1. Exceptional profits:  Usually the profits are large enough to get your interest but not sufficient to make you suspicious of them. 
2. Low risk and high return:  All investments involve some risk.  If a fraudster advertises "no-risk," this statement should be an immediate red flag that something is wrong with his/her sales pitch.  You should not invest if you don't know the risks because fraudsters don't honor money-back guarantees.
3. Urgency: Fraudsters usually offer a reason why you must invest as quickly as possible, such as delays may mean losses of big profits or that they're limiting the offer to just a few individuals. 
4. High-pressure tactics:  Fraudsters often act like they're doing you a favor by letting special buyers get in on their unique investment opportunity.

You should not be afraid to ask questions by sending a follow-up message.  If the original e-mail is valid, the person who sent it will be happy to post a public response to your inquiry.  The National Association of Securities Dealers provides investors educational information about trading, investor alerts, resources, and protection.

Acronyms
You have an IBM PC with a DASD,  DVD, CD-R/CD-RW drives, in addition to DIMM, plenty of DAM/RAM/SDRAM and the latest OS which still may be accessed with DOS/DPMI.  If these acronyms cause your head to spin, go to Computer Acronyms to learn their meanings.

Ad-aware
The best way to protect yourself from spy cookies is to install a bad-cookie catcher.  In addition you should double-check your Internet Explorer settings to make sure the most irritating cookies don't get through to your computer.  One effective cookie blocker is a product from Lavasoft called Ad-aware 6 Standard Edition. It's free for noncommercial use.  When at this site, go to the Software category on the far left side of the screen, and click Ad-aware.  In the Support category on the left, click Download.  Follow the instructions to download a copy of Ad-aware Standard.  Double-click the downloaded file, which is probably called aaw6.exe, and the installer takes you through the steps. When the installer is finished, double-click the Ad-aware icon that is automatically placed on the Window desktop and then click Check for Updates Now and Connect.  If there's a new reference file available, click OK, Finish.  Now wait while the reference file is updated. When you return to the main screen, click Scan Now and click the Settings button and Proceed.  When you return to the Preparing System Scan screen, click Next.  Ad-aware performs an in-depth scan.  When the scan is done, click Show Log File.  The Log File is your key to understanding what's been put on your system, probably without your knowledge or consent. Near the beginning of the file you’ll see Registry keys that advertisers have inserted on your machine.  Toward the end you will see a list of spy cookies (Ad-aware calls them "tracking cookies.").  Click Close to close the log file, and then click Next.  Ad-aware gives you a list of every bad cookie that it has been found on your computer. You can click the headings to sort by specific criteria. Unless you see something that obviously should be saved, check the box in front of each item and then click Next. Ad-aware deletes/quarantines all the items you've selected and then returns to the main screen.  Click the Close (X) button to leave Ad-aware.

Aerial View of Home
TerraFly is a dramatic example of how great technology can give you an aerial view of your home and the surrounding neighborhoods.   Fill in the yellow box with your address for an aerial view of your house.  You can zoom in/out for closer or more distant view of your home/neighborhood.  Microsoft TerraService for .NET Beta 2 Web site contains 3.3 terabytes of high resolution USGS (U.S. Geological Service) aerial imagery and (USGS) topographic maps at terraservice.net.  Again, you can locate imagery by clicking on the map, entering a city or town name in the "Search TerraServer" form at the top of the page, or entering a U.S. street address.

Anti-virus Software Free
If you can’t afford to pay for anti-virus software, checkout Anti-virus from Grisoft (AVG) at www.grisoft.com.  This software is free, can be downloaded from the Internet, and has a good reputation.

AOL PFC & Spell Check
If changing from your AOL Internet Service Provider to another one, there is a way to take with you your e-mail messages and Address Book.  AOL stores your e-mail and Address book in a propriety format in the PFC (Personal Filing Cabinet).  If you contact Password Crackers, a fee based service, it can convert AOL PFCs to a format that can be use outside of AOL.  If you don't trust your typing skills or want to embarrass yourself in AOL chat, right-click in the chat room's text field to run a quick spell check before sending that reply or to "colorize" your next line of text.

AutoComplete/Browser Erase
For those people who use a publicly accessible computer, you should remove the sites visited on the Internet. Your first concern should be the AutoComplete feature.  If you put a letter in the Address Box and got a list of previously accessed sites, AutoComplete was working on that computer. Unfortunately, you cannot delete these entries individually.  You have to delete all of them.  To do that, click Tools, Internet Options.  On the General tab, click Clear History. You can avoid this problem in the future by turning off AutoComplete when surfing the Internet.  Go to Internet Options and select the Content tab. Click AutoComplete and clear the Web Addresses box.  Next, you need to get rid of the temporary Internet files. These are pages you have visited while on the Web. These pages are saved so that when you go to them again they can be pulled from the hard drive. Remove them by clicking Delete Files.  Lastly, you can delete the cookies. Web sites download these small text files so they can identify you in the future.  If you delete them, you'll probably have to enter your passwords manually.  To eliminate the cookies, click Delete Cookies.  In Netscape, click Edit, Preferences. Select Navigator, History.  Clear History and Location Bar, and set Session History to 0. Then click Privacy & Security, Cookies.  Click Manage Stored Cookies, Remove All Cookies.  Finally, click Advanced, Cache, Clear Memory Cache, and Clear Disk Cache.

Automobile Online Deals
There are a number of web sites to help you either buy a car or obtain information pertaining to it.  If you’re indecisive over makes and models, a good place to start your research is with the JD Power Consumer Center site. This site bases its findings on consumer feedback and helps you to narrow your list of choices by price range, safety, style, fuel economy, etc.  You can then check out Consumer Report.  It provides objective car reviews and reliability ratings.  National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has crash ratings for autos.  CARFAX can verify a used vehicle’s ownership and damage history.  Now you might go to Edmunds.com to find a host of data on both new and used cars.  It has extensive reviews, prices to include the dealer invoice, sticker, and average price paid by buyers in your area.  Kelley Blue book determines a vehicle’s value and car reviews.   MSN Autos has information, such as finance, insurance, and warranties, about buying new or used cars.  If you need advice while repairing your vehicle or have questions about service facilities but don’t want to schedule an appointment with a technician, put your question on autos.tech.

Back Button
Have you ever visited a Web site and found that the browser's Back button was disabled by the webmaster?  Some Web sites disable your back button to keep you on their site. If this happens to you, right click on the back button. You'll see a list of pages that you have visited while on that site.  Click something on that list to move back to the previous page. This trick works for the Forward button, too.

Birthday Stats
If you’re wondering what happened on your birthday, check the information on the History Channel’s What Happened On Your Birthday .

Columbia Encyclopedia
This encyclopedia, which has claimed to be the most complete and up-to-date ever produced, consists of 51,000 entries, six and one-half million words on a vast range of topics, and with more than 80,000 hypertext cross-references.

Complaint/Compliment Letter
Now it's easy to write negative or positive feedback letters to a business with Planet Feedback at  <www.planetfeedback.com/consumer/>.  The site gathers information from you about your adverse or outstanding experience and puts together a business letter for your signature. You can then edit and send it out.  You can even have a copy sent to friends so they know what stores to avoid, patronize, or read other peoples’ experiences and comments online.

Computer Blue Book
Most people are familiar with the Kelley Blue Book because it tells you how much cars are worth.  However, there’s a Kelley Blue Book for computers, toys, watches, etc., at strongnumbers.com.  Enter the name of a product and find the "fair market price."  This number is based on millions of online transactions. You can search by product or browse by category.

eBay Auction
The length of time you will want to auction something on eBay depends on the time of year and the item for sale. If your item is one which may not be in high demand, you should run a seven-day auction.   On the other hand, if you have something in great demand, then choose a three-day auction.  Eager bidders tend to bid higher and more often to beat out their competition if everyone wants the item.  With auctions running 24 hours a day, 7 days a week, you should know when the most bidders are around to check out your wares.  For example, always run an auction over a weekend and or holiday.  The best times of day to start and end your auction is during eBay's peak hours of operation, which are 5 p.m. to 9 p.m. Pacific Time,      right after work on the West Coast.  If you're interested in selling on eBay, learn the basics first. They're clearly explained.

Family Tree
If developing your family tree, you may find the following site of use in those efforts.  At this site, you can type in a deceased person's name and read the obituary. It claims to be the world's largest repository of obituaries and death records, with more than 57 million individual entries.  Most of the information appears to be taken from Social Security records. You can search by hometown, too.

If you're connected to the Internet with a broadband service, or if you are thinking of getting it, get information. This site offers news, and tips & tricks concerning broadband Internet connections.