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2008 Best Websites
2008 Best Websites
GasBuddy
Inquiring minds want to know: Where's the cheapest gas? GasBuddy can tell you. The site collects real-time prices from some 750,000 volunteer price "spotters," who send in daily updates from their local stations. With prices varying by up to 50 cents from one station to the next in some cities, it pays to stay informed. A heat map displays where prices are currently the highest (California) and lowest (Wyoming). GasBuddy also shows you how prices have changed over time and can send mobile updates to your phone. Other similar but less comprehensive services include MapQuest's Gas Prices and Gas Price Watch.
Howcast
There's a reason no one ever reads the instruction manual. Ho. Hum. That's why the video how-to site Howcast is such a gem. It breaks from its more staid counterparts, such as Expert Village and eHow, by injecting a necessary dose of humor. Come here to learn "how to make a move on a girl while watching a movie on a couch" and "how to become a saint." Each video is rated — often by thousands of members — so you won't waste bandwidth on the boring ones. We also like WonderHowTo, which neatly indexes and ranks how-to videos from hundreds of other sites.
iliketotallyloveit.com
Social shopping is a buzz phrase you'll be hearing a lot about soon. To see it in action, head to iliketotallyloveit.com. Shoppers post photos of items they like, then solicit opinions and comments from others. The most popular items bubble to the top, serving as a way to spot trends early. Recent faves have included a pair of limited-edition sunglasses worn by rapper Kanye West and a really cool spork (a spoon/fork). For a more curated view of special products, check out Things I've Bought That I Love — "things" run the gamut from chocolate to lip gloss.
Omiru
Focused on "real style for real people," Omiru doesn't just tell you what the fashion trends are — it helps you figure out what actually looks good on you. High-waisted pants aren't flattering on most people (in fact, 70% of people polled by Omiru won't be wearing them this year, even though they're back in style), but horizontal stripes can be (they don't make you look fat if they're narrow). The site recommends dresses for curvy petites and accessories for your little black dress. Sure, tips like these are sprinkled throughout more mainstream fashion sites like Glam and Style, but Omiru's laser focus on practical fashion advice makes it a don't-miss.
PsychCentral
It's hard for many people to talk openly about their mental-health concerns, so it's especially important to have online resources to rely on. PsychCentral is a good place to start. Visitors can take simple quizzes to get a general sense of whether they might have a problem, then check the "Ask the Therapist" section for answers to questions about all kinds of topics, ranging from borderline personality disorder to infidelity. There's even a section in which members can rate their personal experiences with prescription drugs. If you want more news and research, visit MentalHelp.net or the government's more comprehensive National Institute of Mental Health site.
TripKick
Ever spent top dollar on a hotel, only to get stuck in a crummy room? TripKick, which launched in May 2008, solves this dilemma by telling you which floors are best and which rooms to avoid. When we searched for the Hilton Las Vegas, for example, TripKick told us not only which rooms had the best view, but also which were too close to the elevators and noisy vending machines. Travelers can also add their own room ratings. For now, TripKick covers 250 hotels in 12 U.S. cities — and it's adding a new city each month. The site borrows its concept from the airline-seat rating service SeatGuru, which has provided clear maps of the interior of commercial planes for years. Both sites improve your odds of having a truly bon voyage.
Wikitravel
The best travel guides have one thing in common: they're up to date. That's why WikiTravel has become the most invaluable travel resource on the Web. While message boards like Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree Travel Forum are great for specific questions — such as "Should I spend more than a day at Angkor Wat?" — and community sites like TripAdvisor are useful for seeing other folks' photos and reviews, only WikiTravel keeps a concise, current directory of nearly 20,000 destinations. It's so complete, you'll be tempted to skip the guidebook altogether.
Yahoo Answers
Advice is everywhere on the Web, but nowhere is it more accessible than at Yahoo! Answers. Questions are arranged both by topic and what's most popular (e.g., "Is rinsing your hair with milk good for it?") and get all sorts of amusing, creative and,
occasionally, helpful responses. Contributors compete to boost their rankings by answering the most questions and collecting the most positive feedback on their replies. If you've got yet more questions needing answers, visit Ask Metafilter or the newer Try This.
Zeer
This is the kind of site that should have been built years ago. Zeer displays the nutritional labels for every kind of packaged food you can buy, then lets users rate and comment on their favorite items. Wondering whether you should give Doritos Hint of Lime–flavored chips a try? At Zeer, 14 out of 20 people give them the thumbs-up and will tell you exactly why. While the USDA's National Nutrient Database has offered similar information for years, Zeer is so much better designed — with a focus on real products instead of hypothetical portions of generic food items — that you might actually use it.
Afrigadget.com
There's a lot of international development news that doesn't make it onto CNN. So bookmark AfriGadget, a site dedicated to simple, sustainable inventions in Africa. Recent entries have covered efforts to create biodiesel fuel out of local pine nuts in Sierra Leone, and programs to build bicycles out of bamboo in Ghana and Kenya. AfriGadget isn't updated every day (and sometimes not even once a week), but it offers such distinctive reporting that you won't want to miss a single post. For other good sites addressing sustainable development in Africa, check out the African Uptimist and Timbuktu Chronicles.
AskMen.com
Think of it as Cosmopolitan for men. Beyond the requisite yearly hot-babe-ranking (2008's "Top 99 Women" is already live), AskMen dishes out provocative tips on sex, dating and relationships, and schools men on everything from office-party survival to the "FAQ on Semen." Other articles on the site include "10 Signs You're Whipped" and "Turn a Female Friend into Something More." Racier than Men's Health and FHM, AskMen is the go-to site for single guys on the make.
ConcreteLoop.com
You may not notice just how white celebrity-gossip sites like TMZ and PerezHilton really are until you check out ConcreteLoop. Devoted to black celebrities, it regularly features A-listers like Rihanna, Usher, Denzel Washington and Alicia Keys. In addition to the usual paparazzi shots and rumors, you'll find posts on fashion and politics, as well as tons of comments from ConcreteLoop's audience of nearly a million regular readers. We also like Bossip for its lower-brow appeal and Nah Right for its choice video clips.
Health.com
Reading about health doesn't have to be a pill. Unlike most other health sites, WebMD and Revolution Health, — which sometimes treat health information like bitter medicine, Health.com tackles even the most serious matters, like heart disease and depression, with a more sympathetic tone. Although it does not delve as thoroughly into science and treatment as the other sites, Health.com does a better job of addressing the related emotional issues. Its section on breast cancer, for example, explores body image and how the disease can affect your sex life. You'll also find videos of patients who had successful treatment and the doctors who cared for them. Health.com (which is owned by TIME.com's parent company, Time Inc.) was totally overhauled in May 2008, so if you haven't visited lately, make sure to circle back. For a newsier approach to wellness, we rely on the Health News section of the New York Times.
PopSugar
PopSugar is a total delight — an emporium of celebrity, fashion, beauty and even tech news for young, style-conscious women. Although the site contains all the elements of a conventional women's magazine, its whimsical, laid-back tone makes it a lot more appealing. Instead of coming across as a condescending know-it-all older sister, PopSugar doles out news and advice like an awesome new best friend. It also has some good customization options: you can pick the avatar who greets you on the home page and also choose from any of 14 alternate home pages in order to zero in on the topics that interest you most — like food (YumSugar), fitness (FitSugar) and gadgets (GeekSugar). Now that's pretty sweet.
ProFootball Talk
If you can't make it through a day without jonesing for sports gossip, head to ProFootballTalk's Daily Rumor Mill. The site scours news from TV and the Web (including Yahoo! Sports, ESPN, and the NFL Network), then adds its own highly entertaining (and highly opinionated) spin. "I'm more at liberty to give my opinions" than regular sports-news sites are, notes the site's often snarky founder, Mike Florio, 43, who posts updates about 20 times a day from his home in Clarksburg, W. Va. If you're still craving more football, visit Football Outsiders for extreme statistical analysis. Basketball addicts, meanwhile, should check out HoopsHype.
Rate My Professors
Whether you're deciding between French teachers or you just want to vent about last semester's lousy history lecturer, Rate My Professors is the place to go. Students can anonymously grade profs on everything from how difficult they are to the clarity of their lectures — and now teachers can add rebuttals of their own. Long since out of school? Then you might get some use out of RateMDs, a similar site that grades medical doctors. Launched in 2007, RateMDs already has more than 500,000 ratings of about 150,000 physicians. Like all reviews, these should be taken with a grain of salt, but both sites give you some good inside information on the professionals who matter most in your life.
Serious Eats
Join foodies for your fill of culinary news, discussions, recipes and restaurant reviews at Serious Eats, an international food blog to which "Molto" Mario Batali sometimes contributes. Whether or not you're a gastronome, reading about Rome's bountiful organic markets and the hearty hot dogs of Santiago, Chile, will surprise and delight you. Entertaining and heated discussions flare up about the most mundane food-related minutiae: the best thing to eat when you're lunching at your office desk; the pros and cons of Ruth's Chris Steak House. If your interest is specifically big-city dining, check out Savory Cities for terrific videos and chef interviews shot at top restaurants in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco and Seattle. And for a broader range of consumer reviews, menus and online reservations at eateries around the country, check out BooRah.
The Nest
Here's a lifestyle site designed for newly wedded yuppie couples. The Nest — a clever customer-retention device, brought to you by the creators of the wedding site The Knot — covers key topics from design tips for your new home to advice on merging financial assets, to preparations for having a baby. The Nest makes good use of readers' wisdom. There's a "casting call" for couples who want to share their personal stories, plus local guides to restaurants, personal trainers and mortgage brokers that the site's editors cull from submissions.
Geni
For an exercise that's all about family, researching your genealogy can be an oddly lonesome affair, filled with long hours spent sifting through records and making awkward phone calls to far-flung relatives. But Geni turns tree-building into a collaborative effort: the free site gives you the basic tools for diagramming your ancestry, and it also lets you invite others to contribute. If you're serious about tracing your lineage, you'll probably still click on stalwarts like Ancestry.com, Family Search and the USGenWeb Project for their vast digital archives, but Geni makes it easier — and more fun — than ever to create and share your family tree.
MapJack
Immerse yourself in panoramic views of Yosemite National Park; Chiang Mai, Thailand; and San Francisco using MapJack, a new alternative to Google Street View and Microsoft's Live Search Maps. MapJack has brighter, sharper photos than the others, and better navigation tools. To start exploring, just click and drag the icon of a person along the map in the bottom half of your browser; the photographic images in the upper portion will automatically refresh. Start-ups like Earthmine and EveryScape are developing similar next-gen maps, but for now, MapJack offers the best preview of the future of digital mapping.
Mint
Can't afford a personal financial planner? Here's the next best thing: the free site Mint pulls information from all your online financial records, including your 401(k), bank accounts and credit-card accounts, then neatly graphs your cash flow and expenditures. Mint's Trends section shows you a pie chart of what you spend and where (on food, travel, shopping, etc.) and suggests money-savers like lower-rate credit cards. The site will even send you mobile alerts to remind you to pay your bills. For a similar service that doubles as a social network where you can share financial goals and tips, check out Geezeo from TheStreet.com.
NexTag
It may be the plainest comparative-shopping site on the Web, but we like NexTag because of its speedy, comprehensive search results and integrated product reviews. Sure, there are plenty of other good comparison sites out there, including BizRate, Shopzilla and Yahoo! Shopping, but we dig NexTag for its no-nonsense approach that's all about finding you the best deal. And unlike its competitors, NexTag graphs the price history of each product you research, so you can see if prices have gone up or down in recent months.
Nymbler
Choosing a baby name just got more inspired, thanks to an ingenious calculator that uses phonetics to give you fresh ideas. Type in up to six names you like, and Nymbler will suggest dozens of similar-sounding suggestions. When we typed in June, Jada, Jenny, Josie and Jenna, Nymbler came back to us with names like Jasmine, Janie and Jayla. You can save suggested monikers to a favorites list and read about the origin and popularity of each one. If you want to know how common your chosen name has been through history, head over to NameVoyager, which charts the rises and falls of the top 1,000 names since the late 1800s.
Picnik
Anyone can snap a photo. The hard part is editing a crappy digital image and turning it into art. Until now, that's been too complicated for mere mortals. Good thing you don't need any special skills to use the free photo-editing tools at Picnik. Aimed at novices, it lets you crop borders, zap red-eye and add a range of special effects — like blurring, tinting and heat-mapping — to any picture you upload. While FotoFlexer, Photobucket and Photoshop Express all have similar features, only Picnik presents them with such elegant simplicity.
Pixelgirl Presents
Jazz up your Mac, PC or iPhone screen with custom-designed wallpaper from Pixelgirl Presents. The free, high-quality artwork showcased here is submitted by outside creators, who provide links to their own pages for yet more choices. To download images, just click on any site. We also like the more community-oriented Social Wallpapering as well as the vast collection at Customize, which lets you search by color. Got a PC? Then head to WinCustomize for more wallpapers, desktop icons and themed skins for the Windows OS.
SearchMe
View Internet search results through a new lens at SearchMe, an engine that displays results not in the usual text-list format (that's so Google), but as a slick image gallery of actual Web pages you can flip through and filter results by topic. A query on Montana, for example, lets you narrow results into categories like real estate, lodgings, weather and fishing. SearchMe isn't the only visual search engine — rivals include the meta-search site KartOO and newcomer Viewzi (which was still in private beta as of June 2008) — but its clean, intuitive interface sets it apart.
TinyURL,com
Web addresses are annoyingly long and unwieldy — especially when you're displaying search results from just about any website. If you want to cut a seemingly infinite URL down to size, head to TinyURL, plug in the long version, and voilà! Out pops a unique shortcut to use in its place. The abbreviated addresses that TinyURL generates are fewer than 20 characters long and never expire. We're not quite sure how TinyURL works its magic, but why question a good thing? We can't live without this ultra-handy tool; you'll get hooked too. (Also check out the equally helpful SnipURL and QurlyQ.)
Mobagranda.com
Evite is out. Mobaganda is in. Launched in May, this new site simplifies online party invitations and RSVPs. To create an invite, simply enter a name for your event, then add the date and details. Mobaganda will then generate a custom URL you can e-mail to friends, and keep an updated tally of yeses and nos. (Sorry, no maybes allowed.) Mobaganda does everything else Evite does, only without extraneous bells or whistles — and you won't have to register or log in. Invitations are good for 60 days (when your custom URL vanishes), so Mobaganda works best for casual get-togethers, not wedding receptions.
Urban Dictionary
Forget about learning Spanish or Chinese. The language you really need to know to keep up — in the U.S. anyway — is street lingo. To stay hip, visit Urban Dictionary, which has millions of user-submitted words and definitions. Visitors can vote on the best entries and choose the word of the day, like "boyfriend bomb" (when the woman you are interested in reveals that she has a boyfriend) or "text support" (encouragement from friends sent via text message). To translate your kids' geek speak, check out the Internet Slang Dictionary & Translator, which includes the top 25 slang words that parents should know and a quiz to find out if you're clt (cool like that).
Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project
Drop by the University of California, Santa Barbara's Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project to add some truly cool alternative oldies to your music collection — the site has a compilation of about 8,000 songs from the early 1900s. The archived tunes are the oldest to have been digitally preserved; the originals were the first commercial recordings made in the U.S. — etched onto wax-and-metal cylinders, vinyl's precursor. (The site has an extensive history of cylinders as well.) As you listen to the hymns and spirituals, cakewalks and string quartets, you'll feel as if you've waltzed back in time. Are you more into the spoken word? You can also tune into comedy and vaudeville performances, which were among the most popular and amusing recordings of the time. All the audio is free to stream in your browser or download as MP3s, courtesy of the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences.
Hulu
Before Hulu launched in March 2008, watching TV shows on the Web was more fun in theory than in practice. If your show was even available online, you had to hunt for episodes on cluttered network-TV sites, then view them in Post-it-size boxes onscreen. Hulu changed all that by housing dozens of current shows from Fox and NBC, like The Simpsons, House and Late Night with Conan O'Brien, as well as hundreds of golden oldies like The Bionic Woman and Fantasy Island, all under one roof. What's more, Hulu's Web viewer has a full-screen mode and streams high-quality video. Added bonus: way less commercial time. For a bigger warehouse of TV clips and non-network shows, check out Modern Feed.
Imeem
Imeem is a music site on steroids. Not only is it a music store where you can buy and download songs, but it's also an Internet radio station with thousands of channels and it's a social network for sharing your favorite playlists. But what really sets it apart from other online music sellers, like Pandora, Last FM and Slacker, is that Imeem is the first streaming-music site to secure song rights from all four major music labels (which are rumored to have a stake in Imeem). Requesting a particular song on Pandora, say, is always a crapshoot, but on Imeem you can immediately start listening to most any title you type in. That kind of instant gratification is what the Web is all about — and what has long been missing from other free sites.
Kongregate
The Web is a gamer's paradise. Kongregate is our current favorite for its fabulous arcade of free Flash games (most of which tend toward the testosterone-laden shooter and action genres). Games on Kongregate feature better animation and graphics than the simple HTML-based games you'll find on sites like Addicting Games. All 5,000 or so of Kongregate's titles are submitted by independent developers and get rated by other gamers. If you're feeling friendly, you can chat with people online as you play. Other cool Flash-game sites include Armor Games, Nonoba and OneMoreLevel.
ffffound.com
Most people like showing off their pictures — even though the majority aren't interesting to anyone but their mom. Ffffound is the rare image site that showcases photos and illustrations you'll actually want to browse every day. It's both random and beautiful and never feels stale. We would be more specific, but honestly, it's more fun to explore ffffound on your own. If you like what you find, then click on Odd Wall and National Geographic's Your Shot for their distinctive image galleries.
Lookybook
The problem with buying kids' books on the Web is that you can't flip through them before checkout. Lookybook changes that by posting the full contents of hundreds of children's books online, so you can make sure your choices are suitable. You can also review, rate and purchase picture books right on the site. Since Lookybook is new — it launched last November — you may not find every book you're looking for, but we think the site is off to a fine start. Lookybook is one of those sites we can't believe no one thought of before.
Someecards
If you're tired of the sloppy, mawkish sentiment that is the stock-in-trade of most mainstream greeting cards and e-cards, then you'll want to visit someecards. With lines like "Congratulations on being justified in your paranoia about being laid off" and "Dad, it's still hard to believe you're someone's father," one thing this site won't give you is the warm fuzzies. For even more irreverent e-cards, visit Married to the Sea and Toothpaste for Dinner. (Please note that some cards on these sites are not appropriate for minors.)
WebSudoku
As the name suggests, Web Sudoku offers one thing: sudoku on the Web. You won't find fancy graphics, live chat rooms or any other distractions here. What you'll get is a sudoku lover's Utopia with thousands of games ranging from "easy" to "evil." A sudoku tutorial explains the number game to newbies, and power users can download a version of the site to play off-line. Your boss is going to hate us for introducing you to it. Have fun!
Penny Arcade
Online comics are the Web's most enjoyable time suck, and the best ones are those geared toward tech-savvy nerds (i.e., people who don't read Peanuts or Cathy). We especially like Penny Arcade for the way it pokes fun at the high-tech industry and the people who love it. Other addictive offerings include the brilliant and surreal Achewood and PvP, which chronicles the lives and loves of employees at a video-game magazine.
Gaia Online
A kind of Internet carnival, Gaia Online combines chat, games, discussion forums and a virtual world to make it the most popular teen hangout on the Web. Discussion forums are the heart and soul of Gaia and get half a million posts each day. Users can upload artwork for others to rate, or inhabit an avatar to navigate Gaia's virtual world, which is free to use. Gaians can earn gold to bling out their avatars, simply by playing games, posting messages and clicking through the site. For a more international virtual experience, visit the South Korea–based Cyworld or the Eurocentric Habbo.
CarbonRally
Vie to go green by making it a competition. CarbonRally posts challenges, like cutting your shower time by two minutes or line-drying your laundry for a month, to motivate you to reduce your carbon footprint. Never cleaned your refrigerator coils? Neither have we. CarbonRally shows you how to do it and explains why it helps. You can compete on your own or, for added incentive, as part of a team. For extra enviro-credit, check out Zwaggle, where you can donate used clothes, appliances, books and other merchandise to members, then "buy" stuff from other Zwagglers with the points you earn.
COLOURlovers
What color is your palette? Take a break from the wordy Web and peruse COLOURlovers to find out. Although the site caters to design professionals who want to show off or share ideas about color and pattern, it's fun for lay people too. Browse through the various swatches, palettes and patterns to help inspire your next creative project — or your next clothes-shopping trip. The site's excellent blog doles out tips, like how to dye yarn with Kool-Aid, and will teach you something new about color every day.
Apartment Therapy
You don't have to live in a tiny space to get great interior-design ideas from Apartment Therapy. Showcasing one-of-a-kind style statements, like an egg-carton lamp and a kitchen wall dotted with bundt pans, this site is for anyone who appreciates distinctive décor. If you like what you see, head to Apartment Therapy's sister sites, Ohdeedoh (for kid-friendly home ideas) and The Kitchn (for recipes and tips on entertaining). Delve deeper into design on Design*Sponge, which features sneak peeks of unique interiors, alerts on décor mini-trends like polka dots and chain link, and quirky DIY projects.
Digital Vaults
Chances are, you won't be poking through the stacks at the National Archives any time soon. But if you want a glimpse of the Federal Government's historical records, Digital Vaults gives you a curated view of 1,200 of the most impressive holdings. That includes gems like Swedish-born Greta Garbo's application to become a U.S. citizen and a document detailing Laura Ingalls Wilder's real-world little house on the prairie. Not looking for anything in particular? Then click on "shuffle records" to see hundreds of photos, documents, maps, artwork, video clips and audio files, dating from the 1800s to the present. Records are cross-linked by media type, time and theme, such as "Army" or "presidents." You can get lost here for hours — dusty, old documents have never looked so good.
FreeRice
If you want to do a good deed and build your vocabulary, you've come to the right place. Other sites give away charitable donations for little more than a mouse click, but FreeRice makes you earn them. The site challenges you with word quizzes and pledges to donate 20 grains of rice to the U.N. World Food Programme for each definition you get right. (The words get harder the longer you play.) To do more, check out the Hunger Site, which donates to relief agencies Mercy Corps and America's Second Harvest in exchange for your visit.
HypeBeast
Urban style hounds check HypeBeast every day for the latest news on limited-edition sneakers, hats, jeans, shades and other coveted bling. Even if you never buy any of the items featured on the site (many of which are rare or otherwise hard to find), HypeBeast is fun just for the window-shopping. Sneaker addicts will also like Sneaker Freaker and Kicksclusive for their singular and cutting-edge takes on sneaker culture.
Kiva
You don't have to give away money to support a good cause. At Kiva you can make a small loan instead. A unique peer-to-peer lending site that focuses on microloans, Kiva lets lenders pledge funds — from $25 and up — to entrepreneurs in developing countries. As of May 2008, that included a cattle breeder in Azerbaijan and a snack-kiosk owner in Indonesia. Kiva works with microlenders in recipients' native countries and typically pays you back within a year. If you're in need of funds yourself, try Prosper or Lending Club. And if you just want to make sure your cousin Bob pays you back your thousand bucks, try Virgin Money US, which administers loans between people who already know each other.
Net-a-Porter
Fashionistas with no time for real window-shopping can fire up their browser windows and sift through the racks at Net-a-Porter instead. Even if you can't afford most of the togs you see — the site sells everything from dresses and handbags to shoes, jewelry and sunglasses — it's still fun to browse designer goods, like the $335 crocheted blouse by Phillip Lim and the $4,300 python cut-out boots by Miu Miu. The site's clean, no-nonsense design lets you find what you want fast. If Net-a-Porter leaves you empty-handed, check out Vivre or Yoox.
Open Source Food
The pictures alone on this foodie's wiki-paradise are enough to make you want to strap on your apron and start sautéing. Anyone can submit recipes to Open Source Food, and members can rate them. Contribute 10 or more highly rated recipes, and you'll be designated a "pro." If you find an offering you especially like, you can search for all the other dishes submitted by the same chef. Though the Web has no shortage of recipe sites — like All Recipes, Epicurious and Food TV — Open Source Food has an appealing for-the-masses-by-the-masses vibe that makes it worth visiting.
Petfinder
Need a little love in your life? Skip the online dating sites and head to Petfinder instead. The Web's largest pet-adoption site lets you choose from more than a quarter of a million animals, searchable by age, location and gender. Each listing includes at least one photo and tells you whether the animal is house-trained and has had its shots. Many of the available pets come from a local branch of the Humane Society or a local rescue group, which will screen potential owners to make sure they can take care of the animal. Because only nonprofits are allowed to post listings, you won't find pets sold by breeders or pet stores, and many animals are fully grown. With so many pets to choose from, it may be tough to settle on just one.
WikiSky
The World Wide Web may be based here on Earth, but it can give you a bird's-eye view of the rest of the universe. WikiSky is a stellar place to start stargazing. Its gorgeous images of comets, galaxies and nebula — many of which come from the NASA-funded Astrophysics Data System at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics — are accompanied by short scientific explanations that will delight astronomy buffs. For a different lens on most objects, click on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which gives you the most realistic, high-res images of the night sky. The publicly and privately funded project, which aims to eventually map about a million galaxies and quasars, uses a massive telescope in Apache Point, N.M., and a 120-megapixel camera to captur
The World Wide Web may be based here on Earth, but it can give you a bird's-eye view of the rest of the universe. WikiSky is a stellar place to start stargazing. Its gorgeous images of comets, galaxies and nebula — many of which come from the NASA-funded Astrophysics Data System at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics — are accompanied by short scientific explanations that will delight astronomy buffs. For a different lens on most objects, click on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which gives you the most realistic, high-res images of the night sky. The publicly and privately funded project, which aims to eventually map about a million galaxies and quasars, uses a massive telescope in Apache Point, N.M., and a 120-megapixel camera to capture its images. For breaking space news and more photos, visit Space.com. To the moon!
GasBuddy
Inquiring minds want to know: Where's the cheapest gas? GasBuddy can tell you. The site collects real-time prices from some 750,000 volunteer price "spotters," who send in daily updates from their local stations. With prices varying by up to 50 cents from one station to the next in some cities, it pays to stay informed. A heat map displays where prices are currently the highest (California) and lowest (Wyoming). GasBuddy also shows you how prices have changed over time and can send mobile updates to your phone. Other similar but less comprehensive services include MapQuest's Gas Prices and Gas Price Watch.
Howcast
There's a reason no one ever reads the instruction manual. Ho. Hum. That's why the video how-to site Howcast is such a gem. It breaks from its more staid counterparts, such as Expert Village and eHow, by injecting a necessary dose of humor. Come here to learn "how to make a move on a girl while watching a movie on a couch" and "how to become a saint." Each video is rated — often by thousands of members — so you won't waste bandwidth on the boring ones. We also like WonderHowTo, which neatly indexes and ranks how-to videos from hundreds of other sites.
iliketotallyloveit.com
Social shopping is a buzz phrase you'll be hearing a lot about soon. To see it in action, head to iliketotallyloveit.com. Shoppers post photos of items they like, then solicit opinions and comments from others. The most popular items bubble to the top, serving as a way to spot trends early. Recent faves have included a pair of limited-edition sunglasses worn by rapper Kanye West and a really cool spork (a spoon/fork). For a more curated view of special products, check out Things I've Bought That I Love — "things" run the gamut from chocolate to lip gloss.
Omiru
Focused on "real style for real people," Omiru doesn't just tell you what the fashion trends are — it helps you figure out what actually looks good on you. High-waisted pants aren't flattering on most people (in fact, 70% of people polled by Omiru won't be wearing them this year, even though they're back in style), but horizontal stripes can be (they don't make you look fat if they're narrow). The site recommends dresses for curvy petites and accessories for your little black dress. Sure, tips like these are sprinkled throughout more mainstream fashion sites like Glam and Style, but Omiru's laser focus on practical fashion advice makes it a don't-miss.
PsychCentral
It's hard for many people to talk openly about their mental-health concerns, so it's especially important to have online resources to rely on. PsychCentral is a good place to start. Visitors can take simple quizzes to get a general sense of whether they might have a problem, then check the "Ask the Therapist" section for answers to questions about all kinds of topics, ranging from borderline personality disorder to infidelity. There's even a section in which members can rate their personal experiences with prescription drugs. If you want more news and research, visit MentalHelp.net or the government's more comprehensive National Institute of Mental Health site.
TripKick
Ever spent top dollar on a hotel, only to get stuck in a crummy room? TripKick, which launched in May 2008, solves this dilemma by telling you which floors are best and which rooms to avoid. When we searched for the Hilton Las Vegas, for example, TripKick told us not only which rooms had the best view, but also which were too close to the elevators and noisy vending machines. Travelers can also add their own room ratings. For now, TripKick covers 250 hotels in 12 U.S. cities — and it's adding a new city each month. The site borrows its concept from the airline-seat rating service SeatGuru, which has provided clear maps of the interior of commercial planes for years. Both sites improve your odds of having a truly bon voyage.
Wikitravel
The best travel guides have one thing in common: they're up to date. That's why WikiTravel has become the most invaluable travel resource on the Web. While message boards like Lonely Planet's Thorn Tree Travel Forum are great for specific questions — such as "Should I spend more than a day at Angkor Wat?" — and community sites like TripAdvisor are useful for seeing other folks' photos and reviews, only WikiTravel keeps a concise, current directory of nearly 20,000 destinations. It's so complete, you'll be tempted to skip the guidebook altogether.
Yahoo Answers
Advice is everywhere on the Web, but nowhere is it more accessible than at Yahoo! Answers. Questions are arranged both by topic and what's most popular (e.g., "Is rinsing your hair with milk good for it?") and get all sorts of amusing, creative and,
occasionally, helpful responses. Contributors compete to boost their rankings by answering the most questions and collecting the most positive feedback on their replies. If you've got yet more questions needing answers, visit Ask Metafilter or the newer Try This.
Zeer
This is the kind of site that should have been built years ago. Zeer displays the nutritional labels for every kind of packaged food you can buy, then lets users rate and comment on their favorite items. Wondering whether you should give Doritos Hint of Lime–flavored chips a try? At Zeer, 14 out of 20 people give them the thumbs-up and will tell you exactly why. While the USDA's National Nutrient Database has offered similar information for years, Zeer is so much better designed — with a focus on real products instead of hypothetical portions of generic food items — that you might actually use it.
Afrigadget.com
There's a lot of international development news that doesn't make it onto CNN. So bookmark AfriGadget, a site dedicated to simple, sustainable inventions in Africa. Recent entries have covered efforts to create biodiesel fuel out of local pine nuts in Sierra Leone, and programs to build bicycles out of bamboo in Ghana and Kenya. AfriGadget isn't updated every day (and sometimes not even once a week), but it offers such distinctive reporting that you won't want to miss a single post. For other good sites addressing sustainable development in Africa, check out the African Uptimist and Timbuktu Chronicles.
AskMen.com
Think of it as Cosmopolitan for men. Beyond the requisite yearly hot-babe-ranking (2008's "Top 99 Women" is already live), AskMen dishes out provocative tips on sex, dating and relationships, and schools men on everything from office-party survival to the "FAQ on Semen." Other articles on the site include "10 Signs You're Whipped" and "Turn a Female Friend into Something More." Racier than Men's Health and FHM, AskMen is the go-to site for single guys on the make.
ConcreteLoop.com
You may not notice just how white celebrity-gossip sites like TMZ and PerezHilton really are until you check out ConcreteLoop. Devoted to black celebrities, it regularly features A-listers like Rihanna, Usher, Denzel Washington and Alicia Keys. In addition to the usual paparazzi shots and rumors, you'll find posts on fashion and politics, as well as tons of comments from ConcreteLoop's audience of nearly a million regular readers. We also like Bossip for its lower-brow appeal and Nah Right for its choice video clips.
Health.com
Reading about health doesn't have to be a pill. Unlike most other health sites, WebMD and Revolution Health, — which sometimes treat health information like bitter medicine, Health.com tackles even the most serious matters, like heart disease and depression, with a more sympathetic tone. Although it does not delve as thoroughly into science and treatment as the other sites, Health.com does a better job of addressing the related emotional issues. Its section on breast cancer, for example, explores body image and how the disease can affect your sex life. You'll also find videos of patients who had successful treatment and the doctors who cared for them. Health.com (which is owned by TIME.com's parent company, Time Inc.) was totally overhauled in May 2008, so if you haven't visited lately, make sure to circle back. For a newsier approach to wellness, we rely on the Health News section of the New York Times.
PopSugar
PopSugar is a total delight — an emporium of celebrity, fashion, beauty and even tech news for young, style-conscious women. Although the site contains all the elements of a conventional women's magazine, its whimsical, laid-back tone makes it a lot more appealing. Instead of coming across as a condescending know-it-all older sister, PopSugar doles out news and advice like an awesome new best friend. It also has some good customization options: you can pick the avatar who greets you on the home page and also choose from any of 14 alternate home pages in order to zero in on the topics that interest you most — like food (YumSugar), fitness (FitSugar) and gadgets (GeekSugar). Now that's pretty sweet.
ProFootball Talk
If you can't make it through a day without jonesing for sports gossip, head to ProFootballTalk's Daily Rumor Mill. The site scours news from TV and the Web (including Yahoo! Sports, ESPN, and the NFL Network), then adds its own highly entertaining (and highly opinionated) spin. "I'm more at liberty to give my opinions" than regular sports-news sites are, notes the site's often snarky founder, Mike Florio, 43, who posts updates about 20 times a day from his home in Clarksburg, W. Va. If you're still craving more football, visit Football Outsiders for extreme statistical analysis. Basketball addicts, meanwhile, should check out HoopsHype.
Rate My Professors
Whether you're deciding between French teachers or you just want to vent about last semester's lousy history lecturer, Rate My Professors is the place to go. Students can anonymously grade profs on everything from how difficult they are to the clarity of their lectures — and now teachers can add rebuttals of their own. Long since out of school? Then you might get some use out of RateMDs, a similar site that grades medical doctors. Launched in 2007, RateMDs already has more than 500,000 ratings of about 150,000 physicians. Like all reviews, these should be taken with a grain of salt, but both sites give you some good inside information on the professionals who matter most in your life.
Serious Eats
Join foodies for your fill of culinary news, discussions, recipes and restaurant reviews at Serious Eats, an international food blog to which "Molto" Mario Batali sometimes contributes. Whether or not you're a gastronome, reading about Rome's bountiful organic markets and the hearty hot dogs of Santiago, Chile, will surprise and delight you. Entertaining and heated discussions flare up about the most mundane food-related minutiae: the best thing to eat when you're lunching at your office desk; the pros and cons of Ruth's Chris Steak House. If your interest is specifically big-city dining, check out Savory Cities for terrific videos and chef interviews shot at top restaurants in New York City, Los Angeles, Chicago, San Francisco and Seattle. And for a broader range of consumer reviews, menus and online reservations at eateries around the country, check out BooRah.
The Nest
Here's a lifestyle site designed for newly wedded yuppie couples. The Nest — a clever customer-retention device, brought to you by the creators of the wedding site The Knot — covers key topics from design tips for your new home to advice on merging financial assets, to preparations for having a baby. The Nest makes good use of readers' wisdom. There's a "casting call" for couples who want to share their personal stories, plus local guides to restaurants, personal trainers and mortgage brokers that the site's editors cull from submissions.
Geni
For an exercise that's all about family, researching your genealogy can be an oddly lonesome affair, filled with long hours spent sifting through records and making awkward phone calls to far-flung relatives. But Geni turns tree-building into a collaborative effort: the free site gives you the basic tools for diagramming your ancestry, and it also lets you invite others to contribute. If you're serious about tracing your lineage, you'll probably still click on stalwarts like Ancestry.com, Family Search and the USGenWeb Project for their vast digital archives, but Geni makes it easier — and more fun — than ever to create and share your family tree.
MapJack
Immerse yourself in panoramic views of Yosemite National Park; Chiang Mai, Thailand; and San Francisco using MapJack, a new alternative to Google Street View and Microsoft's Live Search Maps. MapJack has brighter, sharper photos than the others, and better navigation tools. To start exploring, just click and drag the icon of a person along the map in the bottom half of your browser; the photographic images in the upper portion will automatically refresh. Start-ups like Earthmine and EveryScape are developing similar next-gen maps, but for now, MapJack offers the best preview of the future of digital mapping.
Mint
Can't afford a personal financial planner? Here's the next best thing: the free site Mint pulls information from all your online financial records, including your 401(k), bank accounts and credit-card accounts, then neatly graphs your cash flow and expenditures. Mint's Trends section shows you a pie chart of what you spend and where (on food, travel, shopping, etc.) and suggests money-savers like lower-rate credit cards. The site will even send you mobile alerts to remind you to pay your bills. For a similar service that doubles as a social network where you can share financial goals and tips, check out Geezeo from TheStreet.com.
NexTag
It may be the plainest comparative-shopping site on the Web, but we like NexTag because of its speedy, comprehensive search results and integrated product reviews. Sure, there are plenty of other good comparison sites out there, including BizRate, Shopzilla and Yahoo! Shopping, but we dig NexTag for its no-nonsense approach that's all about finding you the best deal. And unlike its competitors, NexTag graphs the price history of each product you research, so you can see if prices have gone up or down in recent months.
Nymbler
Choosing a baby name just got more inspired, thanks to an ingenious calculator that uses phonetics to give you fresh ideas. Type in up to six names you like, and Nymbler will suggest dozens of similar-sounding suggestions. When we typed in June, Jada, Jenny, Josie and Jenna, Nymbler came back to us with names like Jasmine, Janie and Jayla. You can save suggested monikers to a favorites list and read about the origin and popularity of each one. If you want to know how common your chosen name has been through history, head over to NameVoyager, which charts the rises and falls of the top 1,000 names since the late 1800s.
Picnik
Anyone can snap a photo. The hard part is editing a crappy digital image and turning it into art. Until now, that's been too complicated for mere mortals. Good thing you don't need any special skills to use the free photo-editing tools at Picnik. Aimed at novices, it lets you crop borders, zap red-eye and add a range of special effects — like blurring, tinting and heat-mapping — to any picture you upload. While FotoFlexer, Photobucket and Photoshop Express all have similar features, only Picnik presents them with such elegant simplicity.
Pixelgirl Presents
Jazz up your Mac, PC or iPhone screen with custom-designed wallpaper from Pixelgirl Presents. The free, high-quality artwork showcased here is submitted by outside creators, who provide links to their own pages for yet more choices. To download images, just click on any site. We also like the more community-oriented Social Wallpapering as well as the vast collection at Customize, which lets you search by color. Got a PC? Then head to WinCustomize for more wallpapers, desktop icons and themed skins for the Windows OS.
SearchMe
View Internet search results through a new lens at SearchMe, an engine that displays results not in the usual text-list format (that's so Google), but as a slick image gallery of actual Web pages you can flip through and filter results by topic. A query on Montana, for example, lets you narrow results into categories like real estate, lodgings, weather and fishing. SearchMe isn't the only visual search engine — rivals include the meta-search site KartOO and newcomer Viewzi (which was still in private beta as of June 2008) — but its clean, intuitive interface sets it apart.
TinyURL,com
Web addresses are annoyingly long and unwieldy — especially when you're displaying search results from just about any website. If you want to cut a seemingly infinite URL down to size, head to TinyURL, plug in the long version, and voilà! Out pops a unique shortcut to use in its place. The abbreviated addresses that TinyURL generates are fewer than 20 characters long and never expire. We're not quite sure how TinyURL works its magic, but why question a good thing? We can't live without this ultra-handy tool; you'll get hooked too. (Also check out the equally helpful SnipURL and QurlyQ.)
Mobagranda.com
Evite is out. Mobaganda is in. Launched in May, this new site simplifies online party invitations and RSVPs. To create an invite, simply enter a name for your event, then add the date and details. Mobaganda will then generate a custom URL you can e-mail to friends, and keep an updated tally of yeses and nos. (Sorry, no maybes allowed.) Mobaganda does everything else Evite does, only without extraneous bells or whistles — and you won't have to register or log in. Invitations are good for 60 days (when your custom URL vanishes), so Mobaganda works best for casual get-togethers, not wedding receptions.
Urban Dictionary
Forget about learning Spanish or Chinese. The language you really need to know to keep up — in the U.S. anyway — is street lingo. To stay hip, visit Urban Dictionary, which has millions of user-submitted words and definitions. Visitors can vote on the best entries and choose the word of the day, like "boyfriend bomb" (when the woman you are interested in reveals that she has a boyfriend) or "text support" (encouragement from friends sent via text message). To translate your kids' geek speak, check out the Internet Slang Dictionary & Translator, which includes the top 25 slang words that parents should know and a quiz to find out if you're clt (cool like that).
Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project
Drop by the University of California, Santa Barbara's Cylinder Preservation and Digitization Project to add some truly cool alternative oldies to your music collection — the site has a compilation of about 8,000 songs from the early 1900s. The archived tunes are the oldest to have been digitally preserved; the originals were the first commercial recordings made in the U.S. — etched onto wax-and-metal cylinders, vinyl's precursor. (The site has an extensive history of cylinders as well.) As you listen to the hymns and spirituals, cakewalks and string quartets, you'll feel as if you've waltzed back in time. Are you more into the spoken word? You can also tune into comedy and vaudeville performances, which were among the most popular and amusing recordings of the time. All the audio is free to stream in your browser or download as MP3s, courtesy of the Institute of Museum and Library Sciences.
Hulu
Before Hulu launched in March 2008, watching TV shows on the Web was more fun in theory than in practice. If your show was even available online, you had to hunt for episodes on cluttered network-TV sites, then view them in Post-it-size boxes onscreen. Hulu changed all that by housing dozens of current shows from Fox and NBC, like The Simpsons, House and Late Night with Conan O'Brien, as well as hundreds of golden oldies like The Bionic Woman and Fantasy Island, all under one roof. What's more, Hulu's Web viewer has a full-screen mode and streams high-quality video. Added bonus: way less commercial time. For a bigger warehouse of TV clips and non-network shows, check out Modern Feed.
Imeem
Imeem is a music site on steroids. Not only is it a music store where you can buy and download songs, but it's also an Internet radio station with thousands of channels and it's a social network for sharing your favorite playlists. But what really sets it apart from other online music sellers, like Pandora, Last FM and Slacker, is that Imeem is the first streaming-music site to secure song rights from all four major music labels (which are rumored to have a stake in Imeem). Requesting a particular song on Pandora, say, is always a crapshoot, but on Imeem you can immediately start listening to most any title you type in. That kind of instant gratification is what the Web is all about — and what has long been missing from other free sites.
Kongregate
The Web is a gamer's paradise. Kongregate is our current favorite for its fabulous arcade of free Flash games (most of which tend toward the testosterone-laden shooter and action genres). Games on Kongregate feature better animation and graphics than the simple HTML-based games you'll find on sites like Addicting Games. All 5,000 or so of Kongregate's titles are submitted by independent developers and get rated by other gamers. If you're feeling friendly, you can chat with people online as you play. Other cool Flash-game sites include Armor Games, Nonoba and OneMoreLevel.
ffffound.com
Most people like showing off their pictures — even though the majority aren't interesting to anyone but their mom. Ffffound is the rare image site that showcases photos and illustrations you'll actually want to browse every day. It's both random and beautiful and never feels stale. We would be more specific, but honestly, it's more fun to explore ffffound on your own. If you like what you find, then click on Odd Wall and National Geographic's Your Shot for their distinctive image galleries.
Lookybook
The problem with buying kids' books on the Web is that you can't flip through them before checkout. Lookybook changes that by posting the full contents of hundreds of children's books online, so you can make sure your choices are suitable. You can also review, rate and purchase picture books right on the site. Since Lookybook is new — it launched last November — you may not find every book you're looking for, but we think the site is off to a fine start. Lookybook is one of those sites we can't believe no one thought of before.
Someecards
If you're tired of the sloppy, mawkish sentiment that is the stock-in-trade of most mainstream greeting cards and e-cards, then you'll want to visit someecards. With lines like "Congratulations on being justified in your paranoia about being laid off" and "Dad, it's still hard to believe you're someone's father," one thing this site won't give you is the warm fuzzies. For even more irreverent e-cards, visit Married to the Sea and Toothpaste for Dinner. (Please note that some cards on these sites are not appropriate for minors.)
WebSudoku
As the name suggests, Web Sudoku offers one thing: sudoku on the Web. You won't find fancy graphics, live chat rooms or any other distractions here. What you'll get is a sudoku lover's Utopia with thousands of games ranging from "easy" to "evil." A sudoku tutorial explains the number game to newbies, and power users can download a version of the site to play off-line. Your boss is going to hate us for introducing you to it. Have fun!
Penny Arcade
Online comics are the Web's most enjoyable time suck, and the best ones are those geared toward tech-savvy nerds (i.e., people who don't read Peanuts or Cathy). We especially like Penny Arcade for the way it pokes fun at the high-tech industry and the people who love it. Other addictive offerings include the brilliant and surreal Achewood and PvP, which chronicles the lives and loves of employees at a video-game magazine.
Gaia Online
A kind of Internet carnival, Gaia Online combines chat, games, discussion forums and a virtual world to make it the most popular teen hangout on the Web. Discussion forums are the heart and soul of Gaia and get half a million posts each day. Users can upload artwork for others to rate, or inhabit an avatar to navigate Gaia's virtual world, which is free to use. Gaians can earn gold to bling out their avatars, simply by playing games, posting messages and clicking through the site. For a more international virtual experience, visit the South Korea–based Cyworld or the Eurocentric Habbo.
CarbonRally
Vie to go green by making it a competition. CarbonRally posts challenges, like cutting your shower time by two minutes or line-drying your laundry for a month, to motivate you to reduce your carbon footprint. Never cleaned your refrigerator coils? Neither have we. CarbonRally shows you how to do it and explains why it helps. You can compete on your own or, for added incentive, as part of a team. For extra enviro-credit, check out Zwaggle, where you can donate used clothes, appliances, books and other merchandise to members, then "buy" stuff from other Zwagglers with the points you earn.
COLOURlovers
What color is your palette? Take a break from the wordy Web and peruse COLOURlovers to find out. Although the site caters to design professionals who want to show off or share ideas about color and pattern, it's fun for lay people too. Browse through the various swatches, palettes and patterns to help inspire your next creative project — or your next clothes-shopping trip. The site's excellent blog doles out tips, like how to dye yarn with Kool-Aid, and will teach you something new about color every day.
Apartment Therapy
You don't have to live in a tiny space to get great interior-design ideas from Apartment Therapy. Showcasing one-of-a-kind style statements, like an egg-carton lamp and a kitchen wall dotted with bundt pans, this site is for anyone who appreciates distinctive décor. If you like what you see, head to Apartment Therapy's sister sites, Ohdeedoh (for kid-friendly home ideas) and The Kitchn (for recipes and tips on entertaining). Delve deeper into design on Design*Sponge, which features sneak peeks of unique interiors, alerts on décor mini-trends like polka dots and chain link, and quirky DIY projects.
Digital Vaults
Chances are, you won't be poking through the stacks at the National Archives any time soon. But if you want a glimpse of the Federal Government's historical records, Digital Vaults gives you a curated view of 1,200 of the most impressive holdings. That includes gems like Swedish-born Greta Garbo's application to become a U.S. citizen and a document detailing Laura Ingalls Wilder's real-world little house on the prairie. Not looking for anything in particular? Then click on "shuffle records" to see hundreds of photos, documents, maps, artwork, video clips and audio files, dating from the 1800s to the present. Records are cross-linked by media type, time and theme, such as "Army" or "presidents." You can get lost here for hours — dusty, old documents have never looked so good.
FreeRice
If you want to do a good deed and build your vocabulary, you've come to the right place. Other sites give away charitable donations for little more than a mouse click, but FreeRice makes you earn them. The site challenges you with word quizzes and pledges to donate 20 grains of rice to the U.N. World Food Programme for each definition you get right. (The words get harder the longer you play.) To do more, check out the Hunger Site, which donates to relief agencies Mercy Corps and America's Second Harvest in exchange for your visit.
HypeBeast
Urban style hounds check HypeBeast every day for the latest news on limited-edition sneakers, hats, jeans, shades and other coveted bling. Even if you never buy any of the items featured on the site (many of which are rare or otherwise hard to find), HypeBeast is fun just for the window-shopping. Sneaker addicts will also like Sneaker Freaker and Kicksclusive for their singular and cutting-edge takes on sneaker culture.
Kiva
You don't have to give away money to support a good cause. At Kiva you can make a small loan instead. A unique peer-to-peer lending site that focuses on microloans, Kiva lets lenders pledge funds — from $25 and up — to entrepreneurs in developing countries. As of May 2008, that included a cattle breeder in Azerbaijan and a snack-kiosk owner in Indonesia. Kiva works with microlenders in recipients' native countries and typically pays you back within a year. If you're in need of funds yourself, try Prosper or Lending Club. And if you just want to make sure your cousin Bob pays you back your thousand bucks, try Virgin Money US, which administers loans between people who already know each other.
Net-a-Porter
Fashionistas with no time for real window-shopping can fire up their browser windows and sift through the racks at Net-a-Porter instead. Even if you can't afford most of the togs you see — the site sells everything from dresses and handbags to shoes, jewelry and sunglasses — it's still fun to browse designer goods, like the $335 crocheted blouse by Phillip Lim and the $4,300 python cut-out boots by Miu Miu. The site's clean, no-nonsense design lets you find what you want fast. If Net-a-Porter leaves you empty-handed, check out Vivre or Yoox.
Open Source Food
The pictures alone on this foodie's wiki-paradise are enough to make you want to strap on your apron and start sautéing. Anyone can submit recipes to Open Source Food, and members can rate them. Contribute 10 or more highly rated recipes, and you'll be designated a "pro." If you find an offering you especially like, you can search for all the other dishes submitted by the same chef. Though the Web has no shortage of recipe sites — like All Recipes, Epicurious and Food TV — Open Source Food has an appealing for-the-masses-by-the-masses vibe that makes it worth visiting.
Petfinder
Need a little love in your life? Skip the online dating sites and head to Petfinder instead. The Web's largest pet-adoption site lets you choose from more than a quarter of a million animals, searchable by age, location and gender. Each listing includes at least one photo and tells you whether the animal is house-trained and has had its shots. Many of the available pets come from a local branch of the Humane Society or a local rescue group, which will screen potential owners to make sure they can take care of the animal. Because only nonprofits are allowed to post listings, you won't find pets sold by breeders or pet stores, and many animals are fully grown. With so many pets to choose from, it may be tough to settle on just one.
WikiSky
The World Wide Web may be based here on Earth, but it can give you a bird's-eye view of the rest of the universe. WikiSky is a stellar place to start stargazing. Its gorgeous images of comets, galaxies and nebula — many of which come from the NASA-funded Astrophysics Data System at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics — are accompanied by short scientific explanations that will delight astronomy buffs. For a different lens on most objects, click on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which gives you the most realistic, high-res images of the night sky. The publicly and privately funded project, which aims to eventually map about a million galaxies and quasars, uses a massive telescope in Apache Point, N.M., and a 120-megapixel camera to captur
The World Wide Web may be based here on Earth, but it can give you a bird's-eye view of the rest of the universe. WikiSky is a stellar place to start stargazing. Its gorgeous images of comets, galaxies and nebula — many of which come from the NASA-funded Astrophysics Data System at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics — are accompanied by short scientific explanations that will delight astronomy buffs. For a different lens on most objects, click on the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which gives you the most realistic, high-res images of the night sky. The publicly and privately funded project, which aims to eventually map about a million galaxies and quasars, uses a massive telescope in Apache Point, N.M., and a 120-megapixel camera to capture its images. For breaking space news and more photos, visit Space.com. To the moon!
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