Photo Journal – When you think about The Wall Street Journal, the first thing that pops into your head is boring financial data, and in-depth economy related articles, right? That makes the two of us. That’s why I was so blown away by what I feel are the best photos I have ever seen online. I was especially impressed by the Pictures of the Day feature – photos here are simply stunning.

It is important to note that these aren’t simply highly professional photos, taken by this accredited photographer or another. It’s about amazing photos acting as news items that hold their own. Each photo is accompanied by a short description to help you understand its context. I truly admire this manner of consuming news because it combines great and powerful visuals with current updates on what’s going on in the world. Some of the photos I found particularly amazing are below. Clicking on the photos below will redirect you to the story behind them.

GlitchScape – GlitchScape is “an experimental sound/vision musical instrument designed and programmed by Tomasz Slawnikowski.” I am not sure I entirely grasped the essence of this interesting project, but I will give you my interpretation of it.

Drag the mouse to create a visual blue box. Each box creates a different sound, and you can add as many of these as you want. The more boxes you add, the more sounds are created in the loop. I think this site is best explained by simply entering it, so feel free to skip the rest of this post and jump right in. I asked my brother: “what is this site? I don’t get it” – to which he replied: “Not everything should be understood :-).” This project reminded me of a video art by Ulf Langheinrich and Kurt Hentschläger I saw a while ago. I was deeply impressed by it, which is why I am sharing it with you – it’s also blue. Coincidence?

Yo-Ho-Ho Cannon – All hands on deck! We have a new captain. He will guide our ghost-ship through 28 levels in hostile seas. No fort will resist us. Remember! Their gold belongs to us! Can you guess what this game reminded me of? Yep, Pirates of the Caribbean. See below Bloopers from POTC: Dead Man’s Chest. For daily updates of cool new games, check out facebook.com/allmygames.

Clicker – Online is the environment where we pretty much live our lives today. Think about it; we shop, listen to radio, read news, send mail and do so much more by simple mouse clicks in front of the screen. Consequently, our transformation into an exclusively webby community is just a matter of time.

One exclusion to the above statement is our TV consumption. Why do we find letting go of the old school viewing medium so difficult, especially nowadays, when visual information on the Web is just as accessible, if not more so? The answer is quite simple; sites such as Hulu.com and the like offer a large variety of full episodes of your favorite TV shows, but not all. Besides, licensing and copyright issues prevent overseas users from enjoying Hulu’s service. That’s a huge bummer for those who want it all – myself included. But let’s say you are satisfied with what the Web has to offer. You still need to work your way around finding what and where to watch because TV shows are scattered around the infinite online playground. So what can you do? In a few words; Clicker is here to help.

Clicker is “the complete guide to Internet Television,” and “catalogs all broadcast programming online, along with TV-quality Web originals, from these silos and delivers them in one seamless, organized experience so you can easily discover what’s available to watch (and what isn’t) online, where to watch it, and what’s worth watching.” Stop by for a refreshing take on the old tube.

Duffel – Organizing a trip can be quite stressful. There are so many things to think about and plan ahead, not to mention the relevant errands one needs to take care of (such as booking a flight and accommodation, car rental, etc.). In addition, you need to set a sight-seeing outline well before your arrival because time is of the essence on vacations, particularly if these are short term visits.

One resource that will help you organize your trip is Duffel, “a trip planning dashboard that organizes and helps you visualize your travel research.” To be honest, I felt the site required too much of an effort on my part and I wish their platform had been more intuitive and simpler overall. Just the thought of clipping and collecting my travel preferences got me tired. On the other hand, what I do appreciate about duffel is their feature of ‘ready-made’ visual trip plans. I found these extremely valuable since they provide you with useful recommendations you can actually implement in your next vacation. The best way to start exploring duffel would be by checking out their list of popular cities. This brought me to Rome, Paris and Tokyo.

This Day in Music – “An Everyday Record of Musical Facts” is what This Day in Music is all about. This sweet website is a cut to the chase resource of historical facts of the music industry. Updated on a daily basis, This Day in Music offers interesting (and real) facts about musicians, bands, concert venues, singers and more that took place today in previous years, from the 50s till today.

But the added value of This Day in Music goes beyond “the Beatles played in Carnegie Hall.” Learn what was the #1 hit on the day you were born, browse through the much less famous mugshots of old time rock & rollers, and discover many more fascinating music pointers. I was really into learning what music inspired famous artists, and This Day in Music’s First Record feature offers just that. This is how I found out for example, that Lenny Kravitz grew up listening to Elton John’s Philadelphia Freedom, and that Nick Cave was shaking his thing to the sounds of Herb Alpert and The Tijuana Brass’ Spanish Flea.

Time Video – What happens when a long-established media giant expands its content coverage to the world of video? In short, we’re talking about a blessed explosion of superb, entertaining visuals. Time is one of the most recognized magazines and content providers in the world, and we’re all familiar with its publicity magnitude potential induced by having one’s face on the Time cover. This has become a sought-after achievement in itself.

So when the famous magazine decided to embark on the video path of modern media, people wondered if Time will achieve the same impact as it had with its print and online magazines. As a person who’s not a religious TIME reader, I was blown away by their video portal. It exceeded my expectations in every possible aspect; the videos, although generated by YouTube, are in excellent quality, present fascinating stories and cover almost every field known to man. To give you a taste of the Time Video power, below are my personal favorites: Best Inventions of 2009, The Future of Green Cities in a Swedish Eco-Town and The Life (and Death Threats) of an Outspoken Afghan Woman.

Gajitz – Warning: this unique blog will get you hooked. It’s a divine resource of ultra-innovative technology, gadgets and scientific discoveries, all wrapped up in chic posts and photos, and top notch content. Creators Kurt Kohlstedt (who also brings us dornob.com, featured on our Weekly Faves a few weeks ago) and Delana Banres do an excellent job in presenting “objects, finds and designs that defy particular typologies, wander away from convention and are more than merely consumable objects.”

Gajitz covers so much more than what’s implied in the name; it touches on many other fields such as transportation, vintage & retro technology, and science, just to name a few. No doubt, this superb blog doesn’t dwell on mainstream technological news and gadgets – why should it? If you’re interested in a deeper, more refined and original coverage of the forefront of technology, click on the Gajitz logo and enjoy the ride. My favorite posts include Reinventing the Wheel(chair): Weelchair Climbs Stairs, Ditch that Woofer: Invisible Speakers Will Rock Your World and Before Photoshop: 7 Photo Edits that Literally Made History.

ShareSomeCandy – Although they say ‘don’t judge a book by its cover,’ design is the name of the game when it comes to purchasing most of today’s products. We enjoy aesthetic things, we take pleasure in beauty, and although money can’t buy love, it can buy attractive objects. ShareSomeCandy focuses on the eye candy of modern living, covering fields such as packaging, furniture, logos, photography, architecture and more. Everything in this blog is so luscious and appealing, you’ll be spending a good amount of time here, let me assure you. Here’s a glimpse of what ShareSomeCandy is about: Ekosistema’s bottles, Matt Lehman’s typography and Ron Arad’s interesting bookshelf.

My Very Worst Date – Victoria Namkung and Jessica Ramakrishnan are the two women behind My Very Worst Date. Both are journalists, which explains the exquisite content of this blog. So what’s the gist of My Very Worst Date? Here’s what Victoria and Jessica have to say: “My Very Worst Date is a commiseration of the moments when the sweet possibilities of romance turn into a sour struggle to get the hell out of the situation. We strongly believe that airing our (and other peoples) courtship disasters provides comedy, comfort and cautionary tales to bear in mind the next time you say ‘yes’ to drinks with a mysterious stranger.”

Reading about the misfortune of others in the dating scene (and sharing yours with others) was never so enjoyable and engaging. To begin, I would suggest checking out the Best of the Worst section. I read several accounts and was extremely shocked by The Jerk story, where the jerk noun turns out to be quite an understatement. Another thing that surprised me was that most of the stories here were submitted by women, thus focusing on the ‘she said’ rather than ‘he said’ side of the story. I feel I must protest; innocent men with genuine intentions also go through really bad dates every now and then…  I wish more men would join this terrific platform and share their dates gone wrong stories as well. This is the perfect venue for both men and women who didn’t want to kiss, but certainly wanted to tell!

Not Very Talented – The name of this site sums it up. Not Very Talented displays numerous cases of extremely untalented people performing unskillfully, to say the least. The amazing part about the site is that most of the videos here were uploaded to YouTube by the goofy performers themselves. This makes me wonder; do people really want to be famous at all cost, to the extent where publicity, however terrible, surmounts the embarrassment of making a fool out of oneself? Obviously the answer is yes. Below are some of the very untalented individuals who made my day. Enjoy!

En Tus Brazos – This is one of those short videos that really hit the spot. Which spot exactly? Try romantic, creative, inspirational, admiration, passionate, even sensual. The love story here is accompanied by absolutely amazing music and sexy tango moves that will hypnotize you and compel you to pay this short love story forward. At All My Faves, everybody – both men and women – unanimously declared this animated video a huge success and a must see. Check it out and while you’re at it, find out where’s the nearest dance studio so you could sign up for some tango classes. Yes, it’s that good!