One Lap of the Web: It Ain't Easy Being Front-Engined

-- Twitter friend @dudehugs is a Weird Twitter savant and a curator of goofy license plates. To archive the world's silliest vanity plates, you have to understand your subject, comprehensively -- which is why his daily driver Ford Focus has a Louisiana plate that says "KANYE." Thusly inspired, someone decided to chronicle whether every state had a vanity plate dedicated to the notable fishstick connoisseur and hip-hop artist Kanye West: The United Plates of Kanye diligently checks DMV records to see if someone's driving around with KANYE proudly emblazoned. So far, Alabama, Arkansas, Missouri, and Nevada have their own mini Yeezys. Most states can't yet search DMV records. Louisiana, obviously, is taken. Indiana suspended its vanity plate program, and somehow, California hasn't snapped up this prime personalization opportunity. Maybe Kim or Khloe or whoever's taking a break from designing Sears clothing or escorting Viennese lechers could reserve the plate for her 1997 Toyota RAV4 that's currently double-parked on Whittier Boulevard. I bought my whole family whips, no Volvos.

-- Some dare sneer at the Porsche 924 as they might sneer at an unattended, noisy child running around the lingerie aisle of a K-Mart. We say that's far undeserved. Especially when you see how nice this one is: just 43,460 miles rest on its five-digit odometer, and judging by its near-pristine camel leather interior, there are no hidden sixth digits. The Reseda green metallic paint is minty and Muppet-approved. Rust is nonexistent. A Magnaflow glasspack is the only thing that isn't stock. And how often do you see a Porsche with a vinyl roof, really? Being right in the midst of vinyl roof territory, this 924 is achingly close to being fitted with an opera window and some landau bars. Buy it from Erie, Colo., for somewhere north of its current bid of $7,195. Then, drive straight to Jerry Seinfeld's house.

-- Some of you may have seen this hoverboard video (above), where a number of random celebrities supposedly take a real "Back to the Future" hoverboard for a spin in a downtown Los Angeles parking lot. (The best part of the video, arguably, was watching Christopher Lloyd drive around in a DeLorean.) It went "viral," which in this definition means three people messaged it to me on Facebook, which is the only accurate counter we know for a rousing success. Anyway, it's fake. Fakey, fake fake. Fake like the dummy Keihin "carburetors" on a new Triumph Bonneville. Fake like the stitching on a Toyota steering wheel. Fake like the Corvette sinkhole -- WAKE UP, SHEEPLE! YOUR GM OVERLORDS ARE LYING TO YOU! Anyway, go back to bed, and rest easy -- the day we see hover technology won't be the day it's promoted by Moby.

Acura
The Acura NSX made its worldwide debut on FEbruary 10th, 1989 at the Chicago Auto Show.

-- The dream of the 1990s is alive on the Internet! While doing research for, ahem, an upcoming story, I discovered that the 1989 Chicago Auto Show was the greatest auto show in history, at least for the Japanese: no less than three of the most influential Japanese cars ever made debuted there. The NSX. The Mazda Miata. The Nissan 300ZX Twin Turbo. In the 1990s, did Japan build the greatest cars in the world? Well, that's a point of contention, especially if you hail from, say, Affalterbach. But if you do think so, come to Takanezawa 1990 -- named after the former Honda plant that built the NSX and the S2000 -- relive the Clinton decade of "Space Jam" and Supras, Arch Deluxes and Alcyones. It's a Tumblr, which we hear is something all the cool kids still use. Follow along, and pump that gauzy 1990s press photography straight into your Dunkaroo-choked veins.

By Blake Z. Rong