I thought I had remembered Dogpile being classified as spyware, so I went on Pest Patrols website and sure enough......http://www.pestpatrol.com/Search/default.asp?qu=Dogpile&sc=%2FPestInfo%2F&Action=Go
You may want to re-think about using it. Oh and by the way, Alexa toolbar is spyware also. http://www.pestpatrol.com/zks/pestinfo/a/alexa_toolbar.asp

I've got google toolbar on my firefox, plus I have a little add-on called spoof-stick that gives a very clear heads-up as to where I am - its a little anti-phishing tool that's more visible to my wife than the status bar. (Its also available for IE)

http://www.corestreet.com/spoofstick/internet_explorer.html add it to your collection

OK here is the deal:

I ran SpyBot and it did seem to find allot of cookies from Dogpile, but didn't necessarily delete the Dogpile toolbar.

I checked it further and I think I will keep it for a little while and then dump it. Once I get all the RSS feeds out of it and into Blog Navigator I will be fine.

Speaking of RSS feeds, I am using this program called Pluck. It uses explorer to 'pluck' RSS feeds from around the net. Pretty nice. Found some sites that I wouldn't have thought of before having a RSS feed.

So now its a toss up between Pluck and Blog Navigator. Although with Blog navigator you can save the blog post on your hard drive.

Anyway, I think I have enough IE plug-ins... time to delete some.

Guess what? I got 1 more search thingy.

This thing called Viewpoint toolbar. Its pretty cool. Its has skins... wish you could make your own but... no spyware from what I see, powered by Yahoo and it give you a visual of websites you are looking for.


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I'll use dogpile for a web search now and then, but CoperNic Pro is my Toolbar Search tool...

Yeah, it would sem that Dogpile has some issues with being spyware, not sure about alexa but it comes up in spybot.

Viewpoint is cool, but I don't see me using it much, but it helps me clear out my favorites and dead links because I can view the site in the viewer.

Doesn't say anything about viewpoint. You know, with all these add-ons I only really run one program and that's Google.

I have to admit, I like Alexa and I use it once or twice a day.

Not to mention adblock, and the other 150 or so extensions you can add to Forefox or Mozilla proper.

As to that Yahoo Article, I tell ya I'd never trust a company that sells Gator, or had anything to do with Gator/Claria or whatever they call it now. ewallet software ..yeah right, and loan Sharks are financial Managers.

joetheblow you can do rss from Firefox as well, just install the extension and use the sidebar feature for them. EasyPaeasie. I also use the open in IE extension for those difficult links, that just will not work from Firefox. That's the only saving grace for me.

I can tell you that the Dogpile Toolbar is definately not spyware any any but the very broadest sense. I'm part of the team that developed that toolbar and spying on people was definately the farthest thing from our minds when we built it.

When we first released the toolbar there were some statements in the privacy policy that had been written by a lawyer who wanted to cover all the bases - making disclaimers about collecting logins, email addresses, web browsing, etc. I think it must have been some boilerplate text and most of it had nothing to do with what the toolbar actually did, but some sites assumed that we were collecting lots of personal stuff and flagged the toolbar as spyware. Once we were on one list, others just copied the list and it spread around.

Some of the sites objected to the fact that the Dogplie site (not the toolbar) collects basic webserver log information such as browser type, ip address, time, date, url requested. We use that kind of thing to count how popular our various services are. There is no personal information attached to any of that. Its also collected by most sites. Still some spyware sites brand that as "spyware" and we are lumped in with software that esentially takes over your computer.

The Dogpile toolbar does not serve ads. We worked hard on the popup blocker to reduce the number of ads our users have to deal with. The toolbar also does not hijack your browser. We do allow you to set your homepage, search page, and autosearch page, but that is only in response to explicit user choice and we don't block the user if they want to change those settings. The toolbar is also very easy to uninstall with an obvious "uninstall" link on the main men. We're not like software that you have to constantly fight to remove.

Sorry if I sound a little insistant. Its been difficult convincing the spyware removal sites to change their listings because it is in their interest to stir up concern and to appear to block a lot of 'bad software'. In most cases there aren't even any ways to contact them. We like our toolbar and don't want to see it get an undeserved reputation.

Thanks for letting me blow off a little steam.

I think the new version of FireFox has the RSS feed built in. I didn't install it yet because I didn't want to loose mmy profiles, favorites and most used links in the url text bar.

what about the profiles? did they stay? and the password manager?

Some of the sites objected to the fact that the Dogplie site (not the toolbar) collects basic webserver log information such as browser type, ip address, time, date, url requested. We use that kind of thing to count how popular our various services are.

Thats called data mining.
Alot of people don't like it.