Kate Robinson Interactive Design

I was going to write this week’s post about how awful the new Transformers 2 movie is, but it’s so bad it’s almost beyond description. Long story short—avoid it like the plague.

**Note: I expected the movie to be bad, but this was beyond bad, insulting really.

Anyway, it’s time once again for my top sites of the week. Enjoy.

Flashlight Worthy Books

A nice site with all sorts of book recommendations divided by category.

Readability

This site lets you set settings to make any webpage more readable. Simply pick your settings, drag readability.com to your browsers bookmark toolbar, and when you come to a page you want to read, click on that link in your toolbar. Styles the content in your settings for easy reading.

9 Great UX Presentations

This is more of a specific post than a site, but it has 9 interesting UX presentations. Really interesting and helpful content on most of them.

ZooBorns

If you don’t enjoy this site you have a heart of stone. It’s a blog of baby animals from zoos. It doesn’t get much cuter than this.

UgLeah

This is the personal blog for a UX designer who works at Adaptive Path. It doesn’t get updated too frequently, but when it does, it’s usually worth it.

Tremendous News

This is a funny/snarky blog that covers a variety of topics. Almost every post at least makes me chuckle, if not laugh out loud.

Line 25

This is a great site for web designers, but I enjoyed this post specifically, as my CSS skills (or lack thereof) needed a refresher.

For a Beautiful Web

Again, another specific post, but this one presents an interesting workflow for web design. I’m excited to try this out with my next project.

Pleasure & Pain

This is the website for Whitney Hess, a user experience designer. The over all site is great, but I found this specific post to be very helpful.

Fab 404

This is a nice collection of well designed 404 pages. I definitely need to update mine.

I’d been hearing people talk about the opening movie for the new Beatles Rockband for a few days now so I thought I would check it out. It’s very well done and quite entertaining. If you’ve got some time to spare I’d give a once through.

1. Five Second Test–A quick way to check the immediate usability of your site. Either upload your own image or test others. Quite addicting.
   
2. 90% of Everything–A nice usability blog. I love their dilbert cartoon collection.
   
3. Wolfram Alpha–Need an answer to a mathmatical or scientific question, here’s your source.
   

4. FactCheck.org–Want to check the facts behind a politicians statement. Here’s your resource.
   
5. RunPee.com–For those of you who go to the bathroom during movies, now you’ll know when to go.
   
6. Skimbaco Lifestyle--I’m not usually big on blogs for women by women, but this one is really interesting, funny and full of great resources.
   
7. Tweeting Too Hard–A collection of tweets that are just trying too hard. Quite funny.
   
8. Web Designer Notebook–A nice blog with great resources for web designers.
   
9. Hoo Card–Free online business cards that can be customized on the fly and sent to anyone. Clever and handy.
   

10. Steal Our Ideas–They come up with ideas, you turn them into something.
    

A new week, a new batch of sites.

1. Your Brain on Design—A lovely design blog.
   
2. WattzOn—A site that helps you measure and track your personal energy consumption.
   
   
3. The Colossal Squid–Build your very on interactive squid.
   
   
4. Design Super Hero–An interesting design blog. This post has some wonderfully colorful wallpapers.
   
   
5. Share Some Candy–A nice collection of artwork/furniture/objects, etc for your viewing pleasure.
   
   
6. Environmental Graffiti–I haven’t spent much time on the site, but I do enjoy these images of the space shuttle.
   
7. Cameron Moll–He does fantastic work and I am linking to his handout for his upcoming session at the HOW conference. Wish I could be there.
   
   
8. CheapTweet–If you follow them on Twitter they’ll let you know about the latest and greatest deals. Or you can view all of the deals on their site as well.
   
   
9. Your NPR Name–This is on the list more for this post then the specific website. Determine your NPR name. Mine is Kaete Greve.
   
   
10. Potato Portraits–It’s exactly what you think it is.
    
    

After a hiatus of a couple of weeks the list has returned. This week’s list has some goodies.

1. Mighty Haus–A simple site with cool items for you house. http://mightyhaus.com/
2. News Map–An interesting way to view the news. Color coded layout that changes over time based on article popularity. http://newsmap.jp/
3. Maira Kalman–The blog of artist Maria Kalman. It has some simple, but quite beautiful pieces. http://kalman.blogs.nytimes.com/
4. The Card Observer–A fantastic collection of business cards. Actually makes me want to design some business cards. http://cardobserver.com/
5. Colorize the Web–A site that lets you search websites based on color. A great way to spend some time. http://www.colorgorize.com/
6. Natalie Jost–The website of designer Natalie Jost. She makes some really beautiful patterns. http://nataliejost.com/
7. Web Jackalope–I must say, I’m a sucker for Jackalopes, but I also really enjoyed their post on lazy registration. http://webjackalope.com/
8. Blogs.com–For those of us who love blogs and lists, its the best of both worlds. Lists of blogs by different topics. http://www.blogs.com/
9. Anthony Bourdain Blog–He doesn’t post very frequently, but I love his writing and I’ll take what I can get. http://anthony-bourdain-blog.travelchannel.com/
10. Finelight Interactive–We finally launched our microsite for the interactive division of Finelight. This is version 1, so check back for enhancements over the next few months. http://interactive.finelight.com/

Only 5 new sites this week folks. What can I say, it was a slow web week for me.

• Postmodernbarney.com—An odd site, but this post in particular is pretty interesting–Uncomfortable Plot Summaries. http://www.postmodernbarney.com/2009/04/uncomfortable-plot-summaries/
• Look at this fucking hipster—The name pretty much says it all. http://lookatthisfuckinghipster.tumblr.com/
• Doodlers Anonymous—A website that features a collection of illustrators whose styles are somewhat doodlesque. http://www.doodlersanonymous.com/index.php?entrycatID=1020
• Daytrotter—A super fantastic record label that provides free mp3s of a good chunk of their music. Great artists and great illustrations too. Thanks to Greg for  a heads up to this site. http://www.daytrotter.com/
• 456 Berea Street—A web usability and accessibility blog. Quick and interesting posts for us usability nerds. http://www.456bereastreet.com/

Here are my top sites for the week.

1. Prettify–A site with lots of high quality wallpapers and icons. http://prettify.tumblr.com/
2. Antrepo–The site of a design collective. The most recent post asks what color is the internet. It’s pretty interesting. http://www.a2591.com/
3. Synaptic Stimuli–The name pretty much sums it up–a site with some crazy ass and beautiful imagery. http://synapticstimuli.com/
4. SoulPancake–A site dedicated to providing a forum to discuss life’s big questions. Upload your own question or comment one that has already been posted. http://www.soulpancake.com/
5. Goodness 500–Curious about which companies are the least offensive? The Goodness 500 site will let you know. Plus, the home page is super cute. http://goodness500.org/
6. The Gif Machine–A collection of highly stupid and very funny animated gifs. Thanks to Eric for turning me on to this link. http://gifmachine.blogspot.com/
7. DesignO’Blog–A helpful and interesting design blog with tutorials, interviews and reviews. http://www.nikibrown.com/designoblog/
8. Geezeo–A personal finance site with info and tools to help you budget and save money. I follow them on Twitter @geezeo where they post links to really interesting articles. https://www.geezeo.com/
9. I’m With Sully–The website of the multi-talented designer/illustrator Kim Coles. http://www.imwithsully.com/
10. iPhone Mockup–Need to quickly mock up an iPhone app or just want to play around, then this is the site for you. http://iphonemockup.lkmc.ch/

A new week, a new set of links.

1) 20 x 200–New art weekly, always affordable, though quick to sell out. www.20×200.com

2) Forgotten Chicago–A small site that gives info about Chicago’s disappearing historic architecture. Pretty interesting and not just because I went to the Michael Reese campus the other day.  forgottenchicago.com

3) Hugs for Monsters–I haven’t spent much time with the blog as a whole, but this post is very funny, if you hate IE6. blog.hugsformonsters.com/post/87657240/overly-judgemental-ie6-splash-pages

4) iCodeBlog–As I’ve started trying to create an iphone app, I’ve found this site pretty helpful. icodeblog.com

5) Funny Spoon–A website that gives you simple recipes from name brand items. Probably pretty good if you need to do some quick and simple cooking. www.funnyspoon.com

6) ISO50 Blog–A really interesting art/design/photography blog. A great way to get inspired. blog.iso50.com

7) TED–This site has the best talks from the TED conferences over the years. A great deal of inspiring and thought provoking talks. www.ted.com/index.php

7.1) How White Am I–A quick little quiz that tells you how white you are. Turns out I’m 42% white. howwhiteami.com

9) Baby Bangs–Dear God, really? www.babybangshairband.com/index2.php

10) Still Tasty–A site that tells you the shelf life of your food. I’m pretty sure I don’t heed almost all of these recommendations. stilltasty.com

One of these days I’ll actually write a real post, but for now I’ve got another list of websites.

1) The Moment Blog–Nice blog on art, design, fashion, travel etc. themoment.blogs.nytimes.com

2) Scatter/Gather–a very interesting blog about content strategy, a topic I need and want to learn more about. scattergather.razorfish.com

3) Your Logo Makes Me Barf–It may be a bit harsh at times, but you can’t deny it, some of these logos are just terrible. www.yourlogomakesmebarf.com

4) Internet Archive–A non profit website that is archiving the internet. Have fun wading through the crazy stuff that lives on the internet. www.archive.org/index.php

5) Ransom Note Generator–Need a ransom note, but don’t have the time to cut out all of those letters? Let this website do the work for you. www.joshuarey.com/index.pl?Action=ShowArticle&ID=134

6) Forvo.com–Learn how to pronounce almost any word (sadly, my maiden name isn’t in here). forvo.com

7) Saftey Graphic Fun–Maybe I enjoy this because my dad was a safety manager for most of his life, or it could be the designer in me. Most likely its because its funny. juliasmexicocity.typepad.com/safetygraphics

Wireframes Magzine–For the IA nerds out there; a fabulous website sharing tools and ideas about information architecture. wireframes.linowski.ca

9) Corporette–A nice blog about the corporate fashion. It’s much better than I’m making it sound. corporette.com

10) Amber Page Writes–A witty, touching and well written blog from copywriter extraordinaire Amber Page. www.amberpagewrites.com

1) Desktop Wallpaper Project—A great project by Kitsune Noir. Every Wed a new wallpaper, available for download in multiple formats, is added to the site. There are some really beautiful designs. kitsunenoir.com/blog/dwp

2) Web Designer Depot—This site is a great reference for any web designer, but this post specifically is fantastic. Comics for web designers, what’s not to love. www.webdesignerdepot.com/2009/03/40-comics-strips-for-web-designers/

3) The Vintage Web—A wonderful blog cataloging websites with designs stuck in the past. Very eyeopening. www.thevintageweb.com

4) Color Scheme Designer 3—A nice web app that lets you create custom color schemes. It’s not quite as pretty as Adobe’s color picker, but it always works, which is a plus. colorschemedesigner.com

5) We Tell Stories—An interesting new project from Penguin books, where 6 authors are writing stories specifically for this format. It also includes a mysterious 7th story that users can search for. wetellstories.co.uk

6) The Grid System—Love the grid? Then you’ll love this site. www.thegridsystem.org

7) Firehouse—I probably only like this because I come from a firefighting family, but this site is great for keeping up with the latest and greatest in firefighting. www.firehouse.com

Bad Gift Emporium—A collection of bad gifts people were given. Add your own or trade for someone else’s bad gift. www.badgiftemporium.com

9) A Girl Must Shop—A blog about shopping. I’ve never actually purchased anything recommended on this site, but for some reason it is soothing to read. www.agirlmustshop.com

10) Boingo—Wireless internet provider for when you’re traveling. Their site clearly lays out where the wifi is and the price is pretty good. I may try it out on my next trip. www.boingo.com