While browsing through my file archives some years ago, I ran across a few folders of locally cached web pages. Browsers like Netscape and Internet Explorer saved these files in order to speed up load times upon future visits to the same sites. Browsers today do the same thing, but the functionality was far more vital in the days of sluggish dial-up modem connections.

From those folders, I culled a large collection of vintage web banner advertisements from 1996 to 2001. Each one is a bite-sized time capsule of web and Internet history, recalling events and trends of the day. You're about to see a big 'ole gallery of these ads with minimal captions that include a month and year they were captured (I got this from the file dates of the images). A few of the ads betray some interesting browsing habits, like the two for online gambling sites. I blame my brother.

If you're tempted to click on any of these (like I am) then I suppose these ads did their job, but you won't find anything on the other side. Most of the sites advertised in these banner ads went out of business long ago.

If you have any memories of the products or sites showcased in these ads, please feel free to share them in the comments below.

[ Continue reading 50 Vintage Web Ad Banners » ]

Up now on PCMag is a slideshow I made showcasing freaky-weird 3D amateur computer art of the early 1990s. It's composed mostly of GIF files from the BBS era that I've been collecting for some time now.

Here's a snippet of the introduction:

Back in the early 1990s, when 3D computer-generated art was still a new thing, a brave new breed of amateur artists emerged. They took up early 3D CGI (computer generated imagery) tools and created graphical works that they then shared on dial-up BBSes and CompuServe.

Over the years, I've collected dozens of these now-vintage images, and I recently noticed that many of them are, well, more than a little bizarre.

When you're done checking out the slideshow, feel free to post your fondest memories of vintage CGI graphics. And if you have any bizarre 3D CGI images of your own to share, please post a link.

I whipped up this Zelda-themed ornament a few days ago out of some leftover polymer clay I had lying around. I thought you might enjoy it.

Have you ever made video game or computer themed ornaments? If so, I'd love to hear about it in the comments.

A few days ago, PCMag.com published a slideshow of vintage Christmas graphics files that I put together. Some of those images were stills from animated GIFs. Below, you'll find the full animated GIF files featured in the article and a whole lot more. Merry Christmas!

Prepare to be besparkled.

[ Continue reading Animated Christmas GIFs of Yore » ]

I've been collecting vintage Christmas GIF files for a while now, and I finally decided to put some of the best ones from the 256-color PC era together in a slideshow. You can check it out over at PCmag.com.

Please disregard the "Christmas Card" stuff they inserted in the title and introduction — I'm not sure why they did that. The images have nothing to do with Christmas cards (those paper things you mail to people). I guess it's hard to concisely describe to the general public what exactly these images are and why someone would want to look at them. Also, the captions are to the upper right of each image. Hope you enjoy it. Merry Christmas.

Update (12/21/2010): I just posted a bunch of animated Christmas GIFs, including those featured in this slideshow.

An image like this should be familiar to early Macintosh users, since the first Macs only supported 1-bit color. That is, two colors total: each pixel could be black or white — on or off — and nothing in between. The image above uses only black and white and a dithering effect to trick your brain into perceiving shades of grey. Somehow, it makes me feel warm and fuzzy inside.

Update: Hover over the image to see 1-bit Mona Lisa rendered with Floyd-Steinberg error diffusion, which is another algorithm for converting color images to black and white.

And you thought eatin' shrooms to grow bigger was strange. How about this: flying green crabs dropping red clay bricks on a grinning, toothy duck wearing a cape and glasses with a double-barrel shotgun coming out of his mouth.

At least it's set in a pond, so the backdrop isn't too fanciful.

The game is Deadly Duck for the Atari 2600, a 1982 shooter title published by 20th Century Fox. I've played it, and it's not too bad. It's a vertical shooter, similar to Space Invaders and Demon Attack.

You play as a duck striving to gun down flying crabs that drop bricks on you — actually, around you. When the bricks land, they temporarily impede your movement to the left or right, then disappear in a few seconds.

This is one of the many vintage video game box illustrations that rendered the typically absurd and abstract situations of extremely low resolution games in a very realistic and literal manner. Super Breakout for the 2600 is one of my favorites (it also inspired a 2006 Halloween costume suggestion).

You can find many more examples of this curious art form on the web, including many parody boxes, so watch out for fakes.

Through science, we've discovered ways of levitating our floppy diskettes.

Discussion topic of the week: Have you ever spilled a drink or any other liquid on your computer? How did you clean it up?