awards for cleverness are handed out on a daily basis here on the good ol’ interweb. they’re plentiful and short lived. maybe not very valuable. they are called blog posts. i’ve been trying to make it standard practice to hand out my gee-whiz back-pats in the “two cents” section and save the main column whenever possible for commentary and original content. this particular site deserves its spot in the main section though, regardless of how “clever” the idea might initially strike you. through sheer force of attention to detail, good design, and high mindedness of content these homemade viewmaster disks, called vladmasters by their 27 year old creator vladimir, are pretty fantastic as objects. the four available are kafka’s parables, italo calvino’s invisible cities, the public life of jeremiah barnes, and lucifugia thigmotaxis. i love them. (via the cartoonist)