Useful Links

A running catalog of cool websites and interesting links from trawling the world wide web. Organized randomly for inconvenience.

Websites

  • After The Final Curtain by Matt Lambros
    • A blog documenting abandoned movie theaters across the United States
  • The Retrologist by Rolando Pujol
    • News and updates on historic 'Americana' businesses and topics
  • HOPE-TUNNEL.org by Dante D. Angerville
    • A wealth of photos of transit photos from NYC, Chicago, and the Northeast, from the early-mid 2000s.
  • History of Home and Game Computers by Erik Klooster
    • A retro website cataloging a PC collection, including some interesting & obscure European models
  • RoadsideArchitecture.com by Debra Jane Seltzer
    • An exhaustive site cataloging vintage roadside architecture through over 75,000 photos. 
  • Buffalo as an Architectural Museum by Chuck LaChiusa
    • A dated (but actively updated!) website covering the underrated and beautiful architecture in and around Buffalo, NY
  • Spike Japan
    • A verbose blog covering some of Japan's forgotten cities and towns during the depths of the Great Recession. Recommended reading: Requiem for A Railway 
  • Bleak Scenes
    • A photography blog that covers a lot of abandoned places in Japan, with a focus on the remnants of bubble-era internal tourism
  • Kathmandu And Beyond by Mark and Kirsty Bennetts
    • A travel blog that covers several interesting architectural sites in the former USSR/Eastern Europe.
  • McMansionHell by Kate Wagner
    • A comedic blog covering the horrible 'art' of the McMansion
  • Fictional Brands Archive by Lorenzo Bernini
    • An archive of 'fake' brands from movies, tv shows, and video games.
  • Don's Depot by Don Ross[1]
    • Catalogs a wealth of historic railroad photos, including many shortlines.
  • lateral thinking by Yoshimi Red
    • A political and fiction blog about China, video games, and related topics.
  • Encyclopaedia of Cryptozoology
    • A wiki for 'cryptids', with a focus towards 'animals unknown to science', rather than the classical monster-inclusive definition. 
  • The Cutting Room Floor
    • A wiki for scrapped, pre-release, and development content in video games.
  • Chicago Transit Forum
    • A forum for transit enthusiasts in Chicago
  • Canadian Public Transit Discussion Board + Wiki
    • A forum for transit enthusiasts in (primarily) the US and Canada, with an attached wiki that is the most exhaustive wiki for bus operators I've found.
  • jonrev
    • Dead mall, urbex, and retail photography
  • Victoria Scott
    • Personal website of one of my favorite photographers & car writers
  • Postcard Past/Present Photo
    • Architectural history, comparing historic postcards to current photographs.

Pages

Useful Rants

  • Bob Is In Hell by Cathode Ray Dude
    • On having to come up with shiny new features for products that have no more possible good new features.
  • Why Cheap Crap Is Evil by How To Drink
    • about why disposable, useless garbage sucks and is dooming us all.
  • Malevolent Foods by Beany Tuesday
    • my favorite/least favorite 'genre' of capitalist foodstuff

Utilities

  • TinyPNG
    • PNG image compressor that does up to 20 photos at a time, as long as they're under 5 MB each
  • Squoosh
    • Another image compressor, with more options for file format. I use this if my images are too big for TinyPNG.
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[1] - Maintained by the Illinois Railway Museum and the DeGolyer Library of Southern Methodist University after his passing in 2023