headspace (user#8924) is a published author and screenwriter who has written a story that was nominated for this year's Pushcart Prize. She has an attractive blog with short pithy posts and long serious posts. I like her opinions on fair use and her list of books she has checked out from the library.
Ok, so Spatch's (User #30183) site seems kind of defunct, and the front page blog posts are of limited interest, but there is brilliance here. Minor brilliance in Martha the Pirate Cat, minor brilliance and black comedy in Oh Die Menschlichkeit, minor brilliance in the love song (mp3) I Do To, and MAJOR brilliance in Cattown! (Ok, the first episode you see will be the best, but it's very funny.) There are also interactive text games, writing, in short, a lot of good stuff.
jarrodtrainque (User #19939) has his site over at Jarrod Trainque. I like the front page a lot, for it's simplicity, mostly. That's the best thing about the site, though. There are some links which are pretty interesting, and directions to all the other places jarrodtrainque spends time on the web.
quibx (User #15338) collects Japanese robot toys. He's got a site reviewing them, and while it isn't all that pretty, it has a ton of reviews. He's now able to incorporate clips from anime's showing the character that the figure represents. That's pretty cool. The power animals are also cool. It isn't all anime figures, though, there's also stuff like the Playmobile Scary Ghost.
Sites like this, which demonstrate such sustained attention and knowledge are always impressive to me. I think they are one of the best things about the internet, no matter their subject matter, because they expose those of us not, say, obsessed with Japanese robot toys, to a whole new world.
kokogiak (User #1747) has a cool site that was linked on the MeFi front page today. His picture of all the known bodies in the solar system larger than 200 miles in diameter, ranked by size, is stunning. But that's just the tip of the iceberg! He's made a bunch of stuff, from a way to overlay two Google maps, to this awesome list of mega-fauna, to a visualizer for huge amounts of pennies. This is just a sampling of the neat hacks and projects on his page, for instance, be sure to go searching for the MegaMoo.
paxton (user #29772) came to my attention for mentioning that he bought a clawfoot tub for $100 on craigslist. He lives near where I grew up, in Worcester Mass, or as we all liked to call it: wuh-STA! His blog, RadioBall (what does the name mean? nothing much.) is full of all things Worcester (and non-) from talk about the incoming Wal-Mart to an odd observation concerning censorship of ... well you read it. He's also veep to the Vice-Chair of the Worcester Cultural Commission and, according to his "who is this jerk" page, handsome.
carsonb (User #7721) has a little blog with a bunch of mixes and little stories, but he hasn't updated it in quite a while. He's still bopping around on MySpace though.
dobbs's (User #13877) site is great. The splash page is a bit intimidating, demanding an email address, but the links at the top (check WTF? to figure out WTF) lead to an explanation and some archived writings from what turns out to be a splendid email list. After reading bits from the archives (I liked I'm on Fire, and check out Untitled #6) I signed up for the list. The writing from his Victory Shag project is also quite good: I don't want to know if this is truth or fiction, but it's a hell of a story. And, to top it all off, the music link has a great set of songs available. I hadn't heard The Handsome Family before, but after reading the Sally Timms story, I had to hear, and they're great!
dong_resin (User #8895) has an infrequently updated joint. It's a shame, because what's here is good. I laughed out loud at this post about why Steve Irwin was right to hold his baby while feeding that croc, and I think Dong Resin vs. Altoids Cinnamon Chewing Gum shows flashes of brilliance. In general, the archives are worth trolling through. The links in the side bar and along the bottom of the page are almost all excellent.
mmhaffie (User #17538) has a personal site where he records thoughts and displays photographs. His pictures, many of which are of natural scenes, are charming. I particularly liked this one of some snow hiding out under a bench.
miss lynster's (User #20640) site is a cute send-up of the notion of the patron saint. There are six saints represented here: Anxiete, Concepta, Exacto, Pantone, Pixela and, my favorite, Typo. The stories and pictures are well-done, and there's a cafepress store for your reliquary needs. You can even get the saints as a desktop icons for a free download.
amyms' (User #47328) site is the home page for MSN's The World of Rock and Roll group. Apparently you can join it. There's some information here, but the design is so poor that it makes my head hurt.
grapefruitmoon (user #19856) is an artist who likes cold places. She's been to some of the same places as me, including Vermont and Hampshire College. She has an art site up called nervousmotion with the Projekt30 people and she's been showing her work at AS220 in Providence this month. She does collage work including two sets of Iceland-inspired pieces.
Wendell (user #206) is one of those rare people who has a humor site that is actually very funny. He had a tripod site back in ancient blogger days and now he's got an empire. Great satire, awesome repartee, and the odd gross graphic or two add up to a funny site by a funny (funny ha ha, mostly) man.
TonyRobots (user #20429) had an old website with a broken poetry machine and a functional bunny machine. I like playing the number stumper game with single digit numbers. He's got a blog now which sings Aaron Neville at you. He also has a CitrusFortress, but I don't know what it does; looks fun though.
younggreenanne (User #26312) has a short, pithy site that reads like a personal ad.
freudianslipper's (User #20325) site chronicles his travails as a working actor. He does a good job of describing the joys and pains of trying to get acting gigs, from getting a call to perform in an Arthur Miller read-through, to flubbing a line at an audition.
jonson (User #14271) should need little introduction, he's one of MetaFilter's best posters. His posts display range and depth, but, most of all, wit. His blog is no different. While his presentation in 'Cory Doctorow should be punched in the nuts' might be a bit abrasive, it's hard to argue with his reasoning, or with the conclusions he comes to. His memories of growing up are worth reading (who wasn't similarly underwhelmed by the square egg machine), and his interspersed links are always great.
Crushinator's (User #22693) site is a link to her livejournal page, which is mostly made up of snapshots of her and her friends. They aren't bad snapshots.
Hip Mama appears to be a website started by susanbeeswax (User #18123) (I get confused by possible changing pseudonyms). It's a cool idea, but a bit frenetic. It's pretty much about being, well, a hip mama, in the procreating sense. Not something I'm likely to achieve, despite being told I can be anything I want to be while I was growing up. I found this post (Where's the Love?) quite affecting.
owhydididoit (User #41046) has a small vox blog that artfully combines photographs and descriptions of his wandering. This truck full of shoes is compelling, but the nature shots are the best part of the site.
mygothlaundry (User #17735) has, in addition to a great username, a very personal site filled with writings about her life. She writes well, her insights are almost always worth reading, and her daily photographs are often very good. (See this shot of daffodils at night.) One of the best things about the site is the wry way that she talks about her kids: there's plenty of love, but little awe. It's refreshing.
I may be in love. thomas j wise's (User #1296) site, The Little Professor, is excellent and far exceeds the diminutive. Much of the blog is outside of my expertise, but it's still well-written and interesting to read. The personal touches (blogging about cats, turning me on to another great crime writer) are judiciously spaced and worth searching out. Check out this cool Victorian Halloween post; and this advice to grad student book buyers is commonsensical but good. I'm charmed by the whole extensive project. The side-bar is also fabulous.
The excellent Faint of Butt (User #18128) has an excellent site dedicated to publishing short short horror stories. "Short stories. Endless nightmares." There are about 200 stories here, but they're all quick reads, many of which send a little chill up the spine. I like Fun Fun Fun, particularly, and also Death by Needlepoint. I have to admit that Bad Santa was the story that gave me the biggest frission of horror.
(The whole site reminds me of the extremely excellent, defunct website, Plots with Guns.)
Ufez Jones (User #12849) just lists his delicious page as his site. It's got some good links on it, but then so do most delicious pages.
Any website where the tag line is "Refenestration Daily" is alright by me. (Although, actually, if I see it on another site I'll be really disappointed.) Alex Handcoding (User #20487) has a nice, personal blog that contains well-written comments on his daily life, and the news, as well as links to his photographs. His design is clean and smooth, the writing is decent, and the archives go on forever. A good sort of personal site.
chasing's (user #20052) Auscillate.com is filled with insightful and interesting posts, like this recent one on the DPRK, with cool stuff hidden away in the archives, like this Tufte Jersey Generator. Check out the gloryhole tapes for all the, well, glory, of a three day ride to Burning Man. His photo galleries are good, as well.
A personal site with a bit of everything, from programming CSS to music musings, willc's (User #18114) site seems innocuous on its face. There is a dark underbelly, however. On the sidebar are links to his other sites: the incisive magazine reviews at Dumpworthy, the fabulous mp3s at his music site, and the very disturbing pictures at My Nail Collection. The latter is essential viewing.
moonbird's (User #16767) blog is a collection of personal musings, links to songs and videos, commentary on politics and science, and some interesting synopses of the latest brain science. I particularly like this breakdown of some of the problems, including explicit homophobia, with the movie '300', which I haven't seen yet, but which strikes me as the most blatant race-baiting going.
cortex (User #7418) Josh Millard Speaks! WTF can I say? I've been avoiding reviewing his site, I've had this post in draft for two weeks, but now he's a mod and I guess I can't avoid the matter anymore.
I mean, certainly you must pay attention to cortex's RPM Challenge album (the David Bowie song is a masterpiece!), and what MeFite doesn't know about 88 lines (here is where I say how disappointed I was not to get a mention). The problem is that this page is just the tip of the cortex media empire, and it's all great! Check his side bar for his other sites, although my current favorite, Pen and Inklings, isn't yet listed.
What I'm trying to say, without being coy, and with too many words, is that JM's website is the model for project driven quality websites. Absolutely fabulous.
gnfti (User #20191) a self-described Child of the Eternal November has several websites. I can't review his Dutch blog, as I don't speak dutch, and his music recording blog seems a bit stalled, but Wolkenvelden looks like it's still going strong. (The index page is really quite nice.)
I'll admit that I've been dreading reviewing it, precisely because I like the songs and the attitude so well. Any bio page that begins
If 2006 were 1920, and Holland were Ireland, Paul Hunt would be drunkenly strolling along the banks of the Liffey, taking off his hat for beautiful women and turning his Dublin encounters into brilliant, unintelligible proseis alright by me, even if it smacks a bit of heresy. This website is one that I always wish were updated more frequently, because I like it so well.
gloege's (User #10472) minimal site is nothing but a pretty cool picture. The page title is nice, though: "Life is a journey. Fuck the destination." I don't particularly agree with the sentiment, except in the sly sense that death is the destination, but I like the boldness of that as a page title.
dsaint (User #12740) has been a member since 2001, but has never made a comment or post. There isn't a lot on the front page of his website, but what's there is interesting. The small side-bar has some good stuff. His projects page looks like it could produce some promising stuff, sometime.
letourneau's (User #1208) website is simple and well-designed. It amounts to three lists, the predominant two are feeds from his Flickr and delicious accounts, with brief commentary on each entry. The third is a link to his Amazon wishlist. It all provides what I don't doubt is a deceptively complete picture of his interests and concerns.
The venerable chicobangs's (User #1010) Vox blog is mostly a place where he recaps the action at his weekly NYC trivia night, Drunken Smartass Olympics. There are enough little gems salted away on the pages here, however, to make it worth a trip through. Of particular note are this Randy Newman song, which I found quite affecting, and this strange comic of Emily Dickinson.
Sticherbeast's (User #17889) livejournal page has not been updated since the fall of 2006, which is shame, since the collection of links and commentary contained therein is worth reading. His post on Cabinet Magazine links to a load of fascinating articles. The link to his Flickr account is worth following, if for no other reason than to see his vaguely Gorey-esque sketches.
A transplant to the UK from LA, both Los Angeles and Louisiana, Katemonkey (User #17096) has a small personal site that's updated infrequently. There is evidence there of another site she's been working on, also a personal site, which includes more of her writing. She seems to have a good attitude and wide interests, even if her recipes don't always work out.
algreer's (User #35289) site is the portal to his photography business. As with all such businesses, the prosaic predominates. However, his music portfolio, and especially his breakdancing portfolio, are worth a look.
brundlefly (User #17897) @ blacksundae. A well-written, well-designed, reasonably standard collection of commentaries and links. I liked this post about movies a lot, it has just the amount of the wry humor I'm looking for. I love the feed from Wordie (which I didn't previously know about), and I can't believe I didn't know about Ninjawords before. And, y'know, I NEEDED to know about the vagina dentata movie.
The entries that really shine, like this one, tell the personal story of evacuating in the face of Katrina.
