If you somehow managed to miss the drama yesterday, Yahoo! announced a large number of layoffs as well as services to be retired; the Delicious bookmarking site among those on the way out. LifeHacker has a list of The Best Alternatives to Delicious but I've yet to make a decision on any of them. I'd love to hear some personal anecdotes of what people have used to store this kind of data. I'm also skeptical that Yahoo! will continue with shutting down the service now that they've seen how big of a deal it is - maybe they can actually rethink their decision?

Being that it is December there tends to be a lot of special holiday websites sprouting up from different design shops to celebrate the occasion and the wrap of another successful year. The Firespring Advent Calendar is one such site and I'm rather enjoying it. It's a plethora of well designed modules, fun to interact with and actually informative. Well done Firespring. Well done.

Thanks to Kate I've been digging through the photostream of Theo Gosselin discovering various gems throughout. The stream is predominantly comprised of people - compelling life documentation - but I'm more intrigued by the shots of various environments. Seriously, these are phenomenal.

Designspiration is, without a doubt, a clone of FFFFound in terms of general concept and, somewhat, in terms of overall design. However, that doesn't discount it as a site worth visiting as there are plenty of inspiring designs, photos, typefaces, etc. If you're interested in reading more about the development of the site go here or ,if you're not concerned with background information, dive right in.

via Courtney.

You may already know about the upcoming IFC series Portlandia - with Fred Armisen and Carrie Brownstein - but with the premiere coming up on January 21st the promotion machine is starting to really rumble. You can watch the first preview of it here or an interview with the duo here regarding the series. According to sources it will also guest feature Kyle MacLachlan and Aubrey Plaza in certain roles. Sounds like a lot of the material will be pulled from their series Thunderant but, having never seen said series, I can deal with that. Looking forward to it.

Despite having access to the entirety of Helveticons I'm still a sucker for a well created set of icons. Fortunately, collections like Icon Sweets 2 (and Vol 1) help fulfill that need with over 400+ icons at large size and almost 300 icons at 16x16. And the craziest part? It's entirely free! Score.

via Will.

• AirPlayer Lets You Stream Video from iOS to Mac - basically it's tacked on functionality to the existing AirPlay method but not restricted to an AppleTV box. If this works for music, I think I may be hooked.
• Add Latency to Localhost - this would have been extremely handy back when Flash development was much higher on my priority list but, regardless, it's a nice trick to have at your disposal.

Today through Sunday (the 19th), if you're running the Chrome for a Cause extension every new tab you open in Chrome will function as a partial donation to a choice of charities. Admittedly, this is really just a clever / positive way to get people to try out Google Chrome for a few days but if it helps a few charities along the way, what's the harm? Great marketing ploy as far as I'm concerned. It's also interesting to see just how many new tabs one opens in a day...

Find some time today / tonight to sit down with the Words Hurt So Good list of 25 Favorite Music Videos of 2010. You can view the playlist here or watch it huge in the browser here but, regardless of how you get to it, find some time to watch them. I wasn't personally familiar with all of them but the ones I did know are top notch.. and I can only imagine the new treats are much the same quality.

I can't say that I'm surprised that the Sagmeister site redesign brings some off-the-wall execution of a perfectly clever idea but I can say that I'm happy to see it. The Making Of video shows the stickers being installed on the office floor that are used for the site navigation. I'm not entirely enthused on the design of the inner sections of the site but that's another discussion for another day - the homepage is brilliant and absolutely worth a gander.

Seeing as how it is that time of year, you should probably procure some Christmas music for all sorts of parties, family gatherings and general walking around for the remainder of the month. Here's some ammunition for your arsenal - both vetted and approved.

• Jeremy Okai Davis Mix - Almost Xmas - fortunately, not a lot of tradition songs, just a compilation of good spirited songs and a few hints at Christmas. The Allan Sherman song alone makes the download worth it.
• The Three Suns - Ding Dong Dandy Christmas - I believe I got this from Janet some time ago and it's managed to stay in the collection ever since. It's a collection of classic holiday songs done as only an instrumental group from the `50's could do them.. swinging and lounge-y.

Loving the contents, the layout and the little UI touches of the portfolio of Javier Arce. He's got a great illustration style - including works for Poolga, various magazines and some just for fun.

Cat Cat Avatar is, apparently, a way to keep your Twitter icon fresh by replacing it with a random amusing cat. It's a single serving function that I can honestly see tons of people gravitating towards. I particularly enjoy the sliding reveal nature of the Latest Users - especially when there's a cat behind that cat.

How am I just now coming across the single serving Tumblr Kim Jong-il Looking At Things? I can't say exactly what it is but it entertains me far beyond plenty of those other awkward world leader tumblogs. Maybe it's because Kim Jong-il makes outlandish claims and its just that much more entertaining to envision him in any situation.

The Black List is not what it sounds like - it is, in fact, a yearly list of unproduced screenplays compiled from tastemakers in the Hollywood / mainstream independent movie making scene. Basically, it's a list of film synopses that have yet to be made and it contains a wealth of entertaining ideas. Here's a taste of a few that I enjoyed:

CHRONICLE by Max Landis
"Three Portland teens become exposed to a mysterious substance in the woods, and, as a result, begin to develop incredible powers. They work together to hone their skills for fun until personal and family problems begin to turn them against one another."

MURDOCH by Jesse Armstrong
"As his family gathers for his birthday party, Rupert Murdoch tries to convince his elder children to alter the family trust so that his two youngest children by his newest wife will have voting rights in the company."

THE GIRL WITH SOMETHING EXTRA by Terrence Michael
"A young man who has been raised his entire life to believe he is a girl comes of age as he enters high school and learns his true gender."

BOY SCOUTS VS ZOMBIES by Carrie Evans & Emi Mochizuki
"A troop of Boy Scouts on their weekend camping trip must protect an island town from a zombie outbreak and save the local Girl Scout troop."

While some of the script summaries are truly outrageous (i.e. that Rupert Murdoch one) it is a fun mental exercise to imagine who would take on particular films and how that would change the overall execution of the story. At the very least, it will be interesting to see which (if any) of these ideas become full-fledged movies.

via Kate.

Seu Jorge collaborated with Kahlil Joseph to create a two-part short film that, at its core, is meant to serve as a promotional music video for Seu Jorge and Almaz but manages to transcend that purpose and become a work of art in and of itself. Nowness has a great rundown with Joseph on the process of working with Jorge and model Jodie Smith - as well as a pristine version of the second film to watch. Part one can be seen here.

via Madrid.

Get in the holiday spirit by taking a walk down memory lane via this photo set of 40 Vintage Santas. However, be forewarned! Some of these Santas are downright scary. #4, #5, #8 and, especially, #32 may induce Santa related nightmares. Other than that, they're quite pleasant!

via Jamie.

I can't help but think I've seen the works of Salva Lopez before. Maybe I'm just tricking myself because the l'Aquatic set just has an instant appeal to it.. or maybe I'm tricked into familiarity because I've seen the Women collab with Ana Cuba previously. Whatever the reason, I'm way into it - there is something worthwhile in every set. The sparsity, the colors and even the switch up in page layout per set is a great boon to my interest.

If Flickr wasn't be aggravatingly slow for me this morning I'd dive right into photostream as well.

via Building a Wolf.

Take some time to read through this NY Magazine profile on James Franco. It's a lengthy bit of insight but when you're covering someone that is currently enrolled in four graduate programs, making Hollywood films, performing in a soap opera and dabbling in art world undertakings; you're going to need every word. Oddly, this sort of summed it up for me:

He’s systematically challenging mass-cultural norms. Franco, you might say, is queering celebrity: erasing the border not just between gay and straight but between actor and artist, heartthrob and intellectual, junk TV and art museum. His obvious relish for gay roles challenges the default heterosexuality of Hollywood leading men like Clooney or Pitt. He seems more interested in fluidity, in every sense, than in a fixed identity.

The oddest part of the whole read is that you're constantly reminded that whenever something unbelievable is mentioned they're talking about this guy.

I had the pleasure of watching the Jean-Pierre Jeunet film MicMacs last night and couldn't speak more highly of it. With quirky directors like Michel Gondry seemingly falling by the wayside with crap it's nice to see someone sticking with their original style and just embellishing it out further. Little bits of animation and CG pepper the storytelling but there's still plenty of practical effects and, above all, a compelling story about an oddball group banded together in pitting two arms manufacturers against each other. I can't recommend it enough.