Comments for Ten Sites for Finding Wonderful Things

Ten Sites for Finding Wonderful Things

2008-03-14T21:05:20Z

Ten years ago today Jason Kottke launched his influential blog Kottke.org. The site is a fascinating collection of...whatever Kottke cares to post there.

So prescient was his vision of the future of publishing though that today he's married to the co-founder of Blogger.com and can be counted among the earliest pioneers in the present era of online bricolage - the art of assembling diverse found objects.

]]> Bricolage has become one of the most dominant themes of the new online world. The word may be French and unfamiliar, but you see the concept in action every time you read BoingBoing, for example. There are few blogs more widely read than BoingBoing - but it's in tribute to Kottke's 10 year anniversary that we offer the following collection of some our favorite places to discover marvelous things online. All are curated by the careful eyes and hands of one or a few editors, making these sites a different experience than places like Digg, Del.icio.us Popular, PopURLs or elsewhere.

Not only are these types of sites widely read, they are also inspiring a cultural renaissance of bricolage on sites like Tumblr and FFFFound.

Great Sites to Find Fantastic Things

Note: If you are reading this story by RSS, you may not be able to see the dynamic list of recent popular stories from each source. You can click through to the live site to see them. Speaking of RSS, reader Víctor Hernández created a spliced feed of all the blogs below into one at this URL.

BoingBoing

BoingBoing is the biggest mover and shaker here. It's a group blog with an art and politics slant. It's a great place to discover "wonderful things" in large quantities. You probably already knew that, though, because you probably already read BoingBoing.

Recent Popular Posts from BoingBoing

Waxy Links

Waxy Links is the link blog that rides beside Upcoming.org co-founder Andy Baio's blog Waxy.org. Baio has taken to doing investigative blogging on various topics on his main site, but his link blog is a widely loved river of weird. When your link blog is hot enough to have an ad from the uber-boutique ad network The Deck on it, then you know you're a monster.

Recent Popular Items from Waxy Links

Neatorama

Neatorama is a lot like BoingBoing, but a lot less high-brow and a little more fun. Regular games of "What Is It?" challenge readers to identify photographs of old and unusual objects. The whole site is almost a clearinghouse of weird and it's a much quicker read than BoingBoing. The long list of authors is lead by Biochemist Alex Santoso, who started the blog as a hobby in 2005.

Recent Popular Posts from Neatorama

Laughing Squid

Laughing Squid is a great place to find cool art, projects and photography from San Francisco and elsewhere. It's the work of web-hosting company owner and aficionado of cool Scott Beale.

Beale's posts regularly hit the front page of Digg and his excellent photos are regularly ripped off without attribution by mainstream media outlets.

Recent Popular Posts from Laughing Squid

JoshSpear.com

JoshSpear.com is run by "one of the youngest brand strategists in the world," Josh Spear, and has a long list of regular contributors. Spear and crew regularly find some of the coolest art, music, craft, design and marketing projects on the web. In addition to speaking and writing around the world, Spear runs SpearCollective, an artist management collective.

Recent Popular Posts from JoshSpear.com

Fresh Creation

FreshCreation is run by Dutch creative Martijn van Osch. The site collects oddly creative works from around the world and almost always includes a video for every post. FreshCreation was the inspiration for our recent post here on the future of interface design.

Recent Popular Posts from Fresh Creation

PicoCool

PicoCool says it "is dedicated to bringing you tiny bytes and obscure content from the world of peer media, social networks and subcultures. Cool content from real people." Lots of great finds from Etsy and other beautiful, small things. The site is run by web designer Emily Chang, whose company did the new design for RWW.

Recent Popular Posts from Fresh Creation

Swiss Miss

SwissMiss is a widely read design blog written by Swiss transplant to NY Tina Roth Eisenberg. Lots of physical objects here but not exclusively. Eisenberg's discoveries are regularly reblogged by other cool-hunting blogs.

Recent Popular Posts from SwissMiss

NotCot

NotCot is a beautiful site that collects image-based links to projects around the web. The site was founded by UX designer Jean Aw and Web 2.0 loving Cognitive Scientist Danial Frysinger. The site's organization is remarkable as well. Entries are navigable by time, popularity or by random selection.

Recent Popular Posts from NotCot

We Make Money Not Art

we make money not art is a phenomenon that simply must be seen to be believed. Run by an international trio of curators, the site's aesthetic is oddly fascinating. When the word "bricolage" comes up, we make money not art is the first blog that many people think of.

Recent Popular Posts from We Make Money Not Art

Those are some of our favorites. What are yours?

We'd love to know.

Comment from Brian on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T21:47:57Z

uncrate.com has been a consistent favorite of mine.

Comment from Marshall Kirkpatrick on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T21:55:34Z

Brian, that is a very manly site to suggest. :) I hadn't seen Uncrate before this weekend at SXSW when I found out that one of my friends writes there! Small world. Thanks for adding the link.

Comment from M!hai on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:11:05Z

I don't know how you missed http://freshome.com/, a great website that amazes me every time I visit.

Comment from Marshall Kirkpatrick on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:19:21Z

M!hai, we "missed" probably hundreds of great blogs that do this kind of thing. That's what comments are for and thanks for yours, that site does look interesting.

Comment from Kris Hoet on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:27:13Z

Take a look at Veerle's blog on webdesign, she's well known within that community and delivers great tutorials etc on a very beautifully designed blog: http://veerle.duoh.com/

Comment from John on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:33:59Z

I am often pleasantly surprised by http://telstarlogistics.typepad.com/telstarlogistics/

Comment from Marshall Kirkpatrick on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:34:19Z

Kris, thanks for mentioning Veerle! I've worked for an organization whose website she did design for and agree that she's awesome.

Comment from M!hai on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:36:53Z

Marshall please edit my comment, because I've posted the link with a "," at the end. Yes ..there are a lot of websites where you can find interesting things, and for a topic like this you would need a very good research that would take months, to ovserve what are the best website. Personally I love Freshome, and that's why I wanted to recommend it.

Comment from Richard on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T22:48:05Z

I like INQdrop.com. It's a online community for people who want to share their stories and opinions. It' a great distraction from life!

Comment from Matt on 2008-03-14

2008-03-14T23:22:44Z

*suckingup*

One of the best sites for finding cool things? AreDubDub ( http://www.readwriteweb.com ) of course!! i guess it depends on what's "cool" to you.... ;)

*/suckingup*

Comment from Jay on 2008-03-14

2008-03-15T00:09:14Z

I'm a fan of browsing LFSTYL (www.lfstyl.com).

Comment from Internet TV on 2008-03-14

2008-03-15T01:33:11Z

Digg?

Comment from SHv2 on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T09:08:07Z

fun blot where scammers get toyed with.

http://emailscamsarefun.blogspot.com/

Comment from swissmiss on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T11:43:37Z

Thank you for the mention! YAY! Waving from NYC!

Comment from Martijn on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T14:26:39Z

Thanks for adding Fresh Creation to the list!

Good to see that I achieved my goal: inspiring others.

Grtz from Holland ;-)

Comment from Rob on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T15:08:37Z

www.FindLikeMinds.com for the things that influence people.

Comment from The Sleepy Surfer .com on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T16:10:11Z

These sites can be a great help when I want to create videos or design graphics.. sometimes new ideas comes just from readig. and new content that are interesting is one of the best input!

Thanks for sharing this post! I love it

Comment from rachel on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T17:16:38Z

someone should give me an invite to ffffound. :(

loveless@ gmail.com

Comment from pistol on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T17:19:59Z

http://gemssty.com has some interesting 'tidbits' (as it says) from time to time too~

Comment from Jason on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T17:47:11Z

awesome post! I've always wanted animal superpowers. Or maybe I just hoped that someone would randomly come pet me and scratch my belly as I was walking down the street, i always get those two confused...

Comment from K on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T17:54:18Z

really nice list ^^

Comment from Peter Kelly on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T18:09:54Z

haha.nu has some really fun stuff. a lot of vids. They showed an artists work, Nanami Cowdroy, who was so talented, I hired her to design a tattoo for me.

Comment from Andy Baio on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T18:25:30Z

Aw, you guys are sweet. Thanks for the linky love, Marshall.

Comment from gavin on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T19:19:09Z

roaming the US and the world for cool stuff. my new fav site for beauty/art/and ads. please visit my site and email me to say hi! http://www.gavinwassung.com

Comment from gavin on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T19:20:01Z

thecoolhunter.net

Comment from richard on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T19:31:17Z

We cover one amazingly cool thing every day at http://fresharrival.com

Comment from Mike on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T19:32:31Z

I think that http://amomentofawesome.com is a great (although newer) site for finding awesome stuff!

Comment from Allie on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T20:05:21Z

I am going to suggest Open Culture (www.oculture.com) where you can find podcasts and videos that will make you smarter. It includes free audiobooks, free foreign language lessons, free online courses, and smart YouTube video collections.
Here are some links to good pages:

http://www.oculture.com/2006/10/audio_book_podc.html

http://www.oculture.com/2007/07/freeonlinecourses.html

http://www.oculture.com/2006/10/foreign_languag.html

http://www.oculture.com/2008/03/youtubesmartvideos.html

Comment from Adam on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T20:51:40Z

http://www.bestsnippets.com has nice collection of cool, funny stuff too.

Comment from Jimmy on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T21:24:24Z

I have a mashup of digg, reddit, delicious and a bunch of other sites at http://www.jimmyr.com/

Comment from sadegazoz on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T21:30:42Z

www.bulentongun.com looks promising

Comment from Neatorama on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T21:56:23Z

Thanks for including us!

Comment from Dimitri Sokolov on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T22:21:19Z

http://www.subbmitt.com

Comment from Scott K on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T22:24:47Z

For my weird/wonderful things, I read:
Neatorama
Boing Boing
Ectomo
Nothing to Do With Arbroath
Dave Barry's Blog
Dark Roasted Blend
Mental Floss
Brass Goggles
Cynical-C
Dethroner
Infosthetics
MAKEblog
Making Light (the Nielsen Haydens' blog)
Neil Gaiman's blog
Warren Ellis's blog

Comment from Yury Akulin : logo design on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T22:37:02Z

It's strange that you don't have FFFound.com on your list.

Comment from sara beth on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T22:44:48Z

inspire me now! (http://szymon.tumblr.com/)
have you seen this?! (http://ohhaveyouseenthis.blogspot.com)
bevel and boss (http://bevelandboss.blogspot.com/)
are all pretty wonderful. :)

Comment from wwew on 2008-03-15

2008-03-15T23:48:45Z

josh spear?

maybe if you're into reading a steady stream of shilling for overpriced, corny-ass crap nobody needs. oooo, new colorways for some wack ass sneakers!

its like reading the ads in a magazine and not the articles.

Comment from TD on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T00:44:48Z

Here is a mashup if you can't get to your favorite feed reader.

186kps

Thanks for the great list!

Comment from Incognita Nom de Plume on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T00:50:30Z

I'm not sure HOW you could have missed the truly wonderful'Proceedings of the Athanasius Kircher Society' http://www.kirchersociety.org/ and, for Japanese strangeness, 'Pink Tentacle'http://www.pinktentacle.com -- these are my 2 most go-to blogs...but perhaps I just have minority tastes....

Comment from Torley on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T02:19:45Z

In itself, this page is a wonderful thing! I really appreciate the inline, live RSS feeds — great idea. Only thing, I wish there were more visuals to catch my eyes! Thanx for this compilation. :)

Comment from Marshall Kirkpatrick on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T02:41:37Z

Thank you all so much for all these suggestions! Really great to discover these sites in comments that I didn't know about before.

Comment from Shrike on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T03:39:17Z

www.damninteresting.com

It's only updated every week or so, but I have never been disappointed with a post. Articles from obscure science and history topics that provide some of the most fascinating reading I've ever seen on the net.

Comment from robby on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T03:41:18Z

I'm a fan of albotas.com. Stands for 'a little bit on the awesome side'. They have news on random stuff like art, toys, movies, comics, japan, video games, gadgets. It's pretty much every site on the internet (that isn't porn) smushed together.

Comment from amanda, herself on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T03:53:41Z

Shameless beg for ffffound.com invite. God I've been regularly using this site for over a year and CAN NOT find anyone with an invite -it kills me! (that should say something about how great it is)

pees oh pees

[/crying]

cellardoor504@gmail.com

Comment from Romke on 2008-03-15

2008-03-16T06:30:35Z

If you're interested in anything French you're going to love www.frogsmoke.com

Comment from Seb on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T10:28:19Z

I try to highlight cool stuff on my site here:

www.CONTEMPOZINE.com - men clothing stores

Comment from hearsetrax on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T11:04:28Z

U forgot about http://growabrain.typepad.com
http://bornrich.org

Comment from mekon on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T11:13:00Z

Metafilter. Perfect....

Comment from db on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T11:36:50Z

www.blather.net

Comment from Timothy on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T11:57:48Z

A Welsh View (xo.typepad.com) is really good, together with "Blame it on the Voices"(http://blameitonthevoices.blogspot.com/) but my favourite is "aboutcolonblank"(www.aboutcolonblank.com).

Comment from Lynn on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T13:44:23Z

A few more great link blogs:

http://www.darkroastedblend.com/

http://growabrain.typepad.com/growabrain/

http://seehere.blogspot.com/

http://nyplep.blogspot.com/

http://www.random-good-stuff.com/

http://spluch.blogspot.com/

Comment from Syed Syahrul on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T16:05:44Z

You got a nice list going on there, but can still add some more.

Syed
http://sirehdancengkeh.com

Comment from curtrock on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T16:22:27Z

http://www.chucksweirdworld.com presents mainstream news and pop culture that, if you didn't already realize was weird, interesting, unbelievable, outrageous, poignant, stupid or really cool...you will! Visit today!

Comment from Peter on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T16:49:40Z

It's in spanish, but you can find wonderful and weird things there:
http://miraycalla.blogspot.com/

Comment from Zeugma on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T22:00:33Z

My personal favorites :
after BoingBoing, Neatorama and BBGadgets :
pink tentacle ( http://www.pinktentacle.com/ )
Tokyomango ( http://www.tokyomango.com/ )
MAKE:Blog ( http://makezine.com/blog/ )
The Raw Feed ( http://www.therawfeed.com/ )
TrustedReviews ( http://www.trustedreviews.com/ )
and
Shiny Shiny ( http://www.shinyshiny.tv/ )

plus a lot more in french, english or japanese.... :)

Comment from Scott Beale on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T22:01:27Z

Thanks for including us Marshall. RWW rocks!

Comment from Differentiate on 2008-03-16

2008-03-16T23:19:02Z

NOT ONE OF THESE WEBSITES COMPARES TO WHAT I AM ABOUT TO SHARE WITH YOU.

I am totally going to make ALL of your days.

In terms of the sheer magnitude of content and ease of perusal, I will now share with all of you the greatest and most terrible secret of the web.

http://theweblist.net/

WEBLIST FTW thank me now curse me later
you'll all become addicts.

Comment from steveballmer on 2008-03-16

2008-03-17T00:11:16Z

THE TRUTH:

HTTP://FAKESTEVEBALLMER.BLOGSPOT.COM

Comment from William Sanchez on 2008-03-16

2008-03-17T03:42:54Z

http://omedi.net

Great blog with great layout, from Brazil, in portuguese.

Comment from Anth on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T08:12:06Z

Good selection. I would add a few sites:

- Ursi's Blog ( http://www.ursispaltenstein.ch/blog/weblog.php )
- Bibi's Box ( http://www.bibi.org/box/ )
- Fogonazos ( http://fogonazos.blogspot.com/ )
- Mira y Calla ( http://miraycalla.blogspot.com/ )
- The Presurfer ( http://presurfer.blogspot.com/ )
- BibliOdyssey ( http://bibliodyssey.blogspot.com/ )

Comment from Steve on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T09:19:52Z

I hope one day my website will make it on a list like this.

www.redeyeblog.com

Comment from Isabelle on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T14:44:30Z

http://girlinthegreendress.blogspot.com

Comment from Susi on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T14:55:29Z

What a great list - it's saved so that I can take a proper look at everything suggested in my own time.
And Zeugma, thanks for the Shiny Shiny add - we love you too!

Comment from Fanboy on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T15:06:20Z

http://www.linedandunlined.com is a wonderfully intelligent place to find new and interesting things.

Comment from Marc on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T16:48:37Z

http://www.fubiz.net - Daily dose of inspiration

Comment from Alex on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T17:04:18Z

Thanks!
Great and fantastic collection!

Comment from jean/NOTCOT on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T19:09:46Z

Thanks for including NOTCOT.org!!! I'm honored we made your list!

Comment from Tom on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T20:39:32Z

http//amplesanity.com - interesting mixture daily (and when you click on a link she shows, you're taken to a new web page - all the bloggers should do this). For you Anne. A loyal reader.

Comment from Tom on 2008-03-17

2008-03-17T20:43:34Z

Oops! http://amplesanity.com - sorry!

Comment from Rachel on 2008-03-17

2008-03-18T03:26:02Z

Great list you have here. Here's one that I visit everyday when I'm in the office:

http://blankanvas.bypatlaw.com/

Pat is an advertising girl with absolutely dry wit that will knock your socks off. A must have office fix.

Comment from jenny, bloggess on 2008-03-18

2008-03-18T16:07:53Z

http://www.sk-rt.com/

Digg for girls.

Comment from Jeremy Watkins on 2008-03-18

2008-03-18T18:40:28Z

My current favourite has to be http://www.makeuseof.com . A tech blog but very well written and very useful.

Comment from kaklong on 2008-03-20

2008-03-21T01:53:24Z

i never know those websites existed! lol.. glad i stumbled on your website today. more cool stuff for me to ponder on =)

Comment from Wade on 2008-03-20

2008-03-21T02:27:33Z

Thanks a lot! I love sites like this that show me wonderful things!

Comment from Srinivas on 2008-03-27

2008-03-27T12:01:39Z

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Comment from Mark on 2008-03-29

2008-03-29T23:47:20Z

My favorite web 2.0 blog is: The Clever Sheep
http://thecleversheep.blogspot.com/
Helps teaching use current web tech in the classroom and beyond...!

Comment from Lee Helm on 2008-04-01

2008-04-01T23:11:53Z

How can this list exist without http://www.iliketotallyloveit.com?
Social shopping with an attitude. Cool, weird, unusual stuff that you never knew you needed, but suddenly, like totally want. Some examples:

For young parents the Mute Button Pacifier
http://www.iliketotallyloveit.com/miscellaneous/mute-button-pacifier-1/

For party lions the Snap-A-Party Set
http://www.iliketotallyloveit.com/foods/snapparty-1/

For fans of take-out chow the Chinese Takeout Votive And Tealight Holders
http://www.iliketotallyloveit.com/artdesign/chinese-takeout-votive-tealight-holders-1/

Comment from Christina on 2008-04-05

2008-04-06T01:04:54Z

I am partial to two particular blogs for my daily links (I read them both as I eat my cereal every morning):

Coudal Partners (for design, literature and even the occasional music link):

http://www.coudal.com/

Largehearted Boy (his daily Shorties links are filled with news about books, authors, music, and musicians, and a lot of pop culture wonderfulness. Plus, his music downloads and other features keep the site fresh and always interesting):

http://blog.largeheartedboy.com/