This site is made possible by member support. 💞
Big thanks to Arcustech for hosting the site and offering amazing tech support.
When you buy through links on kottke.org, I may earn an affiliate commission. Thanks for supporting the site!
kottke.org. home of fine hypertext products since 1998.
Beloved by 86.47% of the web.
Are you ready? I said, ARE YOU READY? End-of-the-year list season has begun!! Woo! Let’s get it started with Information Leafblower’s list of the top 40 bands in America as chosen by a bunch of music bloggers. Lots of guitar music that the indie rock kids like so much.
The NY Times asks a bunch of comedians: Which five comedies would you want to take with you if you were stranded alone on a desert island? My list: Dr. Strangelove, Zoolander, Office Space, Election, and Ace Ventura: Pet Detective.
Five great fight scenes from movies. I’m not a connoisseur of movie fight scenes, so I don’t have much to add to this list, but I’m glad Jackie Chan made the cut.
Top 100 photos taken by the Hubble Space Telescope, a singularly talented photographer.
A list of 20 works of art you need to see before you die. They want to make a list of 50…suggest your favorites in the comments.
The Royal Institution of London has named Primo Levi’s The Periodic Table the best science book ever written. Other authors in the running: Oliver Sacks, Steven Pinker, and Richard Dawkins.
Five great movie monologues. #1 is Merkin Muffley talking to Dmitri on the phone in Dr. Strangelove…one of my favorite scenes of any movie ever.
List of the 7 worst fonts. What, no Hobo or Brush Script? Comic Sans is, of course, #1 with a bullet. (via wider angle)
Top 100 most popular classical music pieces, featuring stuff like Beethoven’s 5th, Pomp and Circumstance, and Mozart’s Eine Kleine Nachtmusik.
Surprisingly good list of the top 10 Web 2.0 losers. It’s too early to pass judgement on Netscape (the site has shot to the top of Google search results for current events keywords because of the site’s high PageRank) and SixApart’s inclusion is wrong. The top four spots are right on; the Odeo situation is sad (I thought they were really onto something), but Flock, Edgeio, and Squidoo seemed not quite equal to the hype right from the beginning.
Stylus magazine has a list of their top 100 favorite videos, complete with embedded YouTube clips of the videos themselves for your instant gratification. Ok, now let’s fight about what was excluded and how wrong that is… (via paul)
Megnut’s got the scoop: Gourmet magazine has named Alinea the best restaurant in the US, amazing considering its only been open a little more than a year. “[Grant Achatz] is redefining the American restaurant once again for an entirely new generation. And that — more than his gorgeous, inventive, and delicious food — is what makes Alinea the got-to-go-to restaurant in the country right now.” (I would argue that the food is the real reason to go, but whatever…)
A list of the 50 worst things ever to happen to music, from Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band (#50) to Suge Knight (#2)…I won’t spoil #1.
Film critic Jim Emerson is collecting great opening shots from movies, including Star Wars, Primer, and Annie Hall. Do you have any favorites that Emerson hasn’t covered yet?
Just started: a list of the 10,000 reasons civilization is doomed.
Update: Shortly after I posted this link, someone added “kottke.org” as Reason #185. (thx, connor)
What’s the greatest software ever written? Google, Mosaic, Sabre, and the Apollo guidence system make the top 12.
This Wikipedia article is keeping track of the largest photographs in the world. Currently, that record is held by a group who turned a jet hanger into a giant camera, producing a single-shot image 32 feet high and 111 feet wide. See also Ian Albert’s collection of colossal images.
The Observer lists 15 web sites that changed the world, including Google, Wikipedia, Blogger, and Amazon. (thx, dylan)
Top 50 movies (by gross) that were never in wide release in the US. Top 3: Rocky Horror, Boyz n the Hood, and Royal Tenenbaums.
The top 50 movie endings of all time. “We’re not talking about the last half hour. We mean the last minute of movie. You know, the ending.” Needless to say, spoilers. (via cyn-c)
List of easily mispronouncable domain names. I’ve always beeen partial to WhoRepresents.com (or whorepresents.com).
The IHT compiles a list of the best and worst moments and memories from the 2006 World Cup.
Zidane won the Golden Ball award, awarded by journalists to the best player of the tournament. Most of the voting for the award came before halftime of the final. Miroslav Klose’s five goals gave him the Golden Boot as the tournament’s top scorer.
List of the top 5 most popular blogs written by scientists. Here’s the top 50 and a list of popular science blogs written by non-scientists. What’s clear is that the blog reading public doesn’t care that much for science…more people probably read Engadget than all of the top 50 science blogs combined.
List of the 10 most beautiful OS X apps. Newsfire is a well-deserved second.
The 10 greatest years in gaming. I’ll always be partial to 1986.
Socials & More