The Lab archives the web sites of the week for your necrophiliac enjoyment. 

In the year 2009...

August 22, 2009:

http://thedailywtf.com

Dedicated to "Curious Perversions in Information Technology"

August 15, 2009:

http://crappytaxidermy.com

nuf said. Thanks to David H.

August 8, 2009:

http://osalt.com

If you're looking for a free, open source version of a commercial software package you can't afford or don't want to pay for, just type in the name of the commercial software, and they'll offer up a list of open source alternatives you can download and use for free. However, I need to note that while many of the alternatives are cross-platform apps, you may want to have access to a Linux box to take full advantage of the offerings. Just saying.

August 1, 2009:

http://www.turbulence.org

Back by bucks from the Andy Warhol Foundation and other deep art pockets, Turbulence has been commisioning and supporting net art for the last 13 years, with an evolving emphasis towards hybrid networked art forms. Check out any of the 160 projects they've supported so far in the archives.

July 25, 2009:

http://hashtags.org

Another great way to take advantage of those Twitter tweets. Hash tags serve as a great way to index stuff, so Hashtags shows you the latest trends in Twitterland. It even helps locate breaking news around the world faster than any news site. Thweet!

July 18, 2009:

http://weburbanist.com

From urban design to subversive art to some truly strange architecture, it's the Weburbanist! However, I do think they could maybe cut down on the ads a little... sheeez, it's slowing down the load of sweet sweet content.

July 11, 2009:

http://www.larrycarlson.com

G4 calls Larry Carlson the Salvadore Dali of the 21st Century. I don't know about that, but definitely the trippiest site I've encounterd in a long, long time.

July 4, 2009:

http://processing.org

Probably should have something more bombastic for the Fourth... this one's pretty nerdy.... but hey, you can definitely use it to make your own virtual fireworks!

Processing is a free, open source programming language that was born out of brains at MIT's Media Lab that wanted to create a tool to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context and to serve as a software sketchbook and professional production tool. It can be used by people who want to program images, animation, and interactions and can be used by anybody for learning, prototyping, and production.

If you want to see projects the community is sharing, go to the sister site:

http://www.openprocessing.org/

And here's some fireworks.

June 27, 2009:

http://atlasobscura.com

This quote from the site pretty much says it all - "The Atlas Obscura is a collaborative project with the goal of cataloging all of the singular, eccentric, bizarre, fantastical, and strange out-of-the-way places that get left out of traditional travel guidebooks and are ignored by the average tourist. If you're looking for miniature cities, glass flowers, books bound in human skin, gigantic flaming holes in the ground, phallological museums, bone churches, balancing pagodas, or homes built entirely out of paper, the Atlas Obscura is where you'll find them." Thanks to Lisa B for submitting this truly wondrous site!

June 20, 2009:

http://vvvv.org

VVVV is a toolkit for manipulating video in realtime, interactive installations, and lately, lots of motion graphics for commercials and designs for magazine covers. You visually program in it by connecing pre-existing nodes together to create pretty much whatever you want. I found the interface kind of primitive and confusing, but got used to it fast and there's tutorials that help, plus the sheer power of this tool held my attention. I know, this ain't everybody's cup of tea, but I like it, and dammit that's what matters! Plus, there's plenty of pretty pictures and videos to look at if you're not into the programming part.

June 13, 2009:

http://www.f295.org

A site full of photo freaks doing 21st century photography. What the hell is 21st century photography? The site describes it as "a vision driven form of photography which freely combines historic methods, alternative processes, and adaptive techniques to create something new." What that gets you is freaks processing pinhole photographs with Folgers coffee and other wacky mashups of that ilk.

June 6, 2009:

http://wordsmith.org/anagram

Here's a lovely time waster... The Internet Anagram Server! Say you want a new nom de plume for yourself, but you want it made out of your real name's letters. Instead of wracking your brain for hours, let the Internet Anagram Server do it all for you in seconds. For instance, my new alias is Modal Diode. Cool, huh? Jeff could be Chef Fjord En! Taylor Dear could have Lady Rat Roe! Too bad it doesn't work for some names, like Chuck Mertz, which returns... nothing! However Charles Mertz does get you...Charm Seltzer!

May 30, 2009:

http://www.preview-online.com

They probably should've called this site "trailers-online" ...maybe they were afraid that too many truckers might get confused. I dunno. Whatever. If you wanna watch the latest trailers / "previews' without an actual trip to your local movie theatre, go here. It's all the visual-aural hype without the stench of popcorn!

May 23, 2009:

http://www.oneriot.com

Here's another one of those sites taking advantage of data flowing out of Twitter and similar services, and actually making use of it. This time as a realtime search engine. Here's a quote from the site: "OneRiot crawls the links people share on Twitter, Digg and other social sharing services, then indexes the content on those pages in seconds. The end result is a search experience that allows users to find the freshest, most socially-relevant content from across the realtime web."

May 16, 2009:

http://gearwire.com

The ultimate site for music gear geeks. A quote from the site: "Since 2005, Gearwire.com is the musician's daily source of gear news, how-to videos, product walkthroughs, artist interviews, and anything else related to music gear and its uses. Whether you are in a touring band, a home studio user, or working in any part of the music industry, there's something for you each day at Gearwire.com."

May 9, 2009:

http://oddmusic.com

From the site: "Showcasing unusual musical creations and sounds of unique artists and artisans from around the globe... Odd music is home to unique, odd, ethnic, experimental and unusual musical instruments and resources." One of my favs is the crazyass Bubble Organ. This site's been around since 1999! ...as long as I've been doing this gig. Proof that the interwebs is bottomless.

May 2, 2009:

http://www.woostercollective.com

Great street-art spot. A quote from the site: "This site is dedicated to showcasing and celebrating ephemeral art placed on streets in cities around the world."

April 25, 2009:

http://www.viceland.com

The online home of a magazine that's far too cool for me. They had me at their posting about Tarantula Hill's new Free Public Esoteric Library that just opened right here in Balmur.

April 18, 2009:

http://twitterfall.com

Even if you think there is absolutely no value in Twitter or tweeting, you still may want to check out Twitterfall. Using Twitter's open API, Twitterfall allows a user to type in custom search queries to filter and search for the latest trends or breaking news stories streaming realtime out of the twittersphere. But beware... it can also quickly become somewhat addictive, and leave you feeling you have your hand on the pulse of the interwebs.

April 11, 2009:

http://popsci.com

Not your daddy's Popular Science Magazine. This online version is actually relevant, useful and entertaining.

April 4, 2009:

http://programmableweb.com

For all your Web 2.0 mashable needs.

March 28, 2009:

http://www.alternativephotography.com

Got this up a little late due to my attendance at the Smithsonian Kite Fest, but here it is now! A great place to learn about the many alternative means of producing photograhic imagery, including making photographic images from flowers, known as the Anthotype process. Thanks again, Matt for this one.

March 21, 2009:

http://media-convert.com

Your free, one-stop file conversion spot. Translate files to whatever format you need right there online... no software download required! That is, if you ever find the actual tool amid the miasma of distracting ads. But hey, it is free, and its huge collection of file conversion options for video, audio, text, data, and compression file formats totally makes it worth all the advertising clutter. It was recently the only place I could find anywhere that could correctly convert a particularly problematic video from my ATT craphone. So, it gets my vote.

March 14, 2009:

http://www.langorigami.com

March 7, 2009:

http://doublenegative.tarasen.net

February 28, 2009:

http://carbolicsmoke.com

February 21, 2009:

http://www.jandrewedits.com

February 14, 2009:

http://deviantart.com

February 7, 2009:

http://www.emvelope.com

Jan 31, 2009:

http://www.theyrule.net

Jan 24, 2009:

http://toxel.com

A site guaranteed ...well, not literally... more like highly likely... to fulfill all your tech and design fetish needs, even if it is a tad too cute for its own good!

Jan 17, 2009:

http://opacity.us

A sort of companion to the late Seth Thomas' great Ruins of Detroit site, Opacity offers up some truly striking photographs of other urban ruins from around the globe. Thanks to Matt and Sue in Charm City for the tip!

Jan 10, 2009:

http://profilactic.com

Ready or not, welcome to lifestreaming! If you and your friends are living your online lives splayed across multiple social networks and Web 2.0 services, this little handy dandy profile aggreagator may just be your cup-o-tea.

Jan 3, 2009:

http://www.digsby.com

In 2009 it's "aggregate man, aggregate". Get all your IMs at one mashed-up spot!

In the year 2008...

Dec 27, 2008:

http://www.readwriteweb.com

A deserving web-tech news blog whose time has finally come.

Dec 20, 2008:

http://callforcreativity.com

An interesting beta site that esentially acts as a social network for artists, but also encourages collaboration between individual artists as well as between artistic organizations, which you can create and manage. Looks prominsing!

Dec 13, 2008:

http://www.urlfan.com

So, what's your popularity in WebTwoPointOhLand? URLfan is a indexing service that ranks your website based on the number of blog/RSS references measured at a given point in time. So instead of the metrics being based on visits or page hits, the data is essentially a popularity guage of your site amongst all those opinion makers and "super influencers" out there in the big old blogosphere.

Dec 6, 2008:

http://keepvid.com

Well, it's that time again kids... video utility time!! Afraid your favorite video on YouTube is about to disappear due to some silly copyright infringement? Apparently, some of you are. I've been asked lately what's a good way to download videos from sites like YouTube or Google Video on to their local hard drive... and this is what I tell them. Simple, multiple format options and it's free. What the Hell else do you want?

Nov 29, 2008:

http://www.evilmadscientist.com

An entertaining geek site that made the big time recently with it's holiday "Apple apple pie" offering, which really impressed me when I learned the lattice on the pie was cut with a 45 watt carbon-dioxide laser.

Nov 22, 2008:

http://dailycostume.com/

In these troubled times, the escape hatch.

Nov 15, 2008:

http://www.metaefficient.com

It's apparently a one person shop, but still a very impressive collection of news and info on efficient (read green) technologies.

Nov 8, 2008:

http://www.diviantart.com

Allegedly the world's largest online art community. It is definitely a great online community resource for artists. And some awesome art too amongst the to be expected but not overwhelmingly large amount of drek.

Nov 1, 2008:

http://www.blotterbarn.com

A fine collection of vintage blotter acid art. Too bad the prints for purchase aren't, uh...you know, "treated".

October 25, 2008:

http://hubblesite.org

Another past Webby winner, this month the online home of the Hubble Space Telescope is celebrating 10 years of the most amazing science and beauty imaginable in the Universe... And after the recent recovery from a nearly catastrophic glitch a few days ago and the upcoming Service Mission 4, we can look forward to celebrating a few more b-days with the Hub!

On an unrelated note... did you hear that Scotch tape emits x-rays and may lead to nuclear fusion??!??!

October 18, 2008:

http://www.spacetimetravel.org

Hey, they deserve it just for the name... Relativity visualized by some nice Germans.

October 11, 2008:

http://www.draganfly.com

The age of the personal UAV has arrived my friends, and I for one would like to to welcome our new tiny overflying overlords. Why should the military and CIA have all the fun? There's a growing community of users and manufacturers out there, and Dragonflyer.com is the home to some of the hottest examples of tiny autonomous fixed wing and rotor-driven aircraft around.. at least commercially available. I like the X6 copter platform with the stabalized video cam. And MIT has even partnered with them to explore intelligent swarms of these babies. No online pricelist... so obviously big bucks ...still, I will have one.

October 4, 2008:

http://uncyclopedia.org

Think Wikipedia meets The Onion... plus some sort of British Bullwinkle.

September 27, 2008:

http://www.dezeen.com

A truly great industrial design and architecture blog. The current feature on Chrysler's Peapod electric car is worth the price of admission.

September 20, 2008:

http://www.searchme.com

A visual search engine, Search Me is a totally different way to view searh hits. It's been compared to the CoverFlow view in iTunes. You type in a search term and you're presented with a of stream of website snapshots of the search hits, that you can flip through... It sort of feels like shopping for vinyl, so I approve.

September 13, 2008:

http://www.the-amazing.com

Nice collection of pretty amazing photos. The current collection of oddities at Google Maps is worth the trip.

September 6, 2008:

http://www.damninteresting.com

A very appropriate website name for This Is Hell, DamnInteresting is a great collection of science and science history articles on the types of wackiness us hellions relish, you know the kind... Tesla's failed (or foiled) plan for free energy for the entire planet involving giant Death Ray towers, tiny extremeophiles being used to clean up a giant pit of toxic waste, or the nearly forgotten story about the first subway system in 1870 Manhatten, that used giant underground pnumatic tubes that could move people at a theoretical rate of over 700 mph. That kind of stuff.

August 30, 2008:

http://io9.com

My favorite new hilarious snarky sci-fi blog.

August 23, 2008:

http://www.scirus.com

Past winner of multiple Webby Awards, Scirus (pronounced Cyrus... I think) is the most comprehensive science-specific search engine on the Internet. Scirus kicks general search engines... like Google's, arse.

August 16, 2008:

http://mydamnchannel.com

They've been accused of being a rip of funnyordie.com, which is kinda true, except here all the shared content is produced by professionals and known artists, so they're usually funnier... and the name definitely reflects the TIH zeitgeist. Check out "You Suck at Photoshop", and the hilarious send up of virtual worlds, "Sn4tchbuckl3r's Second Chance".

August 9, 2008:

http://galaxyzoo.org

Use your delicious brains to help scientists do what no computer can do today - sort through millions of sometime stunningly beuatiful astonomical images from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and help classify them. Maybe you'll even discover something unique and they'll name it after you like "Hanny’s Voorwerp"

August 2, 2008:

http://pot.tv

One of those URLs that's pretty self-explanatory. Think YouTube for stoners, and you are there my friend. And although some of it is actually informative, cringe-filled hilarity abounds. Be sure to catch at least a tiny portion of an episode of "Harry Pothead and the Marijuana Stone"... wow man. Or perhaps the Jodie, Marc and Tommy Chong show. Those kooky potheads!

July 26, 2008:

http://scroogle.org/

From the site: "Since 2000, Google has recorded your search terms, the date-time of each search, the globally-unique ID in your cookie (it expires in 2038), and your IP address. This information is available to governments on request."

Created by an ex-Google employee and owned and operated by Public Information Research, Inc., a nonprofit corporation that also operates Google Watch, it supplies you with an ad-free Google search and masks your identity to boot, and maybe now you understand why you might want that.

July 19, 2008:

Big thanks to TIH irregular correspondent Kevin Harris for this one. A great new beta site (even if it's play thing of ex-AOL execs like Steve Case) that's offering hundreds full length docummentaries like "Super Size Me" for free. And no registration... for now. And they make it easy for you to spread 'em around and plop them on your own social network of choice homepage or your own website, whatever. Getting more docs in front of more peoples' eyes makes people more likely to act is the idea. Steve Case pushing a docs-go-viral thang?!? Who knew?

July 12, 2008:

If you have any interest in particle physics (and who doesn't) here's the best darn online particle physics magazine on Earth. It's publised by Fermi Lab and the Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, and yet I still found it's articles readable, dare I say... engaging. Go there and learn the facts about that scary new large hadron collider.

July 5, 2008:

A sweet little movie info site run by a small gang of Canadian film junkies, including a fellow alumnus of Sheridan College, where I got my animation training a million years ago. The site offers podcasts, trailers, archives, and reviews featuring smart writing with a Canadian accent.

June 28 , 2008:

Indeed. Garage geek site big on the RC, aerial video and such.

June 21 , 2008:

Now not so secret.

June 14 , 2008:

A fake good news site suggested by TIH listener, Scott A. Keep 'em coming!

June 7 , 2008:

Where to go if you need one. And if you already got one you can submit you own!

May 31 , 2008:

The Earth institute at Columbia University, dedicated to mobilizing the sciences, education and public policy to achieve a sustainable earth.

May 24 , 2008:

Thanks to Danny for this one!! It's all for a good cause, the Center For Sex & Culture, dedicated to supporting sex education and sexual safety. And best of all... if you can't get to SF in time (it's tomorrow), it'll all be streamed live and hot over the interweb for free! Without a doubt our hands down... hands up, hands down, handsuphandsdownhandsup...

website of the week!

May 17 , 2008:

Amazing animated wall paintings. Graffiti come to life!

May 10 , 2008:

My new favorite badboy open-source web-based programming language, that's thumbing its nose at corporate coronated solutions while making it easy for programmers to create amazingly powerful apps for the web or the desktop of any OS, without modification. And of course it's free. Hellaicious sweetness!

May 3 , 2008:

Because fail happens.

April 26 , 2008:

Hackontest has begun! Funded by Google and organized by The Swiss Open Systems User Group, Hacketest comes to a head on September 24/25, when for 24 straight hours three teams of programmers will battle for honor and prizes inside a cargo container(!?!), as they try to implement user-suggested improvements to open source software. We all win! And you can participate now by going to the site and making your own feature requests.

Enter yur comments here...

April 19 , 2008:

Will this web app that allows you to send emails that are delivered at a designated time in the future be a success? I dunno... go send an email to your future self.

April 12 , 2008:

In a smarter, better, funnier world, all blogs would look and work like this.

April 5, 2008:

This one's inspired by Chuck, and a certain recent email-triggered tinfoil hat moment. If you're feeling a little paranoid these days about who's reading your email, get Enigmail. It's a free plug-in for the Thundrbird email client from Mozdev, the same folks that brought you Firefox. Makes sending and receiving secure, encrypted email a regular piece-o-cake. But it still won't help with Chuck's problems... they go much deeper.

March 29 , 2008:

If you're like me, and your looking for a flexible, full-featured, enterprise-ready open source content management system, check out Plone. Hey, it's good enough for the Jet Propolsion Lab!

March 22 , 2008:

A hot little online photograhic collection of literary graffitti from all over the world. Alot of it is pretty darn entertaining. It's a virtual gold mine of visual non sequitors... along with a few nuggets of actual art, poetry and wisdom. Plus, you can sumbit your very own encounters with walls there too. I've had my share. Actually, that was a sidewalk - basically a lazy wall.

March 15 , 2008:

A great tech blog that's come a long way fast, winning big awards and kudos since it's 2005 launch. The tons of tips and downloadable tools for Linux, Mac and PC should have motivated me to move faster on this one. It finally took a listener suggestion to get my ass in gear. Thanks to Erin F. via David H!

March 8 , 2008:

Winner of an InfoWorld BOSSIE (Best in Open Sourse Software) award, OpenVPN is a free, open source VPN (Virtual Private Network) solution for your home or biz network. What goes on in your network stays in your network. Bet you never heard of the BOSSIE awards before. It's a great place to load up on free, state of the art anti-hacking tools, which can sometimes also be used as hacking tools... sweet!

March 1 , 2008:

Home of Celestia, an awesome new, free virtal planetarium software. It's actually more of a 3-D space simulator, because instead of just being stuck with the Earth as your vantage point, you're free to zoom through galaxies, orbit planets texture-mapped with imagery from the European Space Agency's Hipparcos satellite, or take a close-in peek at the Hubble satellite. You can also grab tons of prexisiting travel scripts and simulations from the Celestia Motherlode site or just write your own. Pure geek heaven.

February 23, 2008:

This was Wikileaks.org... until last week, when a federal judge ordered the removal of their domain name! That's just how dangerous they think this wiki's goal of "an open-source democratic intelligence agency" really is. Read more here.

February 16, 2008:

"Your One-Stop Command Line Shop!"

February 9, 2008:

The best darned website about sound design in film ever created by a Swede. Get your Foley on, ja!

February 2, 2008:

Your right to anonymity! A directory of free webproxy sites you can use to browse blockled websites from school, work, the library, or any other firewall protected place. The forum is a particularly interesting peek into this little community of webproxy hosts, some apparently making advertising bucks from the kids trafficking through their portals!

January 26, 2008:

Participate in the currently ongoing Davos Conversation via YouTube. Ask questions to world leaders - or maybe Bono - and they just might answer you.

January 19 , 2008:

"Your guide to the money in U.S. politics." Thanks to David H for this one!

January 12 , 2008:

Home of the free, open source IP blocker, PeerGardian2. If you're using P2P and don't want folks like the RIAA or MPAA tracking your activities and invading your privacy, you need to know about this.

January 5, 2008:

A few days late... The online breathalyzer.

In the year 2007...

December 29, 2007:

OK, this is the last OLPC site... at least for this year! A great "independent" news source for all things OLPC.

December 22, 2007:

My new semi-local X0-1 user group!

December 15, 2007:

The World Clock. Actually, more like of a webpage of the week - packed with fast flying facts. Many of them disgusting! Thanks to Laura for this one!

December 8, 2007:

Do good and get a great little revolutionary laptop/e-book reader to boot! Errata from the show - The One Laptop Per Child project was annouced in 2005, not 1995.

December 1, 2007:

Mad paleontology.

November 24, 2007:

Just in time for the holidays!

November 17, 2007:

From TIH producer Drew C: "Lists of how to get through automated messages systems as fast as possible. Honestly, usually you just push '0', but some companies have some pretty weird backdoors."

November 10, 2007:

They calls it "Collectively reconstructing the urban canvas". I calls it creative social disruption. I like Sixten's chops.

November 3, 2007:

Russian mayhem site suggested by Elvis. The masthead - "Just because something cool happens daily on 1/6 of the Earth surface."

October 27, 2007:

A Low power radio communiy website dedicated to "freeing the airwaves from corporate control"

October 20, 2007:

Home to the TED (Technology, Entertainment and Design) conferences. Tons of great videos of past conference speakers, including some of my favorite nerd weirdos, like this year's Stephen Pinker, Theo Jansen, and Hod Lipson and his self-aware robots.

October 13, 2007:

QuickTimes of quantum physics lectures delivered in 1999 by Hans Bethe, the legendary physicist who brought Richard Feynman from Los Alamos to Cornell.

October 6, 2007:

"LDraw™ is an open standard for LEGO CAD programs that allow the user to create virtual LEGO models and scenes." That's insane.

September 29, 2007:

A comprehensive Flash-driven site dedicated to Salvidor Dali. I fell in love with his early works (1910-1927).

September 22, 2007:

Urban Dictionary is a slang dictionary that contributors add to and vote on.

For example:

1. zoomer
14 thumbs up, 13 thumbs down
A person who sells fake drugs and then takes off before being found out."Damn! that zoomer just sold me cat nip!"

2. ZOOMER
4 up, 5 down
n. Instance in which one accidentally inhales a small piece of Marijuana whilst smoking a cigarette of said substance.Fuck my throat hurts. Why? I just caught a fucking zoomer.

3. zoomer
4 up, 6 down
N. A nice way of saying shit.Nn "Hey, your dog left a zoomer in my garden."
Vb "Don't zoomer in your pants man"

September 15, 2007:

From the site: "CrypTool is a freeware program which enables you to apply and analyze cryptographic mechanisms... CrypTool has implemented almost all state-of-the-art crypto functions and allows you to learn about and use, cryptography within the same environment." It's also open source and was initiated in part by Deutsche Bank Group... huh?!? Think about it.
Oh, and happy Software Freedom Day.

September 8, 2007:

It's the Mac community's turn for some open source resources.

September 1, 2007:

Find open source software alternatives to well-known commercial software. Just search for a software, like After Effects, and find its open source alternative(s)! Open sores no more.

August 25, 2007:

John L. Young's fabulous font of secrets. He's disclosed Cheney's "undisclosed location" and posted satellite photos of Rumsfeld's home as well as lot's more significant intel. It's the "the Google of national security." according to William Arkin, Washingtonpost.com columnist and NBC News military analyst. Thanks to Matt for pointing this one out!

August 18, 2007:

In Chicago - Law forbids eating in a place that is on fire.

August 11, 2007:

Free open-source realtime disk encryption.

August 4, 2007:

Really more of a site for kids, but hey, I'm still a kid. At least I still feel like one. Tons of pretty darn cool science experiment instructions delivered in cartoon format. A lot of them I've never seen before and some of them potentially quite messy, which I like.

July 28, 2007:

I thought I'd made this website of the week a long time ago... Apparently I was mistaken. Stellar Flash work from a master.

July 21, 2007:

Dedicated to "sustainable communities - attainable results" with a ton of great online resources to do so.

July 14, 2007:

A classic little Flash bauble that helps brings out your inner abstract-impressionist drunk.

July 7, 2007:

Refreshing tonic to the booknerdy inbred edit nazis at Wikipedia.

June 30, 2007:

A good place to get aquainted with a very interesting new artform born out of MMRPG worlds. Don't know what MMRPGs are? Go there and find out.

June 23, 2007:

A brand new service from our favortie criminals at The Pirate Bay... an image hosting service like Flickr, but without the censorship!

June 16, 2007:

After a flurry of posts by Dr. Biggs about the amazing content in their movies section, I decided it was high time for a tip of the hell hat to this venerable web institution. Before wikipedia, there was archive.org.

June 9, 2007:

Why?  Mostly just for the name, but there's also good stuff too, including a collection of amusing and geeky podcasts with episode titles like "Lite Brite Supernovae" and "Dirty Rotten Astronomers".  Also be sure to check out their Slackerpedia Galactica!

April 21, 2007:

Based on the recent Supreme Court decision and it's assault upon and erosion of the very notion of judicial precedent, I suspect we'll soon also be revisting the "Scopes Monkey Trial". This site may prove handy. It contains by their own admission "the largest collection of writings by and about Darwin ever published". Love the scans of the books and the HTML transcripts on the right side are handy.

April 7, 2007:

OK, yes they're shilling for toys, but there's some good science there too. And toys!

Feb 17, 2007:

Help take part in tasks utilizing "artificial artificial intellegence" and maybe even do some good in this world while you're at it - and I forgot to mention this during the segment., get paid!

Feb 10, 2007:

More Web 2.0 mashup mayhem!  Quote from the site:  "Pipes is a hosted service that lets you remix feeds and create new data mashups in a visual programming environment. The name of the service pays tribute to Unix pipes, which let programmers do astonishingly clever things by making it easy to chain simple utilities together on the command line." Tim O'Reilly calls Pipes a "milestone in the history of the Intermnet" ...that's good enough for me!

Jan 27, 2007:

The author uses it to "think a little more relationally without resorting to doing actual math."

Jan 20, 2007:

Not responsible.

Jan 13, 2007:

Quote from the site: "the most comprehensive photobooth resource on the internet".  Alrighty then!  Thanks Mike!

In the year 2006...

Dec 16, 2006:

Should've been done a long time ago... but for the last three of you out there who don't already know this fabled gaming and comics community.

Dec 09, 2006:

Official site of "America's best-loved unknown cartoonist".

Dec 02, 2006:

Are you a hactivist wannabe... go here to help people who live in counties that censor the internet regain unfettered access.

Nov 11, 2006:

Blurb from this very cool site - "A National Preserve of Documentary Films about American Roots Cultures streamed with essays about the traditions and filmmaking. The site includes transcriptions, study and teaching guides, suggested readings, and links to related websites." - I really like the Alan Lomax vids!

Sept 30, 2006:

Even more torrents than The Pirate Bay!

Sept 23, 2006:

An interesting new model that brings interesting new bands and their interested new fans closer together than ever before.

Sept 16, 2006:

"Gregarius is a web-based RSS/RDF/ATOM feed aggregator, designed to run on your web server, allowing you access to your news sources from wherever you want."   Nice.

Sept 2, 2006:

Life, liberty and the pursuit of Cannabis!   Check out the Top 10 Pot Studies the Government Wished it Had Never Funded.   It's funny because it's true!   Props to Dan on this one.

Oh yeah... if you want to try out a little videoham action, enter the following string into a Google search: "inurl:CgiStart?page=Single" And go here for more info in general about how some folks are using IP cams without bothering to secure them:  http://www.defeatingthehacker.com/videoham/

Aug 12, 2006:

One of my secret website link stashes, now yours!

July 22, 2006:

Because it's cooler than MySpace... Props to Redbecca for this one!

July 8, 2006:

I'm totally against it and that's the only reason I'm pointing it out.

July 1, 2006:

Even cooler than Ajax... use the XML parsing power of Flash and get all RIA with it.

June 17, 2006:

A lousy URL, but a great opportunity to help do real, valuable scientifc research right in your home!

June 10, 2006:

From the lost archvies... still delicious milky goodness.

June 3, 2006:

Possibly illegal, transact at your own risk.

May 13, 2006:

In honor of the first national televised (Conan O'Brian) appearance of my new favorite circus punk marching band, which just also happens to feature my dearest, darling Spank! collaborator... Evie!!!

April 29, 2006:

A sort of blog portal for all things Web 2.0

April 1, 2006:

Pretty self-explanatory, I think.

March 25, 2006:

"People doing strange things with electricity."

March 18, 2006:

You probably already know this one... but if you don't, here's a great time waster! Tons of odd videos uploaded by tons of odd humans all freely available for your perusal.

February 25, 2006:

From their site: "BarCamp is an ad-hoc un-conference born from the desire for people to share and learn in an open environment. It is an intense event with discussions, demos and interaction from attendees." Sounds like a recipe for chaos to me, which is why I'm all over it.

February 18, 2006:

From their site: "Instructables is a step-by-step collaboration system that helps you record and share your projects with a mixture of images, text, ingredient lists, CAD files, and more. We hope to make documentation simple and fast. Show your colleagues how to operate a machine, show your friends how to build a kayak, show the world how to make cool stuff." Yah!

February 11, 2006:

An open source programming language created to teach fundamentals of computer programming within a visual context and to serve as a software sketchbook and professional production tool. It's used by places like MIT's Media Lab, so you just know it's gotta be cool. It runs on Linux Mac and PCs but you do need Java installed.

February 4, 2006:

It ain't pretty.

January 28, 2006:

Our second NASA site of the year and our second satellite tracking utility, 'cept this one doesn't require you to register... use it to track SuitSat!

January 21, 2005:

So damn cute it's positively subversive.

January 14, 2006:

Fly around Earth, or the Moon for that matter,,, Superman style in fullblown 3-D!!

In the year 2005...

July 23, 2005:

From the site: "AIMFight crawls through the depths of the Internet to answer the all-important question that plagues us all: How popular am I right this second?"

July 16, 2005:

Website for the world's first open source beer!.

July 9, 2005:

The home of live surgical video on the internet.

July 2, 2005:

Yet more quality time wasting pleasure.

June 25, 2005:

Pure near-mindless bliss.

June 18, 2005:

We don't normally do blogs but apparently we sometimes make exceptions.

June 11, 2005:

More power than you deserve.

June 4, 2005:

Capt'n Sailorbird?  Colonel Bleep??  Savoir Faire???  They're all here.

May 7, 2005:

Highly recommended by our very own real doctor, Dr. Bigosinski.  Bigs is big on the Death Porn articles.

April 30, 2005:

Absolutely brilliantly mad.  Plastic "creatures" that walk the beach via wind power.  Check out the videos via the "film" link on the front page.

April 23, 2005:

A submission from the original l'enfant savage, Drew.   Thanks, you wild child you.

April 16, 2005:

Lot's of art, some of it pretty darn harsh, which of course is why we like it.   Thanks again Pete!

April 2, 2005:

Without a doubt, the finest site dedicated to balloon hats on the web.   Hats off to Tonya for the tip!

March 19, 2005:

The good, bad and funny of psychiatric medications.

March 12, 2005:

The premier source of monkey and ape news for all us primates.  Kudos again Kristen!

March 5, 2005:

A website that allows users to generate graphs based on numerical data extracted from the CIA World Factbook.  Thanks Pete!

February 26, 2005:

All you need to know about when to look up and observe (among other cool things) Iridium satellites burning up in the atmosphere... all generated in real-time and customized for your location and time zone!

February 19, 2005:

The Molecular Expressions website.   Groovy psychedelic micrographs of beer, ice cream, feathers, buckyballs...
you name it!

February 12, 2005:

From Andy Foulds, the guy that brought us virtual bubblewrap and Tony Blair chasing a pound note with his nose.

February 4, 2005:

Home of the Encyclopedia Mythica.  Check out the bestiary.

January 22, 2005:

Sad and sick and so attractive.

January 15, 2005:

Emotionally scarring offerings at Ebay... Once again, thanks Kristen!

January 8, 2005:

Overdue listing of a site that's tons o' interactive audio/visual fun.

In the year 2004...

December 18, 2004:

One of those no brainers... The Urban Legends Reference Pages.

December 11, 2004:

Quote from the site: "A fundraising program created to support breast cancer research and promote the recycling of electronic waste" ... It's all good. Thanks Alison!

December 4, 2004:

Canadians open their hearts and homes to those of us down under who just can't hack another 4 years of Bush.

October 16, 2004:

A community surrounding the nexus of material from the purile minds behind viking kitties and badgers.

October 2, 2004:

Sort of an open source encyclopedia, Wikipedia allows anyone to contribute to it's corpus of knowledge.
It's also a great intro into the whole wide wacky world of wiki.

September 25, 2004:

Not just another blog, great Flash and other neat trash too.

September 18, 2004:

Absolutely lovely, brilliant site... helps remind me how ignorant I am.

August 28, 2004:

Origami Underground, home of pornogami!

August 21, 2004:

Transform your dead relatives into blingbling.

August 14, 2004:

Home of the Don Martin Dictionary.   Thanks to Ken!

August 7, 2004:

Sorry Chuck, no "dat" in The Tall-Tale Creature Gallery , but it's all still good.

July 31, 2004:

Transportation Futuristics.  I'm a sucker for this stuff... I want my monorail now!

July 24, 2004:

Foist your taste in music on others through the miracle of the web!

July 17, 2004:

You don't have a URL like this unless you registered it around 1996, which is in fact the case.  
Check out the dead boy and his stone dead dog.

July 10, 2004:

Lovely Flash site.  Check out the archives too.

July 3, 2004:

Pretty city.  And be sure to start using Firefox ...now.

June 26, 2004:

The website of The Project On Government Oversight... No possums.

June 19, 2004:

It's for a good cause.

June 12, 2004:

Self-described as "a veritable festering stinkpile of a site that leaves an odd smell that the neighbors curiously won't notice."

June 5, 2004:

I admit I stole this one from The Tavis Smiley Show's tech guy Omar Wasow, but it's just so cool I couldn't pass it up. Find out what which presidential candidates your neighbors support, how much they contributed, where they live, what their professions are... actually, it's kinda frightening.

May 22, 2004:

Strictly Film School.  Lot's of info on all the great films I've never heard of or seen.

May 15, 2004:

Home of the International Robot Racing Federation.  I don't necessarily approve... just pointing out their existence.

May 8, 2004:

Vintage phonograph recordings from 1900-1939 make for excellent surfing music.

May 1, 2004:

Get a load of what the geeks in Oxford are up to with their GPS receivers.

April 24, 2004:

Constantly scanning the web for the next subservient chicken.

April 17, 2004:

If you love to hate really awful movies, you're home.

April 10, 2004:

From Matt.  Make a guy in a chicken suit (and what appears to be garters) do your bidding.  Yes, it's really viral marketing for Burger King, but I don't care... it's still cool.

April 3, 2004:

This one's for Drinky Crow.

March 26, 2004:

From one of our listeners.  Thanks Louis!

March 20, 2004:

In honor of this vernal equinox, a site that explains it all.

March 13, 2004:

DARPA's done it again.  From the folks who brought you the internet... The Grand Challenge realtime live in a 3D satellite mapped environment that you can fly around in and check the progress of the autonomous robotic racers. We're of course all rooting for robots to run amuck at the finish line causing much mayhem and bloodshed.

March 6, 2004:

The Detroit Metro Times' Abandoned Shelter of the Month. Seems to be moribund but still another great archive documenting the amazing decay of Detroit.  Sort of reminds you of Chernobyl. Thanks Elvis for the turning me on to the freaky motorcycle chik from Kiev.

February 21, 2004:

http://www.privatehand.com

Self-described as "The chronicles of an art whore".  One of them thar groovy Flash sites. 

February 14, 2004:

http://www.bugmenot.com/

Tired of websites forcing you to register just to look at their damn content?  Go here, type in the URL and you're there. 

February 7, 2004:

http://www.drunkonia.com/

I've been holding on to this one for a while as an emergency backup website of the week.  Krys and Drew approved. 

January 31, 2004:

http://www.cruel.com

This one's a suggestion from the bitter blind guy. 

January 24, 2004:

http://www.mumbleboy.com

From the erased URL Labs archives, a lost treasure. 

January 17, 2004:

http://mars.telascience.org

Maestro headquarters.  Chuck's right, it is a crappy name... but still worth a WOTW designation.  Download and run a scaled down version of the very same software that the Mars rover is using to navigate.  It's Java!  It's cool!  It's buggy!

January 10, 2004:

http://www.weebls-stuff.com

Come for the toons, stay for the badger.

January 3, 2004:

http://origin.mars5.jpl.nasa.gov/home/

I don't care if you think it's a huge waste of money, I think it's cool.

In the year 2003...

December 20, 2003:

http://www.googlism.com

An ingenious use of the massively powerful Google search engine towards an exquisite waste of time.

December 13, 2003:

http://www.eaa.org

The Experimental Aircraft Association, in honor of the 100th anniversary of powered flight.  I'm also a member and card carrying geek.  You can check out a photo from my recreation of the event in the Random section.

November 15, 2003:

http://www.111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111111.com

I know...one of the most obnoxious URLs in the history of the web, but worth it. The interactive collages are pretty damn nasty and the midi files are atrocious. I love these kids whoever they are.

October 18, 2003:

http://www.awfulnice.com/

Sparking up the Halloween season, the cutest little dead kid on the net, "Young Death" and other disturbing oddities.

September 6, 2003:

http://www.fiendster.com/

I'm only making this website of the week now because I currently exstimate the half-life on this parody site and the site it parodies to about 3 days.  Get it while it's still kinda fresh.

August 30, 2003:

http://www.bushflash.com/

Seems I'm on a roll - yet another harsh Flash site!    And be sure to check out the excellent psychedelic Quicktimes while you're at it.

August 23, 2003:

http://www.blackmustache.com/

Bitter socio-political satire in the guise of Flash animations.  Just my cup o' tea!

August 16, 2003:

http://cmart.design.ru

Conclave obscurum... our very first Russian site.
Beautiful, brilliant, exquisite, frightening and Sean Hopp approved!
And be sure to check out listener Tim Ferguson's great site, Auntiefashions.com for all your t-shirts with a message needs.

August 9, 2003:

http://www.churchofeuthanasia.org

A sometimes self-promotional piece of fluff, but also often pretty darn funny and awfully harsh... Just the way I like it. WARNING: NOT FOR CHILDREN!!!

August 2, 2003:

http://www.vectorpark.com

From El Jeffe hisself... a cool little virtual amusement park.

July 26, 2003:

http://www.boycott-riaa.com

A great site for information no matter what side of the fence you're currently sitting on.  Is that physically possible?

July 19, 2003:

http://www.urban75.com

Quote from their site: "UK ezine featuring bulletin boards, games, photos, protest, rave, drugs & more. This site is strictly non-profit - no banners, no tie-ins, no ads."  Check out their fine collection of useless games.

July 12, 2003:

http://www.retrocrush.com/

Oh Gawd, I'm making this website of the week mostly for the Betty Paige collection.  PLEASE! - Send me some website suggestions now!

June 21, 2003:

http://www.chemtrailcentral.com/

...if you aren't quite paranoid enough.

June 14, 2003:

http://www.vmyths.com/

Another golden oldie from the lost archives, blasting online myths and hoxes away with plain facts.  Do your friends a big favor and go there before forwarding that next missive about email taxes, NEA funding or Nigerian fund transfers.  And go here right now to see the prez do something believed to be physical impossible until these photos were released.

June 7, 2003:

http://www.wardriving.com/

Looking for information on how to locate unsecured wireless networks in order to fulfill all your wi-fi-hi-jinx needs?.  Here you go!

May 31, 2003:

http://www.sodaplay.com/

From the "lost archives", a return of SodaPlay - bigger and better than ever.  What's SodaPlay?  Just go.  And check out SodaRace while you're there.

May 24, 2003:

http://www.fark.com/

Remember, it's not news, it's Fark.

May 17, 2003:

http://www.insecure.org/

Download Nmap and pretend you're in Matrix Reloaded!

May 10, 2003:

http://www.damnhellasskings.com/

Just because I like their damnhellassname.

May 3, 2003:

http://www.nspeace.org/

The North Suburban Peace Initiative.  A small local group doing big things.

April 26, 2003:

http://webware.cite-musique.fr/www/gamelan/

The best online intereactive gamelan...  ever.

April 12, 2003:

http://www.re-code.com

UPC barcode satire/culture jam.  Go there now before Walmart has it's way with these young, brave folk.

April 5, 2003:

http://www.deadtech.net

A local collaborative group of artists and techno-wiz types who recently shared billing with the Contraptionistas at last week's VersionFest . Reverse engineering control of shopping cart locks via inaudible tones is just the tip of the iceburg.

March 22, 2003:

http://www.dontoons.com

Don Asmussen's political toons in easy to take Flash form. My fav is Operation Terrortubbies.

March 15, 2003:

http://svt.se/svt/jsp/Crosslink.jsp?d=3015

Read My Lips. Those nutty Swedes that brought you the Bush/Blair love song video. Some are in English, others not... most are pretty darn funny. OOOPS... forgot to mention the candlelight vigil at the Wells Park gazebo this sunday night at 7pm. It's part of a nationwide candlelight vigil sponsored by  moveon.org.  ...Sorry Kristen!

March 8, 2003:

http://www.whitehouse.org

A cheeky parody site that recently felt the wrath of Dick Cheney and the chill air of clampdown.

March 1, 2003:

http://www.idleworm.com

Check out “Gulf War 2 (aka World War 2.5)”. We found it sadly plausible, but funny.

February 22, 2003:

http://www.moveon.org/winwithoutwar

...sounds better than the alternatives to me.

February 15, 2003:

http://offline.area3.net/wartime/showit.php

There's a URL for you.  It's for a good cause though...  It's the Wartime Project.  "Reflections and reactions against war past, present and future by digital and network artists."

February 8, 2003:

http://www.theuser.org

Absolutely, positively the most beautiful music ever generated from an array of decrepit dot-matrix printers.  Plus an opportunity to listen live to a Montreal silo!?

February 1, 2003:

http://www.googlefight.com

Pit Chuck Mertz against Mancow and see what you get!

January 18, 2003:

http://www.0TV.com

One from the lost archives, but still going strong...a new short video every day plus the fabulous Add-a-panel comics!

January 18, 2003:

http://www.amorphoscapes.com

Beautiful experiments.  "Audio visual relationships between and art and science... maybe."

^ top

In the year 2002...

December 21, 2002:

http://www.cyberarmy.com

Fighting the good fight for a free and independent internet. 

December 14, 2002:

http://www.mine-control.com

Pushing interactivity into some very cool new places.

December 7, 2002:

http://www.bypassgroup.org

A bunch of cool locals promoting collaborative art projects.  My kind of folk.

November 12, 2002:

http://www.konstruktiv.net

Our producer Kevin Harris called it "best site ever".  Whether that's the case or not, it most certainly qualifies for WSOTW.

October 12, 2002:

http://www.sklerosystems.com

Home of the Peace Pumpkin Project.

September 28, 2002:

http://www.rathergood.com

Where Viking Kitties finally taught me the actual lyrics to Led Zepplin's Immigrant Song.

September 28, 2002:

http://www.thingsihate.org

Can you tell what kind of mood I've been in?

September 14, 2002:

http://www.portalofevil.com

They should have a link to us!

September 7, 2002:

http://www.theweirdsite.com

Enough weirdness to keep you occupied for days... if that's your idea of occupation.

August 24, 2002:

http://www.urllabs.com

This place rocks.

August 17, 2002:

http://www.gravity-society.org

A portal to mysterious physics like anti-gravity.  The folks at NASA are currently funding research!  People right now are building propellant-less flying machines!  It sounds like lunacy except... IT'S ALL TRUE!

August 3, 2002:

http://www.defcon.org

It's DefCon X.  Their 10th anniversary!!  So many hacking memories... 

July 27, 2002:

http://www.coreybarba.com

Don't normally promote personal websites, but Corey's a great artist and I recently purchased some of his work and raising his visibility could enhance my investment.

July 20, 2002:

http://www.deathclock.com

This will motivate you.

July 13, 2002:

http://www.cardcops.com

If you want to see if hackers are passing your credit cards around like candy, go here.

July 6, 2002:

http://www.erowid.org/

Lot's of very useful information for psychotrophically inclined.

June 22, 2002:

http://www.networkforgood.org/

Not just another click and feel good site... Some great info and links for those interested in actually doing something to change things for the better.

June 15, 2002:

http://www.rollingthundertour.org/

"...one hell of a good time every step of the way back to true democracy."

June 8, 2002:

http://www.stromwatch.com/

Learn some amazing and appalling factoids about our oldest senator.  Thanks Krys!

June 1, 2002:

http://www.khamush.com/

War on terrorism, threats of nuclear war, global warming, ecological meltdown, civil breakdown.... time for something transcendent.

May 25, 2002:

http://www.live365.com/

Well internet radio got a reprieve this week when the Librarian of Congress rejected the royalty fee proposals of the Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel (CARP).  But who knows what they'll rule on June 20, so enjoy your internet radio now kids... and in the meantime you might want to learn how to get the powers that be to listen to reason at saveinternetradio.org... while there's still time to make a difference.

May 18, 2002:

http://www.asylumeclectica.com/

Wow!  This place gives rotten.com a run for it's money! 

May 11, 2002:

http://www.saveinternetradio.org/

May 21 is the deadline for the Copyright Arbitration Royalty Panel to decide whether internet radio is to survive.  Make yourself heard ...NOW! 

April 27, 2002:

http://www.cs.cmu.edu/hot/2001/05/gallery.html

The Carnegie Mellon School of Computer Science's Gallery of CSS Descramblers.  Geeks gettin' jiggy. 

April 20, 2002:

http://www.leisuretown.com

Revisit an old favorite.  Dilbert on crack I calls it. 

April 14, 2002:

http://www.vitw.org

Voices in the Wilderness.  Go there and learn the truth. 

April 6, 2002:

http://www.pitchforkmedia.com

Don't normally do music review sites, but this local operation is a class act... no thanks to Kevin. 

March 30, 2002:

http://www.rubbermonkey.org

The online home of the Rubber Monkey Puppet Theatre.  Click on the "Deus Ex Machina " link to learn more about the exhibition currently going on featuring machines producing art.  I've got my Lego artbot "Grig" participating again. 

March 16, 2002:

http://www.vectorlounge.com

Just plain cool.  Check out the great Flash puppet...

http://www.vectorlounge.com/04_amsterdam/jam/wireframe.html

March 9, 2002:

http://www.coudal.com/moom.php

MOOM.  The Museum of Online Museums.  A fantastic collection of links to brick-an-mortar museum sites plus some exclusively web-based exhibits.  Everything from Gauguin to a collection of ominous needlepoint!

March 2, 2002:

http://www.enteract.com/~sickdysk/

In honor of the eminent closing of Chicago's greatest coffehouse, The Nervous Center.  God bless you kids.

February 23, 2002:

http://www2.netcetera.nl/~iaaa/

Home of the Institute of Artificial Art Amsterdam.  You MUST see the Department of Artifacial Expression's collaborations with Arthur and the Solenoids and watch the Quicktime clip.  It WILL change your life.

February 16, 2002:

http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/

Don't normally recommend government sites too often, but this one seems deserving.  Lot's of facts about pretty much every country on the planet.  Also a good method to assay the CIA's general take on things.

February 9, 2002:

http://www.soulbath.com

Just another internet art site?  Perhaps, but it kept me amused for quite awhile.  If you've got some free time, free your mind and your mouse will follow.

February 2, 2002:

http://ceruleanstudios.com

Home of the makers of Trillian, an ingenious IM client software that allows users to contact any of their IM buddies.. be they at AOL, ICQ, MSN Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger and all within a single window.  Well, at least that was case until AOL started blocking them... 

January 26, 2002:

http://www.rhizome.org

If you love art, particularly internet-based art... have I got a site for you!  Click on just about any link there and be prepared to be pleasantly immersed for the next hour or two.

January 19, 2002:

http://www.setpixel.com

Local genius Charles Forman's exquisite site.  Many beautiful Shockwave demos and games.  This guy's got it!

January 12, 2002:

http://www.mathbat.com

Sean Hopp's online world...full of great visual and aural art.. and all of it frothing forth from the fertile, fevered mind of the man.

January 5, 2002:

http://micro.magnet.fsu.edu/

They don't get much more geeky than this.  But fun!  Check out the "Powers of Ten" java applet and find your place in the universe.  Thanks Pam!

^ top

In the year 2001...

December 1, 2001:

http://www.cityarts.com

John Klima's site is full of great ideas on how to creatively, interactively use the web in collaborative ways using real-time data.  Glasbead, a spherical music machine run by as many as 200 simultaneous users was a smash hit at Siggraph this year.

November 24, 2001:

oddtodd.com

This unemployed miscreant doesn't need any more press but hey, I liked the cartoon.

November 3, 2001:

Get your war on

Oh man.  Thanks Jeffy.

October 27, 2001:

http://www.amcomm.org

The Association for Multimedia Communications, a fine organization here in Chicago is sponsoring the first annual Flash Fest contest.  Here's an opportunity to strut your flashiest Flash stuff.  I know I'll be there.  Check out the site for info on this event and many other very worthy projects.

October 20, 2001:

http://www.presstube.com

Strictly for fun!  Animation of a very distinctive style applied via Flash plus lot's of other neato time wasters.  Also a place to hear one of my fav groups around Chicago, K-RAD.  Thanks again Polly!

October 6, 2001:

http://www.openp2p.com

A fairly geeky site dedicated to the promotion of that most democratic of technologies, Peer to Peer via the most democratic technological movement, Open Source.  Kudos to Polly Greathouse for the great tip!

September 22, 2001:

http://www.weirdwebbed.com

It can certainly be argued that life is already sufficiently weird these days, but if your looking for a kinder gentler insanity to return to normalcy...

September 15, 2001:

http://www.rubbermonkey.org

This is somewhat self serving since I'll be involved, but on Sept 21 Rubbermonkey theatre/gallery will presenting an opening titled "Deus Ex Machina".  It should be a very thought provoking and fun show and a great excuse to divert attention if only for an evening from the media frenzy.

September 1, 2001:

http://www.prwatch.org

I lifted this from Jorn Barger's stupendous robotwisdom.com.  Thanks Jorn!  Check it out to get to the truth behind major government and corporate public relations campaigns designed to lie, confuse and distort.

August 25, 2001:

http://www.thebranflakes.com

Although I'm not up on the band, I do love their site.  Especially the area called "Scrumpdillyishus Land".  Go there and enjoy the wealth of Flash based weirdness.

August 4, 2001:

http://www.cipherwar.com/echelon

Oct 21 will mark Jam Echelon Day 2001.  Go here for a pre-emptive knowledge gorging and learn all about why Echelon needs to be jammed.

July 28, 2001:

http://www.freesklyarov.org

The U.S. is currently holding a Russian national in the first criminal case involving the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) after giving a presentation at the recent Def Con conference.  Even the company which first brought this man's actions to light for the FBI, now wants him out of jail, but U.S. Attorney Robert Mueller who also happens to be slated for the post of Director of the FBI won't budge.  Something's gotta give.  Learn more about this sordid tale here...

July 14, 2001:

http://www.defcon.org

The ninth annual gathering of the hacker tribes takes place in Las Vegas this weekend.  You can visit virtually via streaming media and peruse a very nice archive of previous conventions... that is if you're not afraid of being hacked while visiting.

July 7, 2001:

http://www.appliedautonomy.com

The age of robotic activism has arrived!!

June 30, 2001:

http://www.sucks.com

Hey all you fellow miscreants out there... If you're looking for a place to spread your bile smeared opinions have I got a site for you!

June 23, 2001:

http://www.xiph.org

If you've so far been afraid of the open sores movement, perhaps the folks at The Xiphophorus Company can turn your pretty little head around with their Ogg Vorbis project... which just may make you say "MP3 who?". 

June 9, 2001:

http://www.ari.net/nordicalite

A valuable lesson awaits all my not-so -web-savy friends.  Click all the way through and marvel at the FTC's wily ways at warning you of the wily ways of others. 

June 9, 2001:

http://www.ari.net/nordicalite

A valuable lesson awaits all my not-so -web-savy friends.  Click all the way through and marvel at the FTC's wily ways at warning you of the wily ways of others. 

June 2, 2001:

http://www.vmyths.com

You can never have enough websites dedicated to debunking computer virus myths, hoaxes, urban legends, and general web based hysteria.

May 19, 2001:

http://www.peacefire.org

I'm absolutely positive that I made this a website of the week sometime in the distant past but alas, there's no evidence of it in the archives.  Don't know why, but there you have it.  I remember covering the release of their anti-censorware software called what else... Peacefire.  In any case they were back in the news this week, so I decided the time was ripe to finally right this wrong.  Welcome back Peacefire!

May 12, 2001:

http://www.spyware.com

The shareware you've been downloading may be secretly tracking you, unless... 

April 28, 2001:

http://www.disinfo.com

In view of their recent Webby nomination they hardly need more accolades, but what the heck!  It's the least I can do for them consiering they turned me on to madman Grant Morrison.  Check out his interview and learn how to create your very own magic. 

April 21, 2001:

http://www.myvideogames.com

Their collection of old Atari TV commercials got me all verklempt. 

April 14, 2001:

http://www.marlysmagazine.com

I'm an old fan of Lynda Barry, but it was finally Jorn's weblog that got me to visit her fabulous site.

April 7, 2001:

http://www.scottmccloud.com

Not just animation's getting a shot in the arm via the powers of the almighty web... that good old fashion format, the comic is also being revitalized and even twisted into some brand new forms.  Check out "Choose Your Own Carl" and see what I mean.

March 31, 2001:

http://www.sharesniffer.com

Salon finally and officially agrees with me... P2P cannot be stopped no matter what RIAA wishes, wants or does.  This stuff is pure!

March 24, 2001:

http://www.webwasher.com

Help hasten the era of subscription based content on the web while surfing in advertising-free comfort.  Wait a minute...is this really a good thing?  Whatever, it's your call now.

March 17, 2001:

http://www.nakednews.com

Sorry!  I just think it's funny.

March 10, 2001:

http://www.infoanarchy.org

The RIAA may have won a battle by successfully muzzling Napster, but they certainly won't win the war over file sharing.  Not with resources like this around.

Feb 24, 2001:

http://www.stopthewar.com

A site advocating sensible drug policies.  Hmmm....  I find their ideas intriguing and would like to subscribe to their newsletter.

Feb 10, 2001:

http://near.jhuapl.edu

Just in time for Valentine's day, the Near Earth Asteroid Rendezvous mission is about to plant a big kiss on it's object of desire, the asteroid named Eros (after the Greek god of love).  Ain't it romantic!

Feb 3, 2001:

http://www.milkyelephant.com

Check out the section called mumbleboy... best description I've come up with yet is Hello Kitty on acid.

Jan 27, 2001:

http://www.sundanceonlinefilmfestival.org

The very first Sundance Online Film Festival.

Jan 20, 2001:

http://www.skepdic.com

Are you as deeply skeptical about what everybody tells you as I am?  You should be.  Believe me.

Jan 13, 2001:

http://www.somethingawful.com

Just remember this, always remember this... Cliff Yablonski hates you.

2000

Dec 23, 2000:

http://www.zerotv.com

Lots o' fun here kids.  Check out Mark Borchardt and Mike Schank's (of "American Movie" fame) new series... or head to my favorite area, the comics.  It's not what you think... way way cool.  And you can even contribute to the mayhem.

Dec 16, 2000:

http://www.popularpower.com

A new use of distributed, peer to peer networking that's not even necessarily evil... you might even help cure a disease.

Dec 09, 2000:

http://www.ndroid.com

Artyfarty, but fun!

Dec 02, 2000:

http://chaos.no-such.com

our old buddies at Hell.com have a special super secret site up for some beta testing...beat the hell out of it.

Nov 25, 2000:

Carnivore feedback

A URL so long and ugly, I hid it.... but it is your chance to voice your opinion on the FBI's plans to spy on YOU to the DOJ.

Nov 18, 2000:

TheBeatles.com

...bout time.  But it really is THE OFFICIAL BEATLES WEBSITE.  Apple corp. is paying the bills.

Nov 11, 2000:

ZappyBaby.de

Only the Germans could come up with this site.  Want-to-be-pregnant women on the go will forever be in their debt.

Nov 4, 2000:

AboutPolitics.com

Home of the Political Site of the Day.

Sept 30, 2000:

DotComix.com

Animation based on an engine kinda like flash, but proprietary.  Still, worth the effort.

Sept 22, 2000:

NullSoft.com

From the folks who brought you among other wonders, Winamp, Shoutcast, Aimster and GNUTELLA for Christ's sake...what took me so long?  All hail Nullsoft!

Sept 9, 2000:

evolution-control.com

These kids should probably should doff their caps in the general direction of Negativeland, but they had me from the Dan Rather ditty, "Rocked by Rape".

Sept 2, 2000:

FindAGrave.com

Wanna know where they buried the evidence?  Look here.

Aug 26, 2000:

blah-blah.com

Helping indies get the properties properly displayed on the web.  Got an idea?  Think blah-blah.

Aug 19, 2000:

Chuck's in the wilds of Michigan so there's no show.

Aug 12, 2000:

Metallicaisgreedy.com

Makes me think there is some kind of justice in this world.

Aug 5, 2000:

Icebox.com

Yet another pretty cool animation site based on Flash technology.  God I love Macromedia... And John K.  Yup, he's there too.

July 29, 2000:

Napigator.com

Who cares if Napster ever goes down due to legal problems... you've got Napigator, your free navigator to nap servers.   Take that RIAA!!

July 22, 2000:

DarkPassage.com

THE urban exploration site.   Come take a crawl along the corroded underbelly of urban america and see what's inside that huge tire on I-94 just outside of Detroit.

July 15, 2000:

No show that week people.....go home.

July 08, 2000:

SearchBastard.com

If you like abuse while you surf, this is the search engine for you, you big dope.

July 01, 2000:

PT Barnum's Lost Museum

Posted this very day and a work in progress,  I haven't seen everything yet but it's very promising so far!  A five-story museum in virtual space.  A recreation of P.T's Museum of Un-Natural History, which burned down for the final time over a century ago.  Check out Jeff Davis in drag!

June 24, 2000:

SodaPlay.com

An immensly entertaining java thingy posted by a way cool group from the UK.  Kind of a mix of puppetry and cellular autamata.  Brilliant I calls it.

June 17, 2000:

No show due to Chuck puking his brains out  the night before... 

June 10, 2000:

FlashKit.com

Possibly the best site for info on Macromedia's Flash anywhere on the web.  At least in my book.  I'm there constantly these days.  They have put together a great community of folks more than willing to share freely all the tricks you'll need turn into a real Flash pro in no time.    Maybe you'll even get a job!

June 03, 2000:

ModernHumorist.com

I was struggling to find a decent site this week and I started surfing randomly.  I went to dumb.com and it was dumb.    Then I went to stupid.com and guess what... it was stupid.  So I went to ModernHumorist.com and found it much less dumb and stupid.  How's that for a plug?    Pretty enthusiastic, eh?  Told you I was desperate.

May 27, 2000:

NUPD.com

Your dead uncle left you a million dollars and YOU DON"T EVEN KNOW IT!!!  You would if you went here.  It's the National Unclaimed Property Database and they know. 

May 20, 2000:

GetSpeed.com

Desperate to find a faster connect to the internet?  Go here, enter your zip code and you'll have dozens of options layed before you in seconds.

May 13, 2000:

JellyVision

Really shameless pandering here on my part.  Still... a great line of funny, funny products.  Tell 'em LaddieO sent you and make sure you mention how much I admire their operation and how wonderful I think they are and how I'd love to work at such a fantastic... oh never mind.  I feel so dirty.

May 6, 2000:

ZeroPaid.com

The best forum I know of for the burgeoning Gnutella and Napster communities.  The Wall of Shame was the story which first brought me here, but it's lots more than that.  It really is a community.    A community on the cutting edge of Freedom and Copyright Law issues and probably soon to be on the lam or digging further underground.  Read the reprinted ZDnet story about the coming clampdown posted on their home page, "Share information, go to jail".

April 29, 2000:

Scour.com

Lot's of cool tools for streaming media, but my absolute fav is ScourCaster, which instantly turns you into a webcaster.    I am the DJ and I know what I play!

April 22, 2000:

Eeggs.com

Just in time for Easter... A site jammed with those legendary software backdoors you've heard about.  Start up your Excel program, click a few buttons and find yourself in a flight simulator or The Hall of Tortured Souls... whichever you prefer.

April 15, 2000:

Napster.com

Any company being sued by Metallica is way alright in my book.

April 8, 2000:

DialPad.com & FreeDSL.com

Two freebies for the price of one... er..

March 17, 2000:

StickDeath.com

Bloody gore updated every week!

March 4, 2000:

JibJab.com

One of the silliest sites I've ever seen... I loved it!!   If for nothing, else go there to check out the fart waffle.

February 26, 2000:

Freedom.net

Our old hackers cum Security Experts at Zero-Knowledge offer a means for secure, safe, annonymous surfing.

February 19, 2000:

Beatnik.com

Sonify man, Sonify!  A great spot that's full of tools and content to enhance your aural web experience.

February 12, 2000:

MyCIO.com

Your one-stop security shop.

February 5, 2000:

Observers.net

Worried about what AOL's doing with your email?  I am.  So are they, but they're watching and monitoring the 800 lb gorilla and reporting about it here.

January 29, 2000:

My.MP3.com

Mp3.com is embroiled in a lawsuit with the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) over this cool little feature.    That should pique your interest. 

January 22, 2000:

Care2.com

Click a button and help save the planet.  What could be easier.

January 9, 2000:

SourceForge.com

Welcome to Geektown.    SourceForge is a free online program repository and portal for the open source gang.

1999

December  11, 1999:

MP3Now.Com

If you're somehow still uninformed regarding the MP3 WORLD DOMINATION movement, tune in here. 

PS... they've already won!

December  4, 1999:

NASA.Gov

Hey, they need some support right around now what with that metric gaff and all and with the Mars Polar Lander taking a dirt nap.

November 28, 1999:

Don't look at me.

November 20, 1999:

Dunno.

November 13, 1999:

Football break I believe.

November 6, 1999:

BurnAllGifs

Hey everybody... let's burn all our gifs!  Go there.  It will all make more sense.

October 30, 1999:

I was out.

October 23, 1999:

Britannica.com

Just one of the most thorough fonts of edited, researched and fact checked info anywhere.   After an embarrasing few weeks of first being up then down then down then down, it's up and behaving beautifully.

October 16, 1999:

Must have been a Northwestern University Football game.

October 9, 1999:

NetAid.Org

Remember Cisco's gift to the world's poor... Can't believe this isn't a dead link.  It isn't, I just checked!

October  2, 1999:

Out to lunch.

September 25, 1999:

Must have slept in... no record.

September 18, 1999:

ResFest

Not just a stupendous worldwide touring digital video fest, also a kick-ass streaming vid site.

September 11, 1999:

Useless Pages    That just about says it all.

September 4, 1999:

Burning Man...

You want to be there... but like me, can't make it.  Click for the next best thing. 

August 28, 1999:

Cybertimes navigator...Ever wanna be a cub reporter for the New York Times?  Well now you can!  Or at least you can use the same resources they do to get their facts all nice and straight.

August 21, 1999:

Spumco.com... I'm pretty sure we did this one before, but I can't find any record of it... so here it is again.  It's time to go back and visit the site even if we did do it before.  It's a more mature site, although thankfully, the humor still is not.

August 14, 1999:

Wild Feeds TV

August 7, 1999:

Intranets.com... 24 megs free space on a free secure server ...Did I tell you it's free?   Who cares!   It's my birthday!

July 31, 1999:

AllAdvantage.com... Blurb to come.  Just go there and look.  Jeez, it takes two seconds.  There's free money involved!

July 24, 1999:

Space.com... Blurb to come.   Just go there and look.  Jeez, it takes two seconds.  Go!

July 17, 1999:

No record... Oh yeah, now I remember.  Well, we won't go into to that now.

July 10, 1999:

Web Soup..."Web Soup is a service for web surfers that collates the efforts of countless self-trained web site reviewers that work hard to identify the newest, bestest sites on a daily and weekly basis. Their diligent efforts are monitored periodically by WebSoup, and the results are presented here in what is hoped to be a quick, easy-to-read, browser-friendly format."  -quote from the site.

July 3, 1999:

No website of the week!!! But a monumental broadcast nonetheless. I show my allegiance to the Open Sores Movement by throwing open the doors to all those dear listeners out there around the globe who'd like their own say on what should be website of the week. I am a man of the people! Or just lazy. We'll see how this noble experiment in true democracy works out and hey... get off my back! I've been really busy.

June 26, 1999:

I finally admit the obvious. The only site you need: robotwisdom.com... I feel better now.

June 19, 1999:

The place to go for all things Linux. Linux.com  ... DUH!

June 12, 1999:

Are you a virtual voyeur. Do you like to watch. Slake your thirst at Allcam.com meester.  They've got it all.

June 5, 1999:

ApocalypsePrettySoon.com... any site this chock full of nuts is alright by me.

May 22, 1999:

Here's a great one. ThirdVoice.com enables users to post notes on othr people's website for others to see... that is if you too are using the software. If some site's really pissing you off with their nonsense and disinformation, now you can tag that site and put your own spin on reality. Right smack inside that person or organization's site and there's NOTHING THEY CAN DO ABOUT IT. Extreme? Perhaps.

May 15, 1999:

Cyber-skirmish rate increases. White House website shutdown. And we learn the identity of the CIH virus and the meaning of the acronym... The taiwanese student's name Chen Ing-Hau.... Get It?! CIH ... Chen Ing-Hau. ...Sheeesh. Anyhow there's no better time than now to completely disappear from sight by surfing sites via Anonymiser! Nobody will know who you are! Personally, I don't want to know you.

May 8, 1999:

Into the scat scene?  Jerry Springer fan?  Check out Doodie.com.  Help spread the doodie.  This site is the work of animator Tom Walker.  He's currently the guy responsible for the opening sequence on ABC's "The Norm Show".  These little brown gems are sometimes stupid, childish and often a guilty larf.

April 24, 1999:

Dead People Server.  "It's really fun" -- Pat Paulsen (1927-1997).  My friend Kristen emailed me this one.   Can't remember which celebrity's alive or dead?  This is definitely the site for you.

April 17, 1999:

Get you beta, hot beta.  Right here.  Barely used Windows 2000 beta 3.  Only $59.95 (US).  Limited time only.  All the bugs you can eat.   Or I got some secret papers for you 'bout ex-prez Bush and his connection with the Kennedy assassination.  Either one, I don't care. Take yer pick.

April 10, 1999:

The Big Brother Award winner, Microsoft wins in the Lifetime Menace category, subsequently releases a Hotmail upgrade that contains the "Cookie Monster" bug just to make sure.  We recommend a Microsoftendectomy at AHN.

April 3, 1999:

Ahh... Sweet Melissa, Turbo Linux and Charlie Manson.  That was a week.

March 27, 1999:

It's life during wartime on the web.  And it's true, the first casualty of war is truth.  BUT, the web does allows us all equal access to information and disinformation from all sides simultaneously and that's a good thing in a bad times.   The Kosovo/Kosova situation is a tragedy regardless of one's position on the conflict.  The University of Nebraska at Omaha has a decent site, sort of a mini-portal to alot of links regarding the crisis.  Check it out!  There's even a link to B-92 the famously banned radio station now broadcasting exclusively over the web from Belgrade.

March 13, 1999:

We officially rename the Microsoft/Intel cartel from WinTel to Dumb&Dumber. We also quickly touch on the resurgence of the film short, revitalized as a genre through places like our website of the week... Atomfilms.com

March 6, 1999:

More cyberwarfare and rumors of cyberwarfare makes me want to think of other places to live, like say... outer space.  Take a look at one of my possible new digs at NASA's  Astronomy Picture Of The Day.  Kudos to Lisa Saaf for this gem.

February 27, 1999:

Seeing we had Kevin Poulsen on, it's only fitting the website of the week be, well, Kevin Poulsen's.  Yeah.

February 20, 1999:

Being the Golden Age of the Lie, two sites championing the notion "the truth will out":  Snake oil outs those krazy kristians.  The Net Hoax Hall of Fame outs all those dopey net hoaxes.

February 13, 1999:

In honor of Valentine's day, a site full of hope for the loveless:  Singlesites.com

February 6, 1999:

All hacking all the time. 2600.com

January 30, 1999:

ENazis, cyberwar, hand transplants, a Russian Y2K prob.  It's the end times people!!!!  Head for HowThingsWork and learn how to protect yourself.

January 23, 1999:

Here comes the Pope, profits for everybody, and all aboard the Microsoft refund wagon!  Head to TheNoodle for details.  Hurry before Feb 15th!!!

January 9, 1999:

Now here's a site!  Lego's world of robotics.  Mindstorms.com

1998

December 19, 1998:

Something about zippergate, that's all I can remember.  Oh yeah, and Jerry Falwell's virtual marriage ceremony.  The website of the week is lost to the tape archives to divulge.

December 13, 1998:

The masses have spoken and won't they shut up.  Catch 'em at Talkspot.com

December 5, 1998:

Just in time for Christmas, Bill Gates gives away his fortune to a street person.   I'm so speechless, I can't utter a website.

October 17, 1998:

The gov's mean to Kevin.  No computer for you mister.  Web o' the week is SearchByMedia.com ...a brave new way to search.

October 17, 1998:

A weird week.  EA kills a too-violent PC game, virtual reality autopsies and a guy with a killer plasma cannon

September 19, 1998:

H4CK1NG F0R G1RL13Z hacks NY Times!  The mirror at Antionline is apparently gone forever...

September 12, 1998:

Burning Man and Microsoft.  The iMac versus the iRon.  Starr report hits the web.  Talk to your congressperson and tell 'em LaddieO sent ya.

August 29, 1998:

I'm really not sure.

August 22, 1998:

Free Kevin!

August 15, 1998:

Here comes the iMac, but who cares...  All hail the Cult of the Dead Cow!!!  Back Orifice rules!

August 8, 1998:

Remember the Aquarians rockin' out at Lycos "a day in the garden"?   Yeah, like wow, wasn't that a happenin.... Stevie Nicks and Don Henley.   Hoowee!  Glad we could make it.  Almost singlehandedly killed the whole streaming, eventcast, on-demand media thang.  Luckily, it lives on at Broadcast.com

August 1, 1998:

We spoke of bugs and spam and green eggs and ham, CIH updates and free software at Shareware.com and Download.com

July 25, 1998:

Beware of the dreaded 'CIH' virus! It will utterly ruin your Windows 95 or Windows 98 computer, turning it from a PC into a huge paperweight, IF the computer is infected AND you boot it up on the 26th of any month. To protect yourself from this virus, first of all don't turn your machine on on the 26th. Then, on the 25th, or the 27th, go to the Symantec Antivirus Research Center. The website of the week was the the infamous OurFirstTime hoax site... now a full-blown porn site.

July 18, 1998:

Lost to time...

July 11, 1998:

Portals:  We waxed poetic about the age of the portal, but in the end our hearts were stolen by TopTenLinks.com

July 4, 1998:

We discuss the nature of privacy on the web. Check out Pretty Good Privacy for more info.

E-mail LaddieO@urllabs.com to share your web insights or to report any dead links.

this is hell

http://www.webwasher.com

Help hasten the era of subscription based content on the web while surfing in advertising-free comfort.  Wait a minute...is this really a good thing?  Whatever, it's your call now.