoms" (literal translation) nowadays is more or less considered to be an excuse for people to publicly get drunk. As the cherry blossoms are only in bloom for only approximately a week, the Japanese media closely keeps track of when exactly people would be able to go to Hanami this time of the year and as soon as they make the "official announcement" of the arrival of the Hanami season, people would rush to the parks with tarps and alcohols.

There were lots of street performers and food/drink stands around the park. What I was surprised to see were DJ booths playing house/trance tunes for some outdoor dancing. It was fun.