10 Blogs to Find Wonderful Things

For my weird/wonderful things, I read:
Neatorama
Boing Boing
Ectomo
Nothing to Do With Arbroath
Dave Barry's Blog
Dark Roasted Blend
Mental Floss
Brass Goggles
Cynical-C
Dethroner
Infosthetics
MAKEblog
Making Light (the Nielsen Haydens' blog)
Neil Gaiman's blog
Warren Ellis's blog

BoingBoing is "Highbrow" ?? I guess some people are impressed by the self-righteous banter of bien-pensant techno-hipsters, but I'm not one of them. Some interesting links are found there, but it does deserve a ribbon for being the most overrated blog in existence.

Neatorama is also not Geeky and self important like BoingBoing. All of the San Francisco hipster vibe crap has worn me thin.

I personally like Boing Boing and read them very often. They have a lot of neat stuff and update their blog at a maniacal pace. :)

I agree with Otterly (although I read BoingBoing frequently). And yeah, BoingBoing may be a more well-known site but I find Neatorama tends to update just as quickly, of not quicker.

Neatorama is way better than boingboing, much better links and half the obnoxious steam punk crap.

also; Corey Doctorow is a self-righteous ass.

Well earned praise Alex!

(And yes, I think there's quite a lot of cross-over between BoingBoing and Neatorama.)

I agree with the above posters, I've had BoingBoing on my daily blog list for years but eventually it became too self-righteous. It seems like the authors now blog about things that solely interest them, like copyright law and self-promotion of their own books and projects (which are also generally dry). The posts that are genuinely interesting (maybe 1/4th of them) are just culled from Neatorama or Presurfer anyway, so I cut out the pretentious middleman and now visit these sites exclusively. Neato is the true directory of wonderful things.

Go neatorama!!! gratz! =D

Not a huge fan of the "hey, BoingBoing copied us!" rhetoric that's been cropping up here and there ever since BB's revamp (I mean, let's face it, the format both BB and Neatorama exhibit is fairly common in the blogosphere, isn't it?) - but nevertheless I would agree heartily with the folks above who've commented that Neatorama is a "more fun" version of BB. I like both, I honestly do, but like a lot of other people who've already commented, I also feel that BoingBoing has started believing its own hype a bit too much lately, and that that self-important vibe sucks some of the joy out of it ... Neatorama is just plain fun, and the folks who post to it seem like nice, approachable, "regular folks," and they do a wonderful job of profiling some of the most interesting and just plain goofy stuff out there - so long live Neatorama =)

Also (upon reading the list) - Alex, even after reading this site for a few years now I never knew you were a biochemist! That's pretty cool =) You, Miss C, et al ought to have an "About Us" link somewhere; surely I can't be the only one who's curious about the folks who run this site (uhmm ... unless such a link already does exist and I'm just the only one who's never actually -found- the danged thing yet ... in which case, feel free to point, snicker, and then disregard ;))

There's a lot of crossover between the two (BoingBoing and Neatorama), but each is unique enough that I have both on my reader and wouldn't miss either! :) Yeah, Neatorama is a more "fun" BoingBoing.

I'm here for the first time b/c of the 10 blogs to find wonderful things article - am looking forward to browsing around, this blog's fans are obviously super-loyal for a reason :)

Neatorama is like BoingBoing, only better.

This blog doesn't beat you over the head with the authors' political views, for one thing.

What #8 said. The good posts on BB come from Neatorama. I switched once I realized that.

Congrats!
and I agree Neatorama > in fun than BB.
Also BB has a lot more posts that are boring.

Congrats Alex & contributors!
Neatorama is neat!
I end up reading 95% of your posts, as I read only 5% of BoingBoing's... I finally stopped reading Boing Boing.

Wow, I just read the same comment 17 times in a row. Really, what was the point of that? If you merely agree with the previous posts, but have nothing else new to add, why comment?

Congrats on the lauds. Yes, I've long felt you and Boing Boing share simmilarities. You guys just aren't as self oriented as they, an it makes you a better blog.

@atNOLA : when you get married, earn a diploma or get a new job, only the first person has the right to congratulate you and share its feelings? Dull life...

BoingBoing highbrow?!? Sure if highbrow means sex, Legos and copyright law. Not that there's anything wrong with that. My favorite topics.

My only complaint about Neatorama is is the occasional grumpy old man "Kids these days..." and "Get offa my lawn!" attitude with some of the posts.

I kinda like Metafilter, too, unmentioned so far.

I went to PicoCool and have a hard time understanding why it's on a list with the likes of BoingBoing and Neatorama. It looks as if it adds a post every 2-6 days and most posts are very old news by the post date. It's cute though and I like the clean design..still, one post in the month of March?

oh nevermind, it says the author redesigned RWW. I guess that earns an entry?

I used to go on both boingboing and neatorama, but now I only visit neatorama. I found boingboing too opinionated on some things and it focussed too much on politics a lot of the time, mostly which doesn't apply to me as I don't live in the US.
I think Neatorama is definitely more fun. Boingboing is for people who want to actually learn useful things but Neatorama is more like QI- quite interesting, but pretty useless information (although some of the art links I showed to my art teacher and she showed them to the class...)

Hell, I love you guys because you aren't annoyingly pretentious. BoingBoing loves the sound of their own voice.

@shecky: Oh, I agree with you. Metafilter is a gem, and the comments there are sometimes better than the front page link.

@stacyj: Good idea! We'll add that to the list for the next time Neatorama gets a redesign :) I've never said that BB copied Neatorama - I think this blog's layout is pretty generic to begin with. I sort of miss the old BB layout though.

Thank you for the pat on the back, guys - truth is, I've always admired Boing Boing for what they did for blogging. It's still one of my daily reads and I continue to be amazed at the stuff they find.

Oh really, they are both weblogs. They both post interesting items. Some interest me, some don't. Boing Boing has ALWAYS had a social/political stance in a fairly narrow field. Thank god for that, it's an important ongoing dialog dealing with one of the most important freedoms that we have! Of course it's serious. Boing Boing never said it would be quirky all the time nor that it would make you laugh all the time. So this site and that are different, vive la difference!

Neatorama is the first blogsite I became addicted to......and I come here everyday because I can always find something that truly amuses me. I also like Nothing To Do With Arbroath and Haha.nu. I look for something that will give me a good laugh at the start of my day. I can usually find it at Neatorama. All of the other blogs I read will be visited after I come home from work. Thank you, Neatorama, for starting my day with a good laugh.

Neatorama is way more fun than BoingBoing. It's also a lot more kid-friendly.

Despite being subtitled "A Directory of Wondeful Things" BB is written by people who can't wait for an opportunity to insert their heavily lefty political stance into the posts, and that's only palatable if you're like-minded.

I suspect their audience is the so-called hipster 18 to 30 or so demographic - or people who identify with same, ( I know a 50 year old father of two who does) whereas Neatorama's is far more inclusive.

I found Neatorama through BoingBoing and for a while I read both. After a short while though the pretentiousness and hipster nonsense wore on me and I started reading Neatorama exclusively.

Neatorama is so great because it is a consistently updated blog with great content. Boingboing updates frequently but about 90% of it's posts I couldn't care less about. Oh, and BoingBoingTV is absolutely abysmal...

Neatorama is very visual in presentation and intellectual at the same time. I can't compare so I won't! (^_^) Wonderful talent here with an eye for interesting things and mind boggling concepts. I love that the team has different styles of posting as well as interests. Congrats! You guys deserve it!