Kottke

This is the third entry in a series of best-of-web resources.
Kottke is the personal site of Jason Kottke, and home of fine hypertext products since March of 1998.  Jason lives in Manhattan with his foodie wife Meg. For fun and income, he builds web sites and edits kottke.org.

Jason's site features links, and his posts are usually short with minimal commentary. He does post several times daily, though.  Jason designed the Silkscreen typeface and has won a Lifetime Achievement Award as a blogger for his writing skills and perseverance.   Everything else you need to know is in the FAQ. Enjoy!

Buzzfeed

This is the second in a series of best-of-web resources.

Buzzfeed is a website devoted to helping you find your favorite new thing online. They feature trends, with images, posted by a panel of editors. Each trend lists a series of related links in a list, that decreases in size and importance toward the bottom of the page.

Readers can sort stories by categories such as music, culture, style, food, celebrity, business, and so forth.  Readers can also submit tips. Buzztastic.

Metafilter

And now, the first in a series of best-resources for Today on the Interwebs. Really, after I'm done you won't need to read TOTI anymore. But I'll probably still write it.

Metafilter (or "MeFi" or "The Blue" if you're soooo hip) is a community blog that aims to post the best of the web.  Mefi was founded by Matthew Haughey in 1999, and currently there is a one-time $5 life-membership fee that allows you to post and comment.  Members write thematic snippets rich with links, and other members can comment on those links.  Each user is only allowed one front page post (FPP) per day.

MetaFilter bans "selflinks," or posts by a person to their personal website or website with whom that person has a significant conflict of interest. Suspected selflinks are scrutinized and deleted.

There are several sub-sites, that Wikipedia expertly explains: 

MetaTalk: A.k.a. "The gray" for administrative questions, requests, and discussions.
AskMe: Or Ask Metafilter, or "the green," where members to post questions to the community without the link requirements.
Metafilter Projects: where members share on-going web-work, and self-linking is encouraged.
MetaFilter Music: where members share their music.
MetaFilter Jobs: where members post jobs.

Metafilter even makes filtering the filter easy.  People can post what they like as favorites, and you can check out "Popular Favorites" if you don't have time for riff raff. Overall: A++, for consistency in best-of-the-web.

GIRLS ARE PRETTY FOREVER

GIRLS ARE PRETTY FOREVER is a blog by Bob Powers that invents something tragic to celebrate every day.  His blog has morphed into a book titled, "Happy Cruelty Day!" Daily Celebrations of Quiet Desperation.  Each entry is a flight of fancy you would expect from your 12-year-old cousin, narrated in the second person. Edgy. 

A sample entry goes as such: 

"Pay Your Uncle Pete To Ask You To Be An Assassin Day!

At around 1PM today, have your Uncle Pete show up to your social studies class dressed in all black. He’ll knock on the door and the teacher will let him in, thinking he’s a responsible adult who has something important to share. Then he’ll find you and he’ll say what you told him to say, word for word.

'I’m sorry to interrupt your studies, but I can’t take no for an answer when we both know that life as a highly paid killer is your destiny. Will you join our Secret Order of International Assassins?' ... "

Another bloodshed favorite:

"Some Christmas Trees Can Talk and Fight Terrorism Day!

Today, at age 35, you’re going to be woken up when your front door bursts from its hinges and an old, brown Christmas Tree still sprinkled with tinsel comes hopping through your apartment to your bed.

'Why didn’t you kill them?' the Christmas Tree will ask..."

And so on an so forth.  More recently, Bob has a second book out, a choose-your-own-adventure titled, "YOU ARE A MISERABLE EXCUSE FOR A HERO," which was featured on NPR. My favorite part of the NPR story is when he reads the opening of the book: 

"Be very careful! You're directing the story and the choices you make can result in murder, graduate school enrollment, torture, marriage, post-apocalyptic slavery, unwanted pregnancy, and even temping!"

If you've ever worked as a temp, you know it's right up there with post-apocalyptic slavery.  I don't usually read fiction, but I'll make an exception when I'm bored. Cute link. 

(From my friend Cammie)

Speed Dressing

Speed Dressing is a commercial for JC Penney created by advertising powerhouse Saatchi & Saatchi.  The ad went public at the 2008 Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, winning a Bronze Film Lion.  It never aired, for fear of offending Middle America.

The ad shows a guy and a girl practicing speed dressing by themselves.  They then join each other and lie to the parental unit, implying they are totally not going to have awkward sex in the basement.  Scandalous, I know.  The ending tagline:

According to Duncan's TV Ad Land, 

"JCPenney, the US department store chain, is playing catch up in the wake of a Bronze Lion being awarded for 'Speed Dressing', a television commercial in which two teenagers prepare for making love in the basement. It appears as though the advertisement was prepared by Saatchi & Saatchi New York and Epoch Films but was never approved by JC Penney, let alone aired on public television. The company is now concerned that the viral spread of the ad will damage their reputation for high standards. Too late!"

Hahaha.  It's a pretty funny ad.  All of the Youtube versions have been taken down so far, so enjoy it while it lasts.

Extreme Hypermiling Guide

The Extreme Hypermiling Guide is an article on Go Green Travel Green that compiles 450+ ways to increase the fuel efficiency of your car.  Driving enthusiast Wayne Gerdes is credited with coining the term "hypermile," which then gave rise to the neologism hypermiling.  I suppose that rhymes with "smiling", thought I originally mis-read that as hypermilling, which is probably what happens when you give grain-millers a large dose of meth. I digress.

Hypermiling is the act of modifying your car or driving habits in order to increase your miles-per-gallon efficiency, exceeding the United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) estimated fuel efficiency for your vehicle.

The Extreme Hypermiling Guide has an ugly design, but very useful tips.  I like their commentary on safe versus non-safe techniques, and worthwhile versus non-worthwhile.  

Safe tips: 

• Watch the crosswalk signs (to know if the light is going to change soon)
  
• Leave room in front of your car (to allow for breaking slowly)
  
• Don’t accelerate too quickly.
  
• Don’t brake if you don’t have to.
  
• Minimize running mechanical and electrical accessories (e.g. air conditioning).
  
• Inflate your tires (to the proper psi according to the manual, or just slightly more; too much more and you can be asking for trouble).
  

Unsafe tips:

• Overinflate tires
  
• Place cardboard over the radiator
  
• Tailgate a truck to reduce wind drag
  
• Death turns (turning off the engine when making 25 mph turn going at 50 mph.)
  

Why do people do this?  At Go Green Travel Green, they're aiming to reduce their carbon footprint, since living-off-the-grid is too hard.  Some people are trying to save any money they can with the rising fuel costs, and/or are naturally stingy.  According to My Money Blog, 

"If you went from say a combined city/highway 22 mpg based on your previous habits to 30 mpg (a 36% increase), and you drove 12,000 miles per year with gas at $3.70/gallon, this would save you $538 over a year. Worth it? Your decision."

Other people just like to drive crazy.  It was interesting to see what driving habits increase or decrease efficiency.  Happy driving. 

(From Bilbao58's flickr, and Digg)

Poop Sign

Poop Sign is a site devoted to selling $8 vinyl poop signs.   It looks like a stop sign, but instead it says poop.  That's it.  Totally inane, and I totally wish I had thought of it. 

Its creator, Chris Yates, seems to have a lot of other artsy projects going on as well.  Chris was born in New Jersey,  got a BFA in sculpture from the Rhode Island School of Design (hey that's where Seth MacFarlane went!) and then moved to Colorado where he currently resides and schemes. 

I like that the site disclaimer says "Video by Harris Porter & Chris Yates, Music by Michael Felix. Please drink responsibly."  Check. 

The part where he falls down and causes an upheaval of stop signs is delightfully cheesy and poorly made, and that's why I love it.  It reminds me of the wacky waving inflatable arm flailing tube man Family Guy bit. They spoof commercials.  Except in this poop sign case, it actually is a commercial, which is self-parodying and meta-weird. 

Metafilter user Saxon Kane points out that their tagline perhaps should have been, "It's like a joke, but it's not funny!" Touché.  Which brings this full circle to what the internets is for.  Pursuing and presenting your grandest ideas, for someone else to poop on. 

(From Mefi)

Caption Competition

Caption Competition is a caption contest site fueled by gorgeous Flickr photos.  Users can submit photos and captions for voting on the UK based site.  The idea is brilliant, the photos are beautiful, the site is well laid-out and I love the pictorial captchas. 

 Some improvement could be made by adding a spell check feature, and more user input.  It has great potential, and the more funny people that log on and throw in their two cents, the funnier the site will get.  Overall: A-.  Enjoy a few winners: 

(From previous TOTI / commentary on photoset )

Grand Theft Auto Board Game

Grand Theft Auto Board Game is a Mad TV sketch spoofing GTA the video game. And GTA the lifestyle. I know what you're thinking, Mat TV making something funny, what are the odds? But just give it a try. Check it:

" ... And Phil Collins." That's why this was the best thing on the Interwebs today.  I love random zingers. 

(From my friend TJ)
PS: I'm on vacation, so I'm going to try and keep this going, but the posts will be decidedly more concise.

With Extra Duck

With Extra Duck is a Flickr photo set of famous paintings with yellow rubber duckies Photoshopped in.  They were uploaded by duck-obsessed London blogger Misty.  She has been adding these since May last year; so far the collection is 44 photos deep and has been viewed 5,866 times. 

My favorite is her take on WF Yeames' 1878 "And When Did You Last See Your Father?" (above).  Mostly because clearly, that was the missing element all along and that child is being interrogated about his wayward rubber ducky.  The contrast between onerous artistic integrity and frivolous pop culture is fantastic. Enjoy a few gems:

(From Metafilter)