[Updates below.]

The Web is alive with Ayn Rand tributes.

• The Last Ditch has a series of quotes up. My favorite: To deal with men by force is as impractical as to deal with nature by persuasion.
  
• The Future of Freedom Foundation has a bunch of articles to read:
  • Ayn Rand Introduced Me to Libertarianism, by Jacob G. Hornberger
    
  • On the Centenary of America's Radical for Capitalism, by Sheldon Richman
    
  • Neglected Fortieth Anniversary (1997), by Sheldon Richman
    
  • Of Course, It All Began with Ayn Rand, by Bart Frazier
    
  • Freedom Biography: Ayn Rand
    The FFF also points to some news articles and opinion pieces written about the creator of Objectivism:
    
  • Washington Times - The Evolution of Ayn Rand, by Steve Chapman
    
  • Chicago Tribune - Rereading 'Atlas' on Ayn Rand's 100th, by Julia Keller
    
  • Philadelphia Inquirer - Assessing Rand at Centenary, by Carlin Romano
    
  • Pittsburgh Tribune-Review - Remembering Ayn Rand’s Legacy of Reason and Freedom, by Michael S. Berliner
    
  • Dayton News-Journal - Rand's Philosophy, Influence Still Hold Weight
  
  
• Capitalism Magazine has The Appeal of Ayn Rand, by Onkar Ghate, Ph.D.
  
• Over at the CATO Institute, there is Three Women Who Launched a Movement - Ayn Rand (1905–1982) and David Boaz pens a memorial
  
• The Ludwig von Mises Institute has Ayn Rand's Contribution to the Cause of Freedom, by Roderick T. Long
  
• The Adam Smith Institute blog asks Why be interested in Ayn Rand?, by Dr Eamonn Butler
  
• Reason Magazine has several articles to read:
  • Ayn Rand at 100 - Loved, hated, and always controversial, the best-selling author of The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged is more relevant than ever, by Cathy Young
    
  • Rand-O-Rama - Ayn Rand’s long shelf life in American culture
    
  • Rand Redux - Reason does Ayn Rand on her 100th birthday, by Nick Gillespie
  
  
• The New York Times has Considering the Last Romantic, Ayn Rand, at 100, by Edward Rothstein
  
• Cox and Forkum put up a nice image
  
• Cafe Hayek has a post on Ayn Rand's Legacy
  
• Join the Party: Why You Should Celebrate Rand's 100th, by Bryan Caplan
  
• At the Objectivist Center, they have Ayn Rand at 100: The Moral Defense of Freedom, By Edward Hudgins
  
• Radley Balko points to some humor: 25 Most Inappropriate Things to Say to an Objectivist During Sex
  
• Will Wilkinson has comments
  
• Tyler Cowen pros and cons the lady while Alex Tabarrok goes into more depth
  
• Chris Matthew Sciabarra has two posts up over at Liberty & power
  
• Sense of Life Objectivists has Happy Birthday, Ayn Rand!, by Lindsay Perigo
  
• On the Lew Rockwell blog, there are posts by Karen De Coster, Stephan Kinsella (another), and Thomas DiLorenzo
  
• Timothy Sandefur comments and complains about some coverage
  
• Foreign Dispatches sounds a note of general disagreement
  
• The Boston Globe hosts a letter: Plenty of reasons Rand was wrong, by Bernie Conneely
  
• Blogcritics has a post by Al Barger up
  
• Yazad at AnarCapLib has some thoughts

I own The Fountainhead, Atlas Shrugged, Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand (I read them in that order, still haven't finished OPAR), and have just ordered Capitalism: The Unknown Ideal and Introduction to Objectivist Epistemology from Amazon.com (the prices were too good to pass up). Though I am far from a thorough understanding of Objectivism and the concepts and axioms it works from, I hope to expand upon what I do understand over the next year.

I consider her contributions to the philosophies of freedom and reason to be critically important and worthy of serious study. Her writing offered to me, for the first time, a moral and objective defense of free-market capitalism, the system I had found myself gravitating towards but found unable to uphold in anything but consequentialist and utilitarian terms. Those terms are useful in debate, but I felt the distinct lack of an ethical dimension to my defenses.

Her work led me to the other nether regions of libertarianism and thus to the Austrian School and anarcho-capitalism. I still find the arguments in Roy Child's The Epistemological Basis of Anarchism: An Open Letter to Objectivists and Libertarians and Objectivism and the State: An Open Letter to Ayn Rand to be very strong objections to the state from a background of Objectivist ethics. I am by no means a "Randian" or a Leonard Peikoff-blessed ARIan or any of the other perjoratives tossed around about some of the Objectivists out there and I do agree that there are at least some areas in her philosophy that either I'm not ready yet to accept or are at the very least confusing or contradictory, but I think that on the whole, she's more right than wrong.

I'll end with a great quote Objectivism Online posted:

In the name of the best within you, do not sacrifice this world to those who are its worst. In the name of the values that keep you alive, do not let your vision of man be distorted by the ugly, the cowardly, the mindless in those who have never achieved his title. Do not lose your knowledge that man's proper estate is an upright posture, an intransigent mind and a step that travels unlimited roads. Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the hopeless swamps of the approximate, the not-quite, the not-yet, the not-at-all. Do not let the hero in your soul perish, in lonely frustration for the life you deserved, but have never been able to reach. Check your road and the nature of your battle. The world you desired can be won, it exists, it is real, it is possible, it's yours.

UPDATED 11:02pm
Here are a few more I came across:

• The Rand Centennial, Posted by Jonathan Wilde at Catallarchy
  
• Publius at Gods of the Copybook Headings and the Reason Hit & Run blog (links via Jay Jardine)
  
• Jacqueline Mackie Paisley Passey
  
• The Ting Blog has personal observations
  
• Disaffiliates has a color photo I've never seen of Miss Rand before
  
• Girls on the Gridiron: "I pick [Atlas Shrugged] up every time I forget why I work."
  
• Amardeep Singh is not a fan and seems to take a very typical "mainstream" approach to the state
  
• Jason Kuznicki : "Incredibly, egoism taught me how to make friends. Egoism."
  
• Bud Parr can't understand why The Fountainhead and Atlas Shrugged still sell more than 100,000 copies per year
  
• The Urban Grind says AS was the one book that "had the most profound effect" on her life
  
• ObjectivismOnline has Happy 100th to America's Greatest Moral Philosopher, by David Veksler
  
• ...the trailing edge: "...Objectivism as a whole never seemed to have much to do with real life."
  
• Richard Bluestein has more photos
  
• Byron Henderson: "I gave Ayn Rand the best years of my life. I grew up and away from her, but I will never forget the time we spent together."
  
• Stephen Bainbridge: "As for Objectivism and Objectivists, they have always struck me as being the worst of the many brands of libertarian kooks."
  
• Bureaucrash comments
  
• News from Anarchistan:

  Rand lit the lamp of freedom amidst a modern dark-age of totalitarianism, facist and communist dictatorships, and the prevailing belief in collectivism. The one who lit a lamp rather than just curse the darkness.

  
  
• Fontana Labs at Unfogged: "I find her interesting only because I find the cultlike adoration utterly baffling."
  
• The Musings of Justine: "I wonder what the atheistic Ayn thought when she met God face-to-face..."
  
• RadicalWacko: "Tonight I drink a toast to a remarkable woman with a remarkable mind who can truly hold claim to being part of the “motor of the world"."
  
• A = A (+/- c8h10n4o2): "Ayn Rand gave us an ideal for which to strive."
  
• Josh Poulson relates his story
  
• David Innes:

  To that extent (only) I can appreciate her as an early pioneer of the 60's era "If it feels good do it" mentality. If my only two choices today were assembly-line-age conformity or Randian egoism I'd go with Rand every time. But that's like saying if I had a choice between the Guy Lombardo's Orchestra and the New Christie Minsterals I'd buy a tambourine. Rand isn't the only choice anymore and almost every other choice is objectively better in the sense that they offer more ways to interact without fundamentally compromising one's integrity.

  
  
• New Anarchist Man: "Overall, the contribution of Rand to the libertarian movement was not very much."
  
• George Mason at the Sixth Column:

  Superficial people condemn almost every real and imagined aspect of this woman and her work, whether they have read anything she wrote or not. Some very fortunate persons have read, absorbed, studied, digested, and applied the principles she presented so clearly, and their lives have changed greatly, for the better. Some have tried to take on the principles she wrote about by short-cutting the learning process, and they crashed, sourly joining her detractors.

  
  
• Division of Labour:

  I spent my senior year in college completely enthralled with Rand, and then like so many others I mostly got over it. Still, I reread her books every few years which is more than I can say for any other writer. Because of Rand, I refuse to cede the moral highground to leftists who peddle an ideology of self-sacrificial service to others.

  
  
• TIQTOQ:

  By the time I got to "Atlas Shrugged", I was tired of reading about her army of tall, cold, brilliant and miserably driven capitalists. Hell, even Rand was addicted to "Charlie's Angels"! But, props must be given.

  
  
• The Idyllist:

  "...I'd like to take a moment to doff my cap at the old girl, who would have been 100 today, for showing me that it was possible to write page-turning fiction, which also tackled big--Big--themes."

  
  
• Gil Milbauer:

  So, my paper was basically a description of a Jeffersonian minimal state, with laissez-faire capitalism. I don't even remember very much of what I wrote (but I'm sure it was good). What I do remember is the professor's comment. When I got my paper back, I could see that he had written in large, angry, red letters:

  YOU'VE OBVIOUSLY READ A LOT OF AYN RAND!!

  I also remember my immediate thought: Who is He???