Wikipedia

Let me tell you, one of the best things the wwweb has going for it is Wikipedia. I guess it started getting big back when I was in school, and it was bashed a lot for being inaccurate and unreliable. As far as purely academic standards go, I think that's a good rule of thumb, but it works wonders for any other situation.
I was perusing through the Wikipedia standards of conduct, and I must say it's pretty extensive; I was sure surprised. Let's say you add a new page, or edit another that's already been made--all of that gets logged in a companion 'history' page, along with your IP address and login name, and it goes through several robotic tests just to make sure you didn't do anything dumb. But, of course, it takes another person who knows what they're talking about to come along to dispute what you've said. Now with the large number of Wikipedia crew, as well as non-paid devotees, they're very quick to point out if your edits need sources or if it falls short of the standards--there's even a rating method for how well-researched pages are.
So, not very good for writing papers, but absolutely excellent for 'information on demand' type queries. Lets say, you hear something about Don LaFontaine passing away (we'll miss you bro), and you want to find out more. I guarantee there's going to be an absolute smorgasbord of information there, and depending on how important the rest of the world considers that topic, you'll have pretty recent information.
So if you've been living under a rock that doesn't have wi-fi, go to Panera or something with ye olde laptop and look something obscure up--chances are you won't be disappointed. If you are, just edit it!