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| Librarians love it when you have a question which can be answered in many different reference books. But if the question is rare, it could take a long, long while find the rare answer. AltaVista works the other way around. If something is extremely rare, you can find it right away. If it is more common, then you get so many results that you have to work a bit to make sure that the ones that are most important to you appear near the top of the list. |
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| If the first name or the last name of your friend is extremely rare, just type in that name. |
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| Maybe the first name or last name alone isn't unusual, but the combination is rare. For instance, Ian Gonzales. Then type the whole name in and put quotation marks around it. |
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| If your friend has a very rare nickname and is often referred to that way, try that nickname alone. If that doesn't work, then try the nickname-last name combination with quotation marks around it. |
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