Where I Go on the Web

There are, naturally, a plethora of good places to visit on the Web; whole services (like Yahoo's "Cool Site of the Month" mailing list) exist and even profit off the rapid and unchartable growth of the Internet. Daily, new pages are being built, updated, removed, and outdated, and it's impossible to keep track of what's hot or not. To this end, I've compiled a list of those places I visit most often and from which I've derived the most pleasure. A few of these are just silly time-wasters, but others are genuinely useful for anyone considering mind-enrichment or a lifetime in cyberspace.

• The TUCOWS Software Database
  One of the oldest and most respected collections of shareware and freeware on the 'Net, TUCOWS virus-checks all of its software and routinely updates its database; although it's no longer as encyclopedic as it once was and is rivalled by places like CNet and the WinSite Archive, it's still an excellent source for HTML authoring programs, Web phone software, graphics editors, and just about anything else you'd need. Probably ninety percent of the utilities on my computer are from TUCOWS, and I keep going back there for more.
• Java On-Line Magnetic Poetry
  For those of you who don't have a fridge or have an extremely sensitive pacemaker, there's a Java applet -- the code for which has been made publically available by its way-cool programmer -- that'll let you experience the fun the rest of us have been having with Magnetic Poetry for the last five years.
• The Illuminated Site of the Week
  A tongue-in-cheek "expose" of the various plots and schemes that lie behind the facade of human society, the ISW (maintained by Steve Jackson Games, an excellent publishing company who also happens to be a good source for the extremely hard-to-find Principia Discordia and Illuminatus Trilogy) is actually an archived list of some of the most hip, Uber-cool, and occasionally creepy (as in, "I can't believe someone actually thought this") sites on the Web -- from a page about the significance of the Easter Bunny to a whole treatise "explaining" how and why string cheese was created by aliens.
• Autopilot: How to Get From Here to There
  A cheesy site otherwise, Autopilot provides one extremely useful applet for those of us who like to drive -- and something I've used more times than I can count: you can get complete, step-by-step directions between any two cities in the continental United States (even accounting for tolls, bridges, and scenic routes). It's a free service, and the code for the applet is also publically available; note, however, that the information is only occasionally updated, so it may not reflect recent construction along the way.
• The Theban Mapping Project
  Someone, God knows who, had the brilliant idea of documenting the complete and on-going history of a fascinating Egyptian archaeological dig. Photographics, maps with expanding levels of detail, and clickable information from the obscure to the silly are all available here, as are one or two other links to other sites of interest. In my opinion, it's a lot neater than that silly Mars Explorer webcam thing.
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• Looking Out a Plastic Castle
  Okay, so it's a shameless plug -- but I really do think that I've got a good book assembled, and I probably spend more time on these pages than any others. So take a look at it and give me your opinion, 'k?
• Excite
  Yes, it's an openly commercial and occasionally annoying portal -- but it's probably the most configurable and flexible of the ones out there. While the search engine isn't all that great, I find that its news filters, comics links, and other features far surpass other "personalized" services offered by the likes of CNN and Yahoo.
• Salon Magazine
  Salon is, in my opinion, the best and most erudite of the various "variety" 'zines on the Web. Offering a wide variety of political viewpoints and free from many of the commercial failings of the traditional papers, Salon often -- but not always; some of its features, like the "Wanderlust" bit, a weekly column about good sex had by poor travelers, are awful -- fills that aching void many of us have where a decent magazine should be. It's free, too, although they recently adopted a "Premium" service following the implosion of the stock market.
• Suck
  You want to visit Suck. Here's how this works: news arrives on the 'Net, usually through a service like Excite. The good but lazy people at Salon then write an insightful commentary about the day-old news. A day later, the better but even lazier satirists at Suck point out how silly the people at Salon are, but they use cartoons. Besides, the Suck staff basically pioneered the whole idea of "in-line" text links in 'Net journalism a few years ago, if you can call what they do journalism. I'm not sure whether I should be using the past tense now or not, sadly, as Suck's parent company has finally gone under and left it to die; only time will tell.
• Sluggy Freelance
  Has there been something missing from your life since the demise of Bloom County? Have you been looking for a funny, sardonic, well-drawn, and extremely weird comic about a boy, the girl next door, the socially maladjusted but technically brilliant son of a transparent Dr. Laura imitation, a cute ferret, and a sadistic, unstoppably murderous rabbit? Would you like plotlines about alien invasion, first dates, and vampirism? Would you like nearly two years of archived cartoons, all produced for free as a labor of love? IS IT NOT NIFTY? (Note: that's a rhetorical question. It is nifty.)
• DiscworldMUD
  Years ago, back in the Stone Age, before we had all these newfangled graphics running around, people who wanted to play RPGs on the 'Net generally logged onto MUDs or MUSHes: text-based environments that were basically like highly enhanced chat rooms. I don't MUD much anymore, but I'm a huge fan of Terry Pratchett and so had to check this place out about two years ago. I never left. The designers have managed to perfectly capture the wit and humor of the Discworld books while adapting them to a massively multiplayer -- and text-only -- world. This Web page both offers the Discworld discussion boards AND a last-resort Java telnet client that allows you to play the MUD over the Web; to really enjoy it, though, you'll want to download something like GMUD or ZMUD.
• L-Space
  Did I mention that I loved Terry Pratchett? Did you go "Who's Terry Pratchett?"
• The Simpsons Archive
  If you've ever wished that you could have just about every Simpsons script from the entire course of the series at your fingertips, complete with scene analysis and frame-by-frame breakdowns, this is a site you'll enjoy. If you haven't wished this, you'll probably be frightened.