Here’s some links I’ve discovered this month that provided me with some inspiration. Be it inspiration to code or to design or to just get something done, hope they provide the same to you.

http://www.uncontrol.com/ - Algorithmic art at it’s finest. I found this through a link to "#55 - Clock" but have found any other one I click on is just as fascinating. Best of all they graciously open sourced these projects and provide them for download.

http://www.firerift.com/ - Who knew a CMS could have such a cool commercial? Looks like a promising alternative, it’s coming very soon so we’ll see if it can live up to that commercial.

http://photosynth.net/ - I’m sure many of you are familiar with this 3D photo offering from Microsoft, I remember being wowed by it a long while ago. But it just got better, they’ve opened it up to the public so now anyone can register and upload photos that can ultimately be shared with those of someone else. Can’t wait to see what monuments are made ’synthy’.

http://fallingsandgame.com/sand/fall1.html - Not much for inspiration but it’s an awesome way to get away for a few minutes and clear your head. Deceptively simple game with no real point but still manages to be extremely fun.

Linotype Font Management - A free font manager that works like magic! Good Things Should Never End - I totally agree, fun site too. McCain Potato Parade - I never had this much fun with potatoes before. Opt Out PreScreen - Save a few trees and get less crap in the mail.

First of all, as a techie myself, this list is mainly just crap that i’d love to have but don’t want to pay for myself. That being said I think there’s some viable gift ideas for the techie on your list that has everything else they could want.

1. IronKey: The World’s Most Secure USB Flash Drive with Internet Protection Services

from $79 It’s a super-duper USB flash drive that offers a rugged military quality design, secured encryption and a ton of other high tech features. The best one of all is that it’ll self destruct after 10 incorrect password guesses or if someone tampers with the case. Obviously way over the top for the normal user but I must admit it’s pretty great to think of a place I can store anything without ANYONE else getting access even if they tried.

2. Optimus Maximus LED keyboard

~$1564.37 OK, this one is a bit of an overshot but it’s so damn cool that it has to be on the list. Each key of this fantastic keyboard has a tiny screen on it to show what the key is supposed to do, not only will it capitalize the letters and show the special characters across the number row when you hit shift, you can also program it to work with your favorite programs like shortcuts in Photoshop or even show graphical representations of the hotkeys for your games. But with a pricetag at almost $1600, i’m sure it’s not going to be on many people’s lists this Christmas.

3. Kidz-Med Thermofocus

$99.95 I don’t understand how, but someone made a device that finds your temperature without any kind of contact using totally harmless and safe infrared technology. Just move it close to the forehead and wham-o you got the temperature. I can imagine this being a supremely convenient and safe alternative to the conventional means of taking ones temperature.

4. VX Nano Cordless Laser Mouse

$69.99 I admit, this is something I actually already own, so I can say with confidence that it’s absolutely amazing because of one single feature i’ve never seen before. The Logitech peeps aptly call it ‘Hyper-fast scrolling’ and it’s amazingly awesome, basically it’s a scrollwheel without the tactile clicks at every turn. You can swipe the wheel and (depending on how hard you swiped) it’ll continue to spin for several seconds. This is perfect for scrolling quickly through webpages and documents once you get the hang of it. I swipe the wheel and then tap it to stop it ‘on a dime’ right where I want to. If that wasn’t enough you can click the wheel and bring it back to the familiar tactile precision scrolling. Because this is activated by clicking the wheel, they added another button right under it that can act as the action that normally happens when you click a scroll wheel (e.g. auto-scroll). Finish it off with a forward/back set of buttons, side scrolling capabilities and the fact that it’s a laser mouse and you can’t get much better. I must mention that there’s been a few comments on Amazon that this mouse is not as easy to set up on macs because apparently it’s not included on the provided CD.

5. InferPoint Slimouse SlimPad

N/A Everything you know about the design of the mouse has been turned on its ear, this thing is square in shape and super thin. It has a scroll ‘wheel’ but the wheel is nonexistent, it uses a sensor touch-scroll that apparently allows for greater precision.

BONUS Geeky Wrapping Paper

$5.99 With all the awesome geeky gifts listed above, you’re going to need something to wrap it in! Choose from 6 different designs including binary, equations and emoticons.

Saw an amazing web campaign for Diesel Clothes that blew me away. I wonder how long and how much that took to make! This is the kind of stuff i’d love to do, although the video portion would probably have to be done by someone else.

Found a cool blog-like resource of cool AJAX and ‘web2.0′ applications and tools over at ajaxFlakes. Looks like it’s only been around since August but it already has 6 pages of cool helpful tools. I’ve already added it to my del.icio.us, will you?

Finally, a friend turned me on to this freelance hub called freelance switch that I thought was a great implementation of a job listing database. There’s definitely no shortage of such sites out there these days but something about how this is laid out and organized really made it easy to use. I’m not much one to actively look for freelance gigs but if I did I’ll be sure to check out this site first!

It’s an amazing feat to put the 200 most successful websites on the web into any kind of organization but to order by category, proximity, success, popularity and perspective? Unheard of! That is until now, somehow the people over at information architects expanded upon their previous version to be more consistent and therefore more revealing and ultimately more helpful. Check it out, there’s images PDFs and webpages and if that wasn’t enough you can even get a printed poster!

Found these sites through a friend, they really take the concept of ‘wall design’ to the extreme. Check them out! WallDesign Blik

Here’s another list of websites I feel are inspirational in thier magnificence. These sites range from a crisp cleanliness and attention to details to an in-your-face graphics intense design but they all have something in common, my admiration. Give them a look-see and let them know what you think about their awesome sites… Grapefruit Tetsoo Production Thanea TokiDoki New Ezra

Absolutely loving all the links over at http://www.kayodeok.btinternet.co.uk/favorites/webdesign.htm. It seems that some were broken when I tried but all in all another great bookmark resource!

Icons are a great way of sprucing up online applications by adding that little bit of intricacy and design to an otherwise boring site full of text links. Creating your own icons are great but what about those of you (oh who am I kidding, us) that are uninspired or pressed for time? Lucky for you (us) there are quite a few resources to gather icons from such as The Iconfactory and HybridWorks to name a few

We’ve always been told that you can find the beauty in and draw inspiration from anything. Well here’s one interesting place, Japanese Manhole Covers displays tons of simply beautiful manhole covers. Another resource to draw inspiration from is Speak Up’s Word It. According to them Word It is…

your opportunity to express in as many words, and as many other graphic elements as you need, what best describes each monthly topic. Each month we will choose a specific topic, idea or theme. For example: the first theme was “inspiration.” So you would go home, or do it at work, and find words, images, artwork, whatever that best describes what inspiration means to you. It could be anything: music, cats, chocolate, museum, love, laundry. Anything that reflects what inspiration is to you. You can do whatever you want to it: vectorize it, photoshop it, scan it or build it and then send it to us.

A few sites to draw inspiration from… http://www.okaydave.com/ http://www.mylkhead.com http://www.starvingeyes.com

I’ve been keeping tabs on a great site called LironBot for well over a year now. It’s run by a clever 23 year-old American Israeli named Liron, who is currently living just outside of Tel Aviv, Israel. First I was pulled in by her blog and more recently by her new Lironbot Podcast. She just so happened to start it approximately the same week I got my iPod so it seemed only fitting that hers would be the first I would subscribe to. After just 5 podcasts she’s already amassed a following of devoted listeners (myself included). Give both a shot and let her know that D3 sent ya!

Missed the May 1st reboot, but it looks like LoveBird didn’t! Frickin awesome, they deserve to be the winner, check it out and find out why for yourself/

Very interesting site of sound, photography, animation and painting. Take a gander at http://www.99rooms.com/