I will post more later specific to your comments (promise.), but just came across this site today (never been there before, don’t really know anything about it), but it has very similar content and target to core77, and thought it might be interesting to take a look for comparison.
http://www.designrelated.com/
to me, aesthetics aside, looking only at layout it’s a bit easier to navigate, and you dont have to scroll through 10 screens to get to the bottom content, esp. if that is a prime location. worth a look i think in any case.
R
