I know we can all feel overwhelmed by how many problems there are in the world and how we can best work to help on our busy schedules, but here's three websites that you can help without leaving your computer or sending any money to ever-questionable charities. I encourage everyone to check these out and spread the word. It may not be an end, as they say, but it's a huge start!

1. Blackle!
As the huge Google corporation is counting on, most of you may not be aware how much electricity and browser space is used up needlessly on internet searches every minute. I just recently became aware that it takes an enormous amount of excess energy to power a white screen than a black one, and in the case of Google, every frivilous little term that is searched has to go through their mega-servers which are set up in addition to average internet routes. Heap Media has finally constructed an alternate site that uses the same custom search while alleviating both those unnecessary problems. Don't keep Googling, start Blackling! {www.blackle.com}

2. The Hunger Site
This is actually almost like five sites in one: the Hunger Site, the Breast Cancer Site, the Pet Rescue Site, the Child Literacy Site, and the Rainforest Site. All of these sites are completely free and funded by artistic and humanitarian advertisers. All you have to do is click once a day (they'll allow you to repeat it again, but only one click per IP address will be counted until the next midnight) on their big button and their advertisers will sponsor almost two cups of food (or .6 bowls of food for rescue pets, or 11.6 square feet of rainforest, etc). It takes about 20 seconds to go through all five and you'll know you made a big difference. You can also always see the previous day's results to make sure.
{www.thehungersite.com}

3. Free Rice
This fun site is funded by advertisers and carried out by the UN Food Program. You can build up vocab while donating rice to starving families around the world. For every word correctly defined, the Food Program allows 20 more grains of rice into their collection to donate. There's no penalty for wrong words and you can keep playing as long as you want, easily donating upwards of 500 grains of rice or so per hour. As their FAQ's point out, it's beneficial for both you in learning new words and for the families for food relief. The rice is really rationed out, not stockpiled, so your correct answers really do increase dramatically the amount of rice sent out and you can see a the representation of bowl filling up as you go. {www.freerice.com}