Buuf is a set of simply amazing icons in PNG format (ready to be converted to ico) done by one of my favourite artists, mattahan. I’ve been watching his icon work for some time (since his Gant series). His work is original and organic — it’s surreal yet stylish and functional. I could imagine these icons used in a wide variety of applications and websites

Buuf has been released under a CC(NC) license. You can download them in PNG format from mattahan’s DeviantArt page. Did I mention that the icons are awe inspiring and that there are 1500 of them?

Buuf is an overly ambitous icon set created by digital artist Mattahan. He started making it when GANT had reached it’s apex and was starting to decline in popularity. Many routes were considered before the current look of Buuf was decided upon. But the always visionary Mattahan knew that simply expanding Aquarilla, Orangatang, or Aquant wouldn’t be enough.

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The terrible beauty power is a collection of icons that are different than most of the icons typically featured here on MaxPower. For one, there is the great name: the terrible beauty power. Second, these icons are pink and feature a womens face and heart shapes. Although different, they do have several things in common with the other icons I write about; they are stylish and functional. I could imagine these icons used on a personal blog or journal site quite easily.

The terrible beauty power were created by mariux and are released under a CC(NC) license. You can download them in PNG format from mariux’s DeviantArt page and read about them on her blog.

if you use this material in your web, please let me know. You dont have to ask for permition to use them, but I’ll love to know about it!

Subscribe to MaxPower: keep up to date about free icons

Also view the compendium listing of all free icons currently cataloged for use.

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These Web 2.0 icons were created by Utom and look like chewy candy — delicious! You can download them in both PNG and ICO format from UtomBox and they are distributed as “free.” Utom is a talented graphical designer and has created a number of great looking WordPress themes in addition to these fine icons.

I recently wrote about how Utom had his great looking U4 WordPress style ripped off by plagiarist Karthik Kastuary of 33rockers.com, its an example of how bloggers can sometimes help each other out.

Web 2.0 is the supposed second-generation of Internet-based services (such as social networking sites, wikis, communication tools, and folksonomies) that let people collaborate and share information online in ways previously unavailable [wikipedia]

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Paul of 2pt3.com just released his custom icon set, twotone. It’s 100% free for any use, comes with every icon in both PSD and GIF format, and also includes one large PSD file so you can manipulate them all as you see fit. Its a great package!

Paul is also a designer at twothirty.com — “we design websites, applications & identities.”

what’s the catch?
there isn’t one. no licensing, no legal, just do whatever you want them. and if you want, post a link the comments if you do use them on a public site, so i can see where they’re being used and how.

Subscribe to MaxPower: keep up to date about free icons

Also view the compendium listing of all free icons currently catalogued for use.

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Over the last little bit a few visitors to MaxPower have let me know about a couple important issues / problems. This is my chance to thank them in a public manner:

Drunkey Love creator Kevin Wetzels alerted me to someone that had copied an entire post of mine, reposted it on their own site, and claimed it as their own original work. For shame. Kevin is a talented graphic artist and has created a great set of free icons (Drunky Love) as well as a very beautiful WordPress theme. Check out both at his website, Drunkey Love. Thanks Kevin!

Matt Oakes sent me an email to let me know that a page I had on MaxPower was now mysteriously disappeared. Turns out, somehow, it became marked as a private. I never noticed a problem because I could see the page fine (as I was logged in). Anyway, problem solved! Matt is a talented Javascript programmer who write plugins that use the jQuery library. I think his Catfish plugin is particularly intriguing. Thanks Matt!

Panoramix has created a wonderful set of icons that are available for personal non-commercial use or for non-commercial use in websites and applications if you get Panoramix’s permission (all you have to do is ask nicely). These icons, as you can see, are bright and funky, and they use perspective very well. They come in both PNG and ICO format. » Read the rest of the entry..

Most people don’t celebrate a first birthday at the two and three quarters year mark, but I thought that since we’ve already missed two real birthdays, any excuse to eat cake is a good one. I would hope that we could celebrate this tremendous achievement of keeping a website alive and healthy for nearly three years. Come and introduce yourself, say hi, share a story, a joke, birthday wishes, whatever. The beer is cold and the tunes are good.

How It Started

MaxPower started from the idea that MaxPower was a great name, and that there were only so many great names out there. MaxPower was borne partly out of the idea of having such a great name, and partly out of learning about the web. You may be familiar with an episode of the Simpsons which featured Max Power, an alter ego of Homer Simpson.

Max Power was dynamic, decisive, uncompromising, and most importantly, stupid. See youtube.

Max Power: Kids, there’s three ways to do things. The right way, the wrong way, and the Max Power way!
Bart: Isn’t that the wrong way?
Max Power: Yeah, but faster!

MaxPower the website was started with the same spirit of dynamic, decisive, and stupidity. One of the very first things published on MaxPower was pictures of the Worlds Biggest Special K, which I owned. It sure wasn’t dynamic, but it was a bold decisive claim about something stupid. I found it in my cereal one morning, it was about five square inches big. I kept it in its own special Pelican case but it broke when I moved across the continent. Sadly any pictures I had of it have disapeared into the web ether. And I learned a valuable lesson, backup your photos of over-sized breakfast particles.

Next up, MaxPower hosted the definitive list of the Top 10 Dirtiest ACDC Songs. Clearly, if ACDC doesn’t embody the ideals of dynamic, decisive, uncompromising, and stupid than nothing does. MaxPower continued to publish the absurdly stupid and inane. Consider the approach we have taken on the deep and complex issue of sphincter bleaching. To this day MaxPower ranks very highly for the term sphincter bleaching and sphincter bleaching pictures. I always take pleasure in seeing creeps arrive at MaxPower looking for pictures of bleached white bums. Fools.

Maturity: Like Fine Wine and Century Eggs

Perhaps with maturity comes a relinquishment of childish and stupid thoughts and posts. Sad really, but writing strange sendups about people who get their bums bleached (and the people who look for information on it) or simply posting the humorous nature of ACDC lyrics has been left behind as MaxPower turned 2.

Since then, MaxPower has published a series of WordPress Plugins that are more popular than ever could be hoped for. These plugins have been downloaded over 5000 times. Not bad for a guy with ZERO programming education.

MaxPower has also recently started to explore issues of SEO, Adsense, and splogging. As well, my post on Free Icons was such a success that it now covers all the costs associated with running a website — that is all I could have ever hoped for.

The Future

People like yourself keep me blogging on a regular basis. I wholeheartedly enjoy reaching out and making challenging someone to laugh, think, or helping them solve a problem. Perhaps this is why MaxPower has recently seen a big surge in the numbers of RSS subscribers, welcome RSSers!

I will always provide full feeds without ads. However, while having subscribers and visitors is nice, I would really like to see more interaction with people on a regular basis. I would encourage you to, every once and awhile, minimize your RSS aggregator and leave a comment, idea, suggestion or criticism. MaxPower does not believe in nofollow, so your comments at MaxPower actually do count for something.

Come and introduce yourself, say hi, share a story, a joke, birthday wishes, whatever. This is a birthday celebration, and all my birthdays have music. This is what I’ll be listening to. Thanks for a great 2.75 years, and here is to 2.75 more. Damn few like us, and they’re all dead.

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Recently I profiled the work of Ken Saunders and his ColorCons icon sets which are available for free from MouseRunner.com. Over the course of our correspondence, I asked Ken if he would be interested in doing an interview for MaxPower about his work. Ken was gracious enough to accept and I eagerly sent him some questions. Here are the results of the interview:

MaxPower - Who is Ken Saunders?
Ken: I’m a 38 year old, Legally Blind individual who has a passion for creating graphics and working on my websites. Legally Blind in the U.S. is one who has a visual acuity of 20/200 or worse. My left eye acuity is 20/400 or worse, and my right is 20/200 or worse. It is difficult to obtain an accurate acuity because of a congenital condition known as Ocular Albinism with Nystagmus.

I also spend a substantial amount of my time volunteering for Mozilla, the creators of the Firefox Web browser. My eye condition doesn’t really bother me because I would never have had the time to do what I do without the condition, » Read the rest of the entry..