The following, in alphabetical order, are some of my favorite places on the web. (The list is partially gleaned from Jonathan's Canon.) I have a feeling that a list like this should be longer, but I haven't recently spent a lot of time browsing the web, and therefore can't tell of too many times I've found that rare gem buried under mounds of sand.
Alertbox (Jakob Nielsen)
Alertbox is a regular column on how to make computers fit for human consumption. It might only be interesting to technical people, but he says some invaluable things.
A powerful and easy to use interface permits visitors to look up passages and perform keyword searches in several Bible translations (in English and other languages).
The Christian Classics Ethereal Library, available on CD-ROM, is a collection of numerous classic Christian public domain e-texts, a lifetime's worth of reading. G.K. Chesterton's Orthodoxy is a good place to start. This site also has links to other sites hosting noteworthy Christian content.
After long and frustrated surfing through innumerable web pages looking for serious Christian thought, and finding pages that are among human thought what MacDonald's is among foods, I found a First Things article entitled Abortion: A Failure to Communicate that was a breath of fresh air and then some: it was serious, thought-provoking, and drew attention to facts that were important but not obvious. First Things is a good place to go if you want to chomp on conceptual meat.
Free Find is a free search engine, and powers the search functionality on this site.
Google (Calendar, Customizable home page, Documents, Froogle, Images, Mail, Maps (Local), Reader, Scholar, Suggest, Video, ...)
Look closely over the links above. You may see something that you didn't know was there.
Google is a search engine that was created after two Stanford doctoral students saw a fundamentally better way to create a search engine. Google searches tend to turn up the pages you want much more quickly than other engines; both their search and their directory are the ones I turn to when I am browsing.
The Gutenberg Project makes numerous classic books available online. It is the place I go if I want to read something on my computer and the Christian Classics Ethereal Library doesn't have it.
A collection of research tools for searching web, newsgroup, dictionary, encyclopedia, phone directory, biography, quotation, ...
The Jargon File is a massive collection of slang terms from the hacker community. The language it records has problems -- it is elitist, and a distressingly high number of the terms are pejorative -- but it is also a witty, insightful, and fascinating document, one that gives a feel for the way a subculture thinks.
Most people won't need this link, either because they would not benefit from it, or because they already know it and have it bookmarked. For that minority that does not fit either category:
This is the homepage for Java, a very sweet programming language that has come out a few years ago. It has the programs you need to get started, extensive documentation (the part I use most is about twenty times the length of the Bible, and very well organized, so that I can usually find what I want in less than a minute), and forums where you can talk with other people. If you want to learn how to program (it's quite possible to teach yourself to program -- I did), this is a wonderful place to start.
Leadership University is a massive compilation of articles from First Things and other sites; it's a good place to go and read and think. It was actually the place where I first found Abortion: A Failure to Communicate.
The Onion Dome is an online journal about the funnier side of Orthodoxy.
The links in the Prologue are an excellent way to get a daily taste of the Orthodox tradition of biography as theology.
This is an example of what community portals should be: practical, friendly, and a work of art. This one is for Orthodox Christians.
For reasons elaborated by Neil Postman in Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in an Age of Show Business, present American political discourse is a matter of show business, sound bites, empty phrases, and hard-hitting images -- not rational arguments and positions -- to the effect that most of what reaches us from the candidates is not helpful in choosing who to vote for.
When I asked around for websites that would cut through the circus and tell where candidates stand on issues, Vote Smart was reccommended to me. I am mentioning it, not to say that it's better than other sites in the same category, but in hopes that people may use resources like this to get past TV showmanship, and vote based on where the candidates stand on the issues.
This category is for personal sites, including those of friends and acquaintances who publish real content, that I like. At the moment, it's small (my best friend Robin's site, for instance, has little besides a resume and some links), but I'm hoping that it will grow over time.
Once upon a time, in the University of Illinois's student web pages, there was a web page entitled, "HTM-Hell". HTM-Hell featured, among other lowlights, "The magical world of frames", with a prize offered for clicking a button buried in no fewer than thirty frames, and "Shrine to the Goddess Tracey Ullman" (which, after a number of clicks, revealed a large black-and-white portrait of an old man).
Sadly, the HTM-Hell I knew is no longer available, but in the course of reading up on usability, I found a page that occupies a similar niche. Written by a usability expert, this page should be visited by every web developer who has a terrible web page -- and may be enjoyed by visitors who have suffered through bad web pages.
Wolfhawke is on this page because it contains fiction and some nonfiction -- as well as having a nice look and feel. Josh is an American who grew up in Turkey and has lived in Germany, and we mesh well.
A glimpse into the life of missionary's kids (who are a blend of the country their parents are from and the country they grew up in).