If you live in America, it’s hard to imagine what it’s like to still favor Yahoo over Google. Over the recent years, Google has evolved from a search engine service to providing free email, navigation, maps, operating systems, image hosting, social networks…you get the picture. The technology that Google has created is, for the most part, beneficial to human kind, though some question the comapny’s practices of privacy and security.

Case in point, the residents of Japan weren’t very fond of Google’s Street View vehicles prowling their streets, snapping up photos and peeking into their homes. But now Google has found a more beneficial way of utilizing their Street View vehicles, aiding in Japan’s recovery efforts after their disastrous earthquake and tsunami.

Google has repurposed its Street View vehicles in Japan to help document the damage done and the reconstruction efforts that are being made to rebuild the devastated areas. And even though there are still plenty of skeptics on why Google is doing what they’re doing in Japan, there’s no denying that they’ve used the technologies they’ve developed to lend a huge hand in Japan’s recovery efforts.

[Source: PC World]

Should you change your oil yourself or head to your local Jiffy Lube to get it done? According to Yahoo and CouponSherpa, changing your car’s oil yourself isn’t worth it.

In CouponSherpa’s latest list of 20 Things it’s Cheaper to Buy than DIY, changing the oil in your car makes it to #15. They say “Even my most mechanically inclined friend goes to a quick-lube joint these days because he doesn’t know what to do with the used oil.”

Yahoo goes on to say about DIY oil changes: For the inexperienced, changing your oil is not only physically difficult – especially without ramps and other equipment – but also environmentally unfriendly. (Do you know how to recycle your oil? We thought not.) “That’s the biggest problem,” says Kate Forgach, an editor with CouponSherpa.  “Many cities and counties don’t allow consumers to dispose used oil down sewers or in the trash, as we did in the past. The oil now must be brought to recycling centers or city dumps, where consumers are often charged to leave it.” It’s a hidden cost many of us may not understand up front. There’s also the issue of time and possible frustration. “Most people also don’t want to hassle with accumulating enough oil to make the trip and expense worthwhile. Unless you have multiple vehicles and are a real do-it-yourselfer, it’s just easier to leave the entire mess to a quick-lube center,” says Forgach.”

What do you think? Is it as waste of time to change the oil in your car yourself and it’s much easier to just drop it off at the shop? Or is it worth the money saved to do it yourself – if you know what you’re doing? Let us know in the comment section below.

[Source: Edmunds Inside Line]

Back in 2004 Oprah Winfrey gave away 276 Pontiac G6s to her audience members. And like all things Oprah touches, it turned to gold – gold for Pontiac and General Motors anyway. Popularity of the car shot up overnight and now Volkswagen is hoping for a repeat performance as Oprah will reportedly give away two Routan minivans on an upcoming show.

While a Volkswagen model, the Routan is actually a Dodge Caravan/Chrysler Town & Country underneath and is built in North America at Chrysler’s Windsor, Ontario plant in Canada.

Routan sales haven’t been strong for Volkswagen as it struggles for market share in a segment that is seemingly past its prime and filled with strong and established competitors from Toyota and Honda – not to mention from Chrysler with its own version of the same vehicle.

In such a well-established vehicle segment, the Routan’s biggest problem seems to be awareness, but that will all change after millions of Americans hear Oprah say that word: Routan. Awareness for the Pontiac G6 reached 87 percent after the 2004 Oprah giveaway. The Pontiac G6 also because an immediate top search item on both Google and Yahoo. GM even said that unique visitors to the Pontiac website were six times the average in the weeks after that famous Oprah show.

Luckily for Volkswagen, meeting the surge in demand won’t be a problem as Chrysler jut announced it would not shutter its Windsor assembly plant, which had previously been on the chopping block.

[Source: Wards]