Actually I find the name a little snotty, because some of the paintings are really kind of wonderful.

If you’re considering adopting a dog anytime in the foreseeable future, you might consider helping to counteract a terrible trend at animal shelters: large dogs with black coats, when given up for adoption, are euthanized at a much higher rate than smaller or fairer-coated dogs, essentially because the public have an irrational fear of them.

“‘Please don’t overlook our black dogs,’ rescue groups pleaded on their home pages above pictures of Rottweilers, Chows and Labs sporting bright bandannas. One shelter’s website just came right out with the grim truth: ‘The general public is not aware of how doomed black dogs are when they are brought to a pound.’…

“Most black dogs have to rely on shelter staff and volunteers to steer potential adopters their way. And indeed, many shelters take extra steps to make black dogs more adoptable, according to Kate Pullen, director of animal sheltering issues at the Humane Society of the United States in Washington, D.C. Teaching the dogs tricks, putting placards on kennels highlighting the dog’s personality (‘I may just be a black dog, but I know how to balance a biscuit on my nose.’), making sure multiple black dogs aren’t kenneled next to one other — anything to catch the eye and imagination of potential adopters.

“‘I’ve had to turn away many black dogs because I can’t fill the place up with them,’ says Jill Wimmer, shelter manager at PAWS Atlanta, that city’s oldest and largest no-kill shelter.’ And every one I turned away had a great temperament.”

Sorry, just a little bit of off-topic editorializing there.

Noted designer Cameron Moll examines the would-be alternative to the sIFR Web typography technique and reports on its relative merits. “I personally see Cufón as a good interim step between sIFR and @font-face.” However, Moll notes some nontrivial drawbacks, including Cufón’s inability to allow text selection and the lack of a hover state.

Photographer Matt Siber’s two series of gently manipulated photographs transform the very tall roadway signage found in the Mid-west into eerily beautiful commentaries on advertising. “Elimination of the support structure in the photographs allows the signs to literally float above the earth. In some cases the ground is purposefully left out of the image to further emphasize the disconnect between the corporate symbols and terra firma.” Be sure to see both the first and the second series.

Terrific idea: this utility puts five days’ of weather forecasts right into iCal. However, I’d like a little more detail than the topline it seems to provide.

Emily Gordon exposes the truth. (Correction: this post was written by Martin Schneider.)

A few dozen, death-defying examples of the illustrator’s custom hand-lettering.

Clever concept for a browser-based sticky post from Jack Cheng +

Simple, elegant, browser-based tool for viewing front pages (the printed ones) from newspapers around the world.

In this installment of Breakfast At Sulimay’s, a Web video series in which three senior citizens listen to and critique contemporary music, the Animal Collective track “My Girl” gets the once over. “This group is not gonna get very far…”