This links page is partially to suggest places of interest to others, but also to remind me of sites I may have forgotten about. In general this page seems to weather storms better than my own personal bookmark files.
There has been a half-arse'd attempt at organisation here. Please be mindful of this. It has not been done to challenge your preconceptions about how links are presented. It's just because I'm a disorganised fool.
Please notify me of any out of date, changed, or dead links you find.
- Last update: 29th Mar 2008 -
Companies
- Blackcatnetworks.co.uk - My ever capable hosts and a lovely bunch of lads over all.
- The Bitmap Brothers - Official site of the legendary game creators, famous for their unique style during the early 90s and their collaborations with the Rhythm King record label. Sadly the site hasn't been updated since late 2002 and the announced Speedball Arena game seems to have largely been vapourware with the microsite now pointing to an ISP holding page. Almost makes me weep so it does. The world needs a new Speedball game.
For more up-to-date Bitmap info there is a rather smashing German fansite called Gods Country that should suffice. - Factor 5 software were responsible for one of my all-time favourite computer games, Turrican 2. About ten years ago they announced a follow-up, Thornado. Some storyboard art and a demo theme by Chris Hũlsbeck were released but there was no mention of the game beyond that. I occasionally check back at the site in the hope that it would be announced. Even if it was for a "next-gen" platform like the Playstation 5 (a new Turrican game might actually spur me to buy a next-gen console). Sadly these days Factor 5 seem content with producing endless Rogue Squadron games for Lucasarts.
Cookery
- Kake's (vegan) Cookery page is an excellent resource for girly vegan and low-fat recipes.
Culture
- Bruce Campbell Online - The official site of the worlds greatest wisecracking action B-movie star. also featuring his lectures/treatise on acting and the movie business and fat people and greed and stuff. Bruce Campbell is officially one of the greatest men who ever lived... as far as I'm concerned... and an example of how we all should be: Stubborn. Opinionated, and outrageously handsome... with a firm jawline. Ted Raimi is his boy wonder, butt monkey and brother of Bruce's ally in fighting entropy, infamous evil freak-goblin Sam Raimi.
- Slugger O'Toole - Public notes on life and culture in Northern Ireland. Moderated and edited to remove the wankers that exist on other such public forums.
- The Internet Movie Database (IMDB) - What has become a fairly crucial piece of the internet for anyone interested in movies to an extent beyond just watching them. Fairly concise details on virtually every movie ever made with cast and crew cross-refs and one of my favourite parts; trivia and goof lists.
- Star Wars.com - Very little needs to be said. It's official. It has an extensive database of people & places in the mythos as well as up to date, if officially sanctioned, news and imagery. Sadly they now charge for the most (theoretically) juicy stuff.
- Dungeons & Dragons - Official section on the Wizards of The Coast site for the worlds oldest fantasy roleplaying game. Featuring as well as information on the game, news, downloadable modules and accessories, merchandise, rules updates and various other related downloads and info. There has been a lot of criticism from long-time D&D players of WOTC's handling of the game since their takeover of TSR but in their defence how many other companies do you know of online that offer an entire fantasy medieval town for free download..?
- Dragonsfoot - is a good resource for 1st Edition Advanced Dungeons & Dragons materials including modules, maps, character sheets etc.
- The Order of the Stick - Absolutely excellent online comic strip featuring the adventures of a hapless group of D&D adventurers. Apparently the initial adventures have been collected in a book you can read on the toilet. A great read if you are even remotely into the Dungeons & Dragons game.
- SV Games - Have got license to sell cheap PDF downloads of long deleted and usual hard to find, not to mention expensive AD&D gaming materials such and rulebooks and modules. Why spend $30-$130 on a classic module on eBay or Abebooks etc when you can buy it here and print it out yourself for $5. I actually think in some cases list of erratas and corrections have been included.
- And on a final D&D note; here is the script (on the author, Michael Reaves' site) for the unmade final episode of the mid-80s cartoon series where the kids die and Venger wakes up to find it was all a cheesedream and Dungeon Master is in actual fact his fat ugly wife.
Friends
- Jodi Crisp - The Strange and slightly mad yet lovely Jodi and her travels around this world and beyond.
- rryBlog - Rory dwells here in the nothovel doing we know not what. We don't like to ask. It all looks so innocent from a cursory glance. But we know the truth. Or rather we don't want to know the truth. Best just leave it.
- Colin Turner - The new website of Colin Turner.
- Darryl Sloan - The website of Darryl Sloan Portadown based author and musician.
- Dave Wilson - Hyper little genius and madman.
- Jonathan McDowell - The website of Jonathan McDowell, ex-pat Ulsterman living on the mainland and running his own ISP with friend Simon Huggins.
- Patrick Moore - The website of Patrick Moore, not the famous astronomer and Xylophone player (who can be found here). Paddy has moved his wibble to his slightly more lazy but slightly more updated Livejournal
- Paul Devlin - Been ages since Paul updated his site. years infact. And probably that long since anyone has seen him. I'm going to assume he's dead just to piss him off.
- Unmusic - The site set up to document the various projects of one Robin Hyder AKA Killermike.
- Wild Wanilla - My girlfriend Pirita's website. As well as the usual industry standard website gubbins like photos, blogs and links it also contains details about her hand-made clothes and other artistic works.
Games
- Planarity - Flash-based web game: Untangle Vertices for fun and profit. Well not really profit, perhaps profit of the soul or something. Infuriatingly addictive.
- Fairies - a really relaxing and beautifully put together puzzle game wherein you have to match up coloured jars of faeries in order to free them and score points.
- Hamsterjam - new remake of the classic C=64 game Rockman, 'cept it features everyones favourite rodent the Hamster (not Hampster). Features mega-cute graphics and net-tallied high-scores. Also Free.
- Dismount - Rather bizarre but fun games wherein you have to assist the hero in his quest to injure himself as much as possible to claim insurance. (New link)
- Yolkfolk.com - The official Dizzy fansite. Featuring all the required info and trivia on the ZX Spectrum's greatest hero as well all the games via the Java-based Spectrum emulator Hob. Most of the games are also available for download for all the major PC formats.
Media
- The BBC - The web portal for the BBC. For News, Entertainment, all brought to you through the unique way the BBC is funded, etc...
- The Onion - Americas finest news source. They don't report the truth, just an infinitely more entertaining form of lies.
The Portadown News - The only source for what's really going on in Northern Ireland, or Portadown at least.Editor Newton Emerson sadly succumb to lures of hard cash to become a proper journalist and has since abandoned the Portadown News like the contemptably no-integrity loser that he is.- Private Eye - Britains longest running source of topical irony. Cutting through the misinformation to bring you the truth... allegedly.
- Blogger - Fed up with the poor state of media reporting? Do it yourself with Blogger, or just use it as a quick and easy way to post recipes and shit like I do.
Music
- And One . co . uk - My site all about the German synth-pop/EBM band, And One. Note this is an unofficial site and I won't take any crap from people giving me abuse over cancelled tour dates or crappy gigs or lame albums. The official site can be found here. Though it can often be found to be ambiguous or dead.
- Evil-e.net - Evil E's popular, officially endorsed, Front 242 site. Probably the most comprehensive and complete site dedicated to Front242 online.
- James Ray - My new James Ray portal. I'm not a huge fan of James Ray. He's done some cool stuff and his new project 4080 Peru seems... interesting... but Gangwar was largely shite. However he's not that well represented online and I was bored one night. So there you go. An 'official' site has since appeared at www.thejamesray.co.uk offering the majority of James Rays back catalogue as free moderate quality unsorted mp3 downloads. Fans I know couldn't be bothered downloading them sadly proving once and for all that you can't even give most of this stuff away.
- Foetus - The web-home of one of the most original artists of the last quarter century. Foetus AKA Jim Thirlwell has undoubtedly influenced so many in the sphere of rock with his blend of seedy experimental sleaze-rock, mixing blues and rock n roll with industrial sensibilities.
- Impaled Northern Moonforest - Only the blackest black metal goes into Impailed Northern Moonforest. The very blackest chunks of evil scraped from the bases depths of Seth Putnam's mattress and thrown into a blackest black cauldron of blackness from which arises the blackest evil black that black has ever blacked. It's quite black, and if you play it backwards you can hear the devil. Or a funny noise that could be the devil if you really try to convince yourself really hard. It may of course just be an indistinct reverse fart but you need to keep an open mind about these things. (MySpace)
- KillingJoke.com - New official site managed by long-time KJ fan Jester Joe Mojica. His unofficial site still lives on www.killing-joke.com.
- Lycopodeia is my tribute site to the musical project of the (I think) well talented Marc Phillipps. Currently mainly consists of a frontend to his currently rather limited storage space, but he's planning to potentialise his presentation mechanism once he has realised his functional location ethos.
- Mindphaser - The worlds best and most comprehensive Bill Leeb/Front Line Assembly/Delerium site. Mindphaser owns! etc... See the new store on Cafepress for some shoddy merch
- Mordant Music - New dark and sinister art from the Portion Control camp.
- Portion Control - New minimalist site from the legendary electro-punk innovators focusing on their latest release/s. The site 319-online.net fan site is largely given the responsibility of reporting the latest news and info and documenting the history of the band.
- Throbbing Gristle at Brainwashed. Probably one of the most dedicated and concise sites about this most influential and important rock band on one of the most dedicated and concise sites on alternative/art music sites online.
- Nectarine - Demoscene radio playing requested scene related music, mods and chiptunes 24 hours a day.
- sevcom.com is the official Severed Heads site. Tom Ellard is in the process of reissuing all the back catalogue remastered via the site. Most of the albums are available now on cheap home brewed made to order CDR with extra tracks and new artwork. Many are available for online purchase and download there are also free rare tracks and access to one of the longest running fan communities on the net.
- Peter "Skaven" Hajba is one of my favourite "demoscene" musicians. Like many of the more talented demoscene musicians he has gone on to be involved in the commercial games sector. Selections of his own output can be download from his page on Mikseri (Finnish).
- Official homepage for The Weathermen - Eccentric faux-pop featuring a Belgian and an American and their problems with obsessive fictional groupies. I have set up my own humble tribute page to them here.
- whomix is a project coordinated by geeky cult-fan and Japan-based cannuck musician mutagene to assemble fan-produced Dr Who remixes/covers/tributes/mashups/pisstakes for the good of mankind.
Resources
- Steal These Buttons - As you may have noticed I'm kinda fond of the industry standard 80x15 dinky linkbutton. George Taylor McKnight has an impressive interactive repository of the things over on his site. The few I create myself I submit and I steal the rest as it says on the tin.
- ShieldsUp - Simple, but effective site which will scan your computer for open port and other security breaches and inform you of them and suggest resolutions.
- UK Nova - One of the few still running media bit torrent trackers. Strictly dealing in rare and commercially unavailable UK TV, radio and movie material. From old obscure comedy from the 1950s to last weeks Eastenders. Long may it live. (It delivered unto me both series of Nightingales. You can't beat that shit.)
- WikiPedia - probably the best free encyclopedic resource there is. It's a publically editable database of facts and great at it too. I rarely need to look anywhere else these days.
- MusicBrainz Artists/Album database and tagging software. Hopefully one day will replace that vile freak that was once freedb.org as the default repository for published audio fact.
- The Open Sauce - Great online database of user submitted recipes. Needs more support from the public.
Retro
- The World Of Spectrum - The Ultimate online resource for all things pertaining to Sir Clive's little gem.
- The Your Sinclair Rock n Roll Years - a site dedicated to the best Sinclair Spectrum magazine there ever was, and just like the magazine this site is crap... in a funky skillo sort of way.
Currently Nick who runs the site is in the middle of creating a show based upon the BBC's Rock n Roll Years documenting the life of the Spectrum year by year. Quite ambitious. First few years are online for download. - ZX Format - A new quarterly Magazine aimed at the burgeoning ZX Spectrum Retro scene. With reviews, code, articles etc etc etc. Available for PDF download with optional 1 donation. Quite a good read with an informative site behind it and one of the very few half-decent CafePress collections.
Shops
- SVP (Blank Disc Shop) - Very good and cheap source for Printer & CD/DVD consumables. Have regular special offers on postage which make things as cheap as chips.
- Leisure Games - Very good online retailer for various table-top and roleplaying games and various assorted accessories as well as models and miniatures and other items of geeky cultitude.
- Discount Computers NI - Local enterprise dealing in cheap computer kit and refurbished bits. Satisfactory dealings with them thus far, but they don't generate the best air of professionalism. nb: Despite the store being in the same place, selling the same stuff with the same staff this company is in no way connected to previously trading Discount Computers NI who may still owe people money and warranty time and replacements and deliveries and stuff. They are very clear about this... BTW when buying in person you really need to demand a receipt from them. They seem reluctant on that score and getting a receipt when buying electronic goods is usually considered wise. And they wonder why people find them suspect?
- Mplex - Seem to have taken over a lot of the business from Discount Computers lately and are technically my local computer shop. Haven't had too much experience with them myself so far but reports from friends have been good. I'm a bit put off my the bugs and typos on the website which are the sort of thing to make one hesitant with the old credit card but they are a fairly new outfit so I guess they need time to work out the groove. Unsure of their forum. It's good that a firm has such an open feedback mechanism but the staff come off as a little immature... I mean, I'm never going to be endeared to anyone who refers to people as "m8".
- Play.com - For cheap DVDs, music & games and quick delivery nothing really beats play.com. Except maybe...
- Sendit.com - who have the added benefit of being local, plus they'll do searches for deleted items and give you a quote.
Social
- Aware - Irish voluntary organisation for support and assistance with depression and related psychological illnesses. Aware NI deals with the North however the website has been crippled by bad design for quite some time. Phone numbers are still active as far as I am aware.
Software
- amaroK - A music player and library program for KDE. I've found myself growing very fond of amaroK over the past year and now use it as my main player. It can be slightly buggy but mostly it's the best music player I've found on any platform and does all it's functions to an almost perfect degree. As well as a searchable music library it has wikipedia integration, can output using a variety of player engines (eg xine, gstreamer etc), supports podcasts and has the ability to send playlists to k3b to be burned to data or audio CD. Very nice and highly recommended.
- GAIM - Instant Messaging Client, started off as an AIM client for the linux Gnome system but over time evolved into a multi protocol (covering all the majors like MSN, ICQ, Yahoo, Jabber etc) that runs on any system running GTK. There is also now a version for Microsoft Windows and an Apple Mac native version in the pipeline.
- Mozilla
PhoenixFirebirdFirefox -The worlds bestest Internet browser and anyone that says different will get a punch in the stomach.Ok, Firefox is a bit shit. I find it reliable but it's as bloated as the proverbial and has an ugly UI. I still prefer it to Opera though. Mandrake Linux - Probably the best Linux distribution for the beginner, easy(ish) to set up and use... and of course free to download (3-4 CDs worth mind...).Since it became the stupidly named Mandriva Linux and started being almost as aggressively commercial as Red Hat, it has also got a bit shite. Luckily there is a great alternative for the novice linux user in the form of...- Ubuntu Linux - Created as a friendly and aggressively free OS by the nice people at Canonical. Comes in two forms and two flavours: live CD bootable versions for those who want to try linux out without installing (or want to run linux temporarily on machines that only have Windows etc on them) and an installable version for those that decided they want to keep it. There is the standard Ubuntu running the Gnome desktop and Kubuntu for those that prefer KDE's slightly Windows-esque offerings.
- Open Office.org - Free Open Source Office suite to rival Microsoft Office. Available for Linux flavours and Windows in a multitude of Languages.
- WinAMP - Still the best Media Player for Windows.
XMMS - The best media player I've found for X-windows.I've since fallen in love with amaroK. Despite it being a "suite" of a kind it is a fantastic one and well worth installing KDE for. Though since I'm a KDE user anyway I might be seen as biased...- AVG free edition - Free and easy to setup Anti-Virus software for Windows. Like all Anti-Virus software this program is next to useless if you don't update it regularly. Like once a week, or more if you hear there is a season of viruses going around on the media etc. If you don't update your virus definitions regularly then don't use an anti-virus program. It's that simple. Anti-virus software that isn't regularly updated with the latest definitions is worse than useless. It's just like having a dud smoke alarm. Or an empty fire extinguisher.
- SwatIt - Free basic Trojan and Bot scanning. Good if you are one of those muppets that downloads everything strangers send you on MSN, Yahoo and the seedy Lolita teen-sex chatrooms you hang out in.
- Ad-Aware - Great free program for scanning your HD and removing Spyware; like the Cookies, stupid ad things and data mining applications that various pieces of software feel the need to install on your computer.
- Zina is an absolutely excellent mp3 php application. Like
the equally excellentAndromeda* only with added plus points, like being free on the GPL and being able to generate low-fi versions on the fly with the lame mp3 encoder, thrown in. Just drop it in your mp3 directory with some server software like apache, IIS or Xitami at it and it'll generate a database at that address. E Voila... as they'd say in France if they used it. Which they probably do but in reality they'd say "Heeeey" like Joey from Friends because allegedly in France they think Joey is the best thing out of the states since Jerry Lewis.
*(you may wonder how something can be equally excellent and better. Well, they both have their plus and minus points, but if Zina becomes as tight and pleasing to the eye as Andromeda and gets the bugs ironed out it'll be FAR superiorZina now pisses all over Andromeda from a great height.)
Zeitgeist
- MyDeathSpace - Morbid or honourable, MyDeathSpace documents MySpace members who have died. Rather than obituaries it seems to focus on the manner of the deaths, which is why I find it slightly morbid and voyeuristic. I've also noticed that the majority of the deaths seem automobile related. Which appeals nicely to my personal hatred of traffic.
- Gone with the Blastwave - Cynical Polish webcomic about faceless teambased combatants fighting a forgotten future war in a ruined city.
- The official I. Helford fan club. Do you feel a love for the omnipresent chairman of Viking Office Supplies and his unique presentation style? Then join the club!
- Chuck Norris Facts - All true facts about Chuck Norris and why you should respect and fear him more than god or die.
- The Darwin Awards - The Darwin Award is given to those people who through their own ineptitude, naivety and outright stupidity have done a service to mankind by removing their moronic DNA from the genepool.
- Disturbing Auctions.com - a site dedicated to the weird and freaky stuff people stick on eBay etc.
- All Your Base... - One of those meaningless crazes, that starts off as some private little gag between some geeks, possibly potheads, and spirals out of control until it becomes almost a pseudo-religion. A bit like OBEY.
- BadgerBadgerBadger - Despite numerous requests someone has yet to inform me of what the hell this is exactly. Sounds like Covenant on magic mushrooms (mushroom mushroom). Magical Trevor rocks though. Weebl has many more.
- The Chap Magazine - "The Chap is a quarterly serving of advice on personal grooming, revolutionary etiquette and common courtesy, offering guidance to those cast adrift in a world of increasing vulgarity. If you are alarmed at the sartorial standards exhibited by today's youth and seek instruction in the subtle arts of hat doffing and cufflink appreciation; or if your life is already dedicated to the pleasures of the Dry Martini and the briar pipe - The Chap cordially invites you to take a leisurely stroll along the electronic boulevards herein."
- Rate My Poo.com - The worst site on the internet. Worse than Rotten.com. I just had one glance at this site and felt disgusted beyond endurance. Do not go to this site... but you will, because ultimately you have no free will. So go, but don't say I didn't warn you. And I meant it.
- Reflectoporn - This phenomenon began to appear on eBay a few years ago. Photographs of seemingly innocent items placed for auction that upon closer examination contained the reflection of the naked photographer who will very often be fat and/or ugly. This has since become a craze akin to online streakers with eBay deleting countless auctions every month based on someones unflattering nudity being revealed in items like TVs, kettles and spoons (list is not exhaustive).
- bash.org - The Quote Database. The best of the wisdom and banter from IRC and related enterprises.
- The Perry Bible Fellowship - Some really fucked up enjoyable cartoons.
- Urban Dictionary - an online dictionary that specialises in colloquial language. especially handy in this day and age when people chatting in a global environment feel the need to use local language and no-one kens a fuckin' baldies what the fuck they're beatin on 'bout.
Sadly drowning in submissions from moronic schoolkids with free unrestricted internet access and no fucking discipline. - The Wayback Engine - Archive.org's (in)famous archive of the internet. Research those embarrassing old websites you made when you were 17 full of your embarrassing poetry, pathetically badly written half-finished fiction and lame mixtapes and realise with horror the real truth of the universe, that only things you don't want to lose really get lost but your mistakes will haunt you forever.
At least they rarely cache images with any great priority so those naked pictures of your girlfriend/wife you posted on your website in 2001 when drunk probably won't be archived. I say probably. You are probably best just trusting in the lord to forgive your sins and covering your transgressions with the sands of 404 than checking and becoming a pillar of salt.