E-News to Go

Federal chat. The U.S. General Services Administration has launched GovGab.gov, a new blog designed to improve access to government information and services. Daily posts will cover a wide range of topics from, "What to do when an airline loses your luggage," to, "How to submit a recipe to the Library of Congress cookbook."

Blogging for a cause. Bloggers big and small challenged their readers on Oct. 1 to fund classroom projects in high-need public schools. Google, Yahoo!, Six Apart, and Federated Media will give awards to the bloggers who inspired the most generosity between now and the end of the month. DonorsChoose.org, a nonprofit site where teachers post projects to fulfill student needs, and donors from all walks of life can choose the projects they want to support, was behind the campaign. At DonorsChoose, bloggers created challenge pages listing their favorite classroom projects and urging their blog readers to donate to those projects. The blogs Engadget and TechCrunch have set up challenge pages featuring technology requests such as "Teaching Literacy Through Podcasts" ($390) and "Laptop For Learning" ($925).

Shopping buddy.Online shopping service Mpire today introduced WidgetBucks, a new e-commerce advertising network. Using a technology dubbed MerchSense, WidgetBucks (http://widgetbucks.com) displays contextual shopping widgets in publishers' advertising space. According to the Seattle-based company, over 2,000 publishers and partners, including InfoSpace, RockYou, SixApart, Whateverlife, BuddyTV, WidgetBox and ePage, as well as content partners eBay and Shopping.com, have beta tested the network.