Let’s get you started with Web 2.0 news

On a daily bases, I have to at least explain twice what Web 2.0 is and what it means for us. Unfortunately too many people shrug their shoulders after my lyric and slightly persuasive story about this revolution. Sometimes however, a somewhat smarter person does get excited about the new developments. He or she wants to learn more! Debuzzing the buzzword Web 2.0! From now on, I can refer to this blog post, since I’ll list some blogs to get you and others started with keeping up to date on the Web 2.0 news. I’ve also included a link to all the RSS feeds.

First of all, this is a selection of the blogs I keep track of for The Next Web Blog. This blog is all about international start-ups, so not just news from Silicon Valley, and also discusses the personal side of being an Internet entrepreneur. Next to keeping you up to date, we strive to inspire you as well. So that’s tip no. 1! Let’s get started with other great Web 2.0 blogs. Here we go!

The BIG Guys

• TechCrunch – THE Web 2.0 blog. Founded in June 2005 by Michael Arrington. They have over 650,000 RSS readers, which is huge. Arrington and his team primarily cover new start-ups and news about funding. They like business models and aren’t really focused on social developments or developments outside the Valley. The best source to stay up to date.
• Mashable – Also one of world’s largest blogs. This one is all about social networks. Most of the times founder Pete Cashmore and his writers report about large networks like Facebook and MySpace. Yet they aren’t afraid of discussing small networks as well. That makes it an interesting blog, also since some of the low-profile networks are absolutely hilarious. One remark: sometimes this blog is a bit of a TechCrunch copy cat.
• ReadWriteWeb – One of the early birds as the blog was founded on April 20, 2003. Founder Richard MacManus collected a team of gifted writers and techies who often surprise me with thorough analysis. It’s not an easy blog to read, you’ll have take your time. Yet it will certainly pay off since you’ll get a better understanding of the causes behind the latest trends.

Finance and economy

• VentureBeat - I must admit, when I visited the blog this afternoon it was the first time. Normally I just read it in my RSS reader. The clean-styled blog was founded by Matt Marshall in the end of 2006, which is actually pretty late. Not that it mattered though, since Marshall has an impressive track record. Together with six other editors he has created a trustworthy and no-nonsense source for news about venture capitalists and start-ups.
• Reuters Technology – The only one in this list that has a team of old school journalists behind it. It’s a good source to keep yourself up to date with the news that affects whole societies instead of just the start-up scene.

New start-ups

These are three handy resources to keep up with all the new start-ups that are emerging daily. Saurier Duval’s Museum of Modern Betas, Emily Chang’s eHub and review site KillerStartUps.

Publishing

• Smashing Magazine – If you’re into design, this is the site to visit. Smashing Magazine is maintained by Sven Lennartz, the owner of the Dr. Web Magazine and Vitaly Friedman, the creator of The Web Developer’s Handbook. On a daily basis, they offer free design tools, graphics and tutorials that are – actually – smashing. Check out the free blog headers for example.
• Problogger – Australian Darren Rowse has always been my favorite problogger. Just read this legendary story about how he became a problogger, and you’ll see what I mean. As no other, he knows how to tell you in an intelligent and accessible way how you can improve your blog skills.
• Publishing 2.0 – This is a blog about how technology is transforming media. It’s published by Scott Karp and Robert Young, the co-founders of Publish2, a social news aggregator powered by journalists. Traditional media companies lost their monopolies and people found hundreds of new ways to find the information they need. That calls for a blog who monitors these revolutionary developments.

Web Celebs

• Scobleizer - When I started blogging for The Next Web, co-founder Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten gave me the corporate blogging book Naked Conversations. For me this book symbolizes the start of my professional blogging career. It was co-authored by Robert Scoble, a (video)blogger I really admire. Read his interesting and sometimes funny blog to know what’s happening in the world of geek.
• Seth Godin – it doesn’t get more guru-like than bestseller author and entrepreneur Seth Godin. Read his impressive bio here. If you want Godin to show up at your event, you’ll have to pay 50,000 US dollars. You could also just read his blog, on which he posts short notes as well as long analysis. Sometimes I find his views truly inspiring and eye-opening.
• Valleywag – the dirtiest blog of this list. They’re the gossip blog and have ruined several lives and careers. People love it though. If you’re into it as well, subscribe to this blog. Just make sure you read this post by Michael Arrington first.

So that’s the list I’ll now distribute to people who want to get started with Web 2.0 news. Just one more advice: make sure you follow interesting Twitter users as well. Dutch Twitter hero Pixites (blog) is a good example, he posts interesting articles from all over the web. Add the feeds of guys like him to your RSS reader as well to make sure you don’t get stuck on the same sources.

For your convenience

To make it easy for you, I’ve created a Netvibes Universe on which you can look up all the RSS feeds of these blogs. Oh and if you miss a good source, please let me know in the comments!

• Add these feeds to your Netvibes:
• Download an OPML file

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