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Necessities
Essential
- Your guide to the dense jungle that is the Internet.
- foobar2000
- A very good and non-bloated audio player.
- Winamp
- My second favorite audio player.
- Opera
- My favorite web browser.
- Firefox
- My second favorite web browser.
- Google Chrome
- A browser that is currently in beta. It's looking interesting. I particularly like its intuitive and non-intrusive in-document search.
- XPize
- Makes your XP shine like a neutron star.
- Launchy
- An application launcher.
Reference material
- hyperdictionary
- What does 'defenestration' mean?
- Online Etymology Dictionary
- What's the story behind the word 'campus'?
- HowStuffWorks
- How do UPC bar codes work?
- pinouts.ru
- Can DVI carry analog signals?
- The Phrontistery
- What's an exequy?
- Unwords
- Isn't a hallucidation a contradiction in terms?
- Wikipedia
- What are hot Jupiters?
Editors
- TextPad
- A very good text editor. It does line numbering, keyword highlighting, and regex searching. It doesn't do code folding.
- MetaPad
- MetaPad replaces Notepad.
Utilities
- SIW
- Tells you everything about your computer.
- Microsoft PowerToys
- Small programs that make life in Windows XP happier (I like CmdHere.exe and PowerCalc.exe).
- Sysinternals Suite
- Small programs that make troubleshooting your computer easier.
Gaming
Flash games
- 3D Logic
- Make non-overlapping colored paths on a cube's six faces.
- Gridlock
- Help a brick get out of its room.
- The Hapland series
- Make things work and then escape through a portal.
- Planarity
- Untangle a planar graph.
Other games
- Ballance
- Awesome ball game with neat music.
- Cave Story
- A sweet 2D side-scrolling action-adventure game. You find yourself underground, in a cave system. Be sure to pick up the Deluxe edition, as it contains the OST as MP3s, a level editor, and a small game called Ikachan.
- Elasto Mania
- An unrealistic (and therefore fun) 2D motocross game. See Moposite for replays and high scores.
- Enigma
- A ball game. I mean, a puzzle game. I mean, a dexterity game. I mean, an action game.
- N
- You play a ninja who has to escape rooms by doing what ninjas do best (escaping rooms).
- Narbacular Drop
- The precursor to Valve's Portal.
- Neverball
- A ball game. See Neverball Hall of Fame for replays and high scores.
- Shyguy's Cave of Death
- Pick up coins and avoid everything else.
- Simon Tatham's Portable Puzzle Collection
- A lot of small, fun puzzle games. My favorites are Inertia and Net.
- Sokoban++
- A good clone of the classic Sokoban warehouse game. Push boxes into designated areas.
- StepMania
- An emulator (sort of) for DDR. Hit arrows in sync to the music's beat. See Bemanistyle for music.
- TrackMania Nations
- A free racer. If you like Nations, why don't you consider buying TrackMania United and its prequels? See TMX for more goodies.
- The Ur-Quan Masters
- A mind-blowing science fiction game. UQM is Star Control 2 for modern computers, but it has some extra features like voice acting. Be sure to use The Ultronomicon in your adventures around the Milky Way.
Emulation
- EDuke32
- An emulator for Duke Nukem 3D. Hail to the king, baby!
- Gens
- The de facto Sega Genesis emulator.
- PlayGuy
- The best GameBoy emulator that I've found.
- Tile World
- An emulator for Chip's Challenge. (You need the file chips.dat to play it.)
Gaming help
- GameFAQs
- Helpful user-submitted walkthroughs, maps, and in-depth FAQs for a lot of games.
Gaming encyclopedias
- Encyclopedia Twinsunica
- [Little Big Adventure] Don't get too close to the Supergros.
- The Ultronomicon
- [Ur-Quan Masters] The game doesn't have any form of a tutorial, so you might want to use the Ultronomicon extensively.
- Halopedia
- [The Halo series] Did you realize that Graveminds speak in trochaic heptameter?
- Combine OverWiki
- [The Half-Life series] Did you know that the voice actor of Alyx Vance, Merle Dandridge, also supplies Alyx' face?
- Encyclopedia Hiigara
- [The Homeworld series] Did you know that the Khar-Toba was only one of many exile ships?
People
Friends
I know them very well and talk to them frequently.
- Alex Spurling
- A software developer in England.
- Even Alander
- A student of 3D design with whom I live.
Others
I think these people are interesting.
- Eric S. Raymond
- Maintainer of the Jargon File.
- Jakob Nielsen
- A bi-weekly column dealing with web design.
- Jeff Dee
- An artwork designer known for his work in the AD&D books, as well as an outspoken atheist.
- John Walker
- Founder of Autodesk. His site is huge and contains all manner of interesting things.
- Mindstalk
- A self-described polymath.
- Paul Graham
- Paul Graham is an excellent essayist.
- Phil Plait
- Also known as the Bad Astronomer.
- Sam Hughes
- Things Of Interest, and the title doesn't lie.
- Stephan T. Lavavej
- A software developer at Microsoft. Reading his site was what pushed me into learning HTML and creating a web site of my own.
Cerebal
Science
- Charles Darwin Online
- Contains all things Darwin.
- Kunstformen der Natur
- Insanely high resolution images of the pages from this famous book by Ernst Haeckel. (The title is German and means "Artforms of Nature".)
- talk.origins
- Explains what evolution is all about, and explores evolution/creationism confrontations.
- Ebon Musings
- Reflections beneath the Milky Way.
- Rationally Speaking
- The web site of Massimo Pigliucci.
- RichardDawkins.net
- Contains all things Richard Dawkins (and more).
- Pharyngula
- The blog of PZ Myers, a developmental biologist at the University of Minnesota, Morris.
Books
- LibriVox
- A library of free audio books.
- Project Gutenberg
- A library of books in the public domain.
Audio
Music
- Airbase
- Has an online store of MP3 songs. My Life and Schizofren are awesome.
- Aura
- Has lots of free songs. Breathing Silence and Naked Angel are magical.
- Aural Planet
- Awesome downtempo trance. Blue Water Cave and Have You Ever Been are sweet.
- Labworks
- Labworks makes mostly vocal trance (mmm, female voices). My favorites are Summerbreeze (Aura Remix) and Two Worlds (Airplay Edit).
- Lynne Music
- Bjørn Lynne is best known for composing the music to the Worms games and his site offers a selection of songs for download.
- NiCe Music
- Has lots of hours-long mixes. Yummy.
- Shadow of the Beat
- Makes drum-and-bass-ish music.
- Sonic Mayhem
- Makes action-type music.
- Xerxes Music
- Downtempo electronic-type music.
Remix sites
- VGMix
- Hosts lots of quality remixes for game music.
- Hybridized
- Has tons of hour-long mixes. Great stuff for having in the background when working.
Collection sites
- Galbadia Hotel
- Look no further for game OSTs and anime music.
Podcasts
- Point of Inquiry
- PoI interviews prominent intellectuals, philosophers, and scientists.
- The Thomas Jefferson Hour
- A weekly podcast dealing with Thomas Jefferson and his views. The show is made by a scholar impersonating Jefferson being interviewed.
Visual
Exploration
- Google Earth
- Lets you explore the Earth.
- World Wind
- Also lets you explore the Earth, but with more statistics.
- Celestia
- Lets you explore the universe. Check out The Celestia Motherlode for things with which to populate that virtual universe.
Art
- deviantART
- Lots of amateur art. You can buy prints (I have four).
- Bathsheba Grossman
- Grossman makes mathematical art (I own the Large Scale Model).
- Art of Greg Martin
- Makes neato space pictures.
deviantART
- alexiuss
- Draws majestic characters and apocalyptic scenery.
- Artgerm
- Draws wonderfully pretty ladies.
- daggerpoint
- Draws super hero-type women and plain pretty women. (Not all SFW.)
- DKF
- Mostly space renderings.
- mr-mister
- Draws strong women. Sexy!
- Philipstraub
- Awesome vistas.
- PolishPanties
- Draws awesome manga, but unfortunately the gallery is tiny.
- reiq
- Draws mostly NSFW women.
- spirapride
- Draws various things, including pretty women, Final Fantasy, and Ninja Gaiden.
Images
- Visible Earth
- Our planet is grand and beautiful.
Video
- Beyond Belief I and II
- Two very interesting annual symposia on science and religion. The first is vastly superior to the second, but Peter Atkins made the second one not suck. (I can't wait for the third.)
- Loading-Ready-Run
- Canadian sketch comedy group.
- the show with Ze Frank
- A discontinued show about news and stuff. (Ze Frank is my Dear and Glorious Leader!)
- Growing Up in the Universe
- A children's lecture on evolution by natural selection, I mean by Richard Dawkins.
Various
Physics
- Animating Fracture
- I, for one, want to shoot steel balls through walls of ceramic and PVC.
- Gravitas
- I, for one, want to hurl galaxies at each other.
- Falling Sand Game
- I, for one, want to watch sand and other miscellaneous particles fall.
- Ronald Fedkiw's simulations
- I, for one, want to serve water from a hollow Buddha statue.
Online comics
Daily
- Cyanide and Happiness
- A stick-figure comic with revoltingly funny jokes. Therefore, only mature minds should read it.
MWF (or other three-days-a-week schedule)
- Cectic
- Skepticism in comic form.
- Decorum
- Geeky comic about life, the universe, and subatomic particles.
- Penny Arcade
- Canonical reading for any gamer.
- The Warehouse
- OONTZ-OONTZ-OONTZ-OONTZ
- xkcd
- Some nights typing "*hug*" just doesn't cut it.
Weekly
- Simulated Comic Production
- Cautionary tales.
Haphazard
- Dresden Codak
- What you get when you are high on science.
- f8d
- Minimalist musings on various things of interest.
- LegoRobot
- Weird and incredibly hilarious stories about unstable people.
- Miscellanea
- Flow diagrams and funny slides.
- Nearing Zero
- Jokes for nerds, jokes for nerds.
- Pixel
- What if pixels had philosophy?
- Subnormality
- Crazy stuff in everyday life.
- VG Cats
- Funny cats making comments on games.
Frozen
- Big Science and Proverbs
- Two discontinued comics by Albert Sweigart which ran in The Daily Texan, a student newspaper of The University of Texas at Austin. I think almost all of the Big Science ones are hilarious. Proverbs occasionally falls flat.
- Concerned
- A comic about an alternate story for Half-Life 2 (sadly discontinued).