1. A system for assisting users with the selection of items on the Internet, comprising: one or more hardware processors; at least one web robot operable on the one or more hardware processors for crawling multiple websites to determine published userIDs and associated published preferences; a database accessible to the one or more hardware processors for storing the userIDs and associated preferences; software operable on the one or more hardware processors for performing an analysis and suggestion function; wherein the system initially assumes that a userID used by a first user on a first website represents the same user as the same userID used by a second user on a second website; wherein associated preferences stored for a particular userID include preferences for items available from a plurality of websites; wherein the system provides a third user with specific preference association information for a first item based on the expressed preferences of at least the first and second users across multiple websites relative to the first item and items that at least the first and second users have previously reviewed; and wherein the preference association information provided to the third user is based on both positive and negative preferences of the first and second users.