Blogs: What do you read?
 

Bdk3clash told me about Google Reader a couple weeks ago, and I've gotten more into reading blogs since then. Google reader is an RSS aggregator, which basically means that instead of going to 10 different sites to read 10 differnt blogs, they all get streamed to one page so you can see new posts more easily. There are other services that do the same thing but this one is better designed than the few I've used. Here is the post Brad made about it with a brief explanation and some discussion.

I tried searching for a thread where people listed blogs they liked, but the word "blog" comes up so often it was pretty futile. I don't remember seeing one anyway.

So the way we're going to do this is pretty simple, hopefully simple enough for the people here that have had trouble figuring out what at thread is about lately. Just follow this format for posting blogs you like...



Here are the blogs currently on my google reader feeds:

Blog Maverick: This is a blog written by Mark Cuban, owner of the Dallas Mavericks. He is a really smart guy and mostly writes about basketball and business. Lately he's been talking about GooTube a lot from the perspective of DMCA Safe Harbor Laws. It's a really good source for unfiltered opinions; he rips on the NBA and Google a lot.

Deadspin:: This is a sports blog that I'm sure a lot of you read already. It is similar to Blog Maverick in that it's a really unfiltered perspective on a news topic we're bombarded with. Image ESPN if Stuart Scott and Chris Berman were replaced by more knowledgable versions of frat guys. I get almost all of my sports news here now.

Gawker: Like Deadspin, I'm sure many of you have heard of Gawker (same company). Gawker is a media/pop culture news blog focused mostly on stuff in New York.

Gizmodo: Gizmodo is basically just reviews of cool toys and gadgets. It will usually have a good answer for the "What should I buy with my Amazon gift card" threads. Also owned by Gawker, which I promise I have no financial interest in.

Gothamist: Gothamist is a New York City blog about all kinds of stuff. News, restaurants, concerts, politics, basically whatever. I know this is really only going to be of interest to people in New York, but there are a bunch of other "...ist" sites all run by the same people. You can see all of them here, and they include: Austin, Boston, Chicago, Houstonist, London, Los Angeles, New York City, Paris, Philadelphia, San Francisco, Shanghai, Seattle, Toronto, Washington DC. I don't read the other ist's, but I would assume they're as good as Gothamist, which is very good. Basically anything that's going on in the city they cover will be on there.

i'm not a player, i just krush a lot: This is Kurosh's blog. No explanation needed.

Kissing Suzy Kolber: This is an NFL blog that is written in a similar style to Deadspin, though it's not quite as good. I mostly keep it around for something to read when I've run out of other stuff and for their weekly cheerleader profiles.

Paul Kedrosky's Infectious Greed: Paul Kedrosky works in venture capital and writes a bunch of short thoughts about current events in business every day. Pretty interesting stuff, from a perspective that you don't often get in mainstream media.

The Superficial: Imagine Entertaiment tonight if Paris Hilton just called Mary Hart fat and then effed her boyfriend.

What Would Tyler Durden Do: Kind of a cross between Page 6 and Deadspin, celebity gossip written by for guys in their early 20's.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

so I'm just setting up Google Reader now. do you subscribe to the full syndication, or partial (no ads)?

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Nice thread, will check some of these.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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so I'm just setting up Google Reader now. do you subscribe to the full syndication, or partial (no ads)?

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I don't think I ever saw and option for full or partial, but I have adblock so I guess they'd both look the same to me.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

you just made the internet that much more dangerous to my productivity

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Evan,

this is awesome, thank you very much. now I'll have something more than 2+2 to read in the mornings. again, excellent work. mark cuban's blog in particular is good

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Bruce Schneier's blog on security (tech and more general) issues.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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so I'm just setting up Google Reader now. do you subscribe to the full syndication, or partial (no ads)?

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I don't think I ever saw and option for full or partial, but I have adblock so I guess they'd both look the same to me.

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google reader is cool. welcome to web 2.0 KBZ!

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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so I'm just setting up Google Reader now. do you subscribe to the full syndication, or partial (no ads)?

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I don't think I ever saw and option for full or partial, but I have adblock so I guess they'd both look the same to me.

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google reader is cool. welcome to web 2.0 KBZ!

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http://googlereader.blogspot.com/200...it-better.html

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Good post.

I currently read the following:

Gawker for entertainment purposes

Curbed for happenings in NYC real estate

Daily Kos and Atrios for politics (liberal websites)


There's a few more I read every once in a while, but I read those every day.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

I read Daniel Negraneau's blog whenever he has something new up there. It's gotten a little boring lately, though, since he hasn't had a lot of poker stuff on there.

Your submissions look interesting, though. I'm going to look at some of them. Need more hours in the day.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Lawschool dropout's poker blog - I assume that's a mandatory read for any poker players.

That's about the only blog I'd drop by on a regular basis that hasn't been mentioned before.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

I don't read blogs much at all, but the one I do check out from time to time is Lore Fitzgerald Sjoberg's

He is an Internet humorist and columnist at Wired; he was one of the founders of the now-defunct Brunching Shuttlecocks humor Web site (the archives still work, and there's some great stuff in there. He doesn't update that often, but a lot of his stuff is really very funny. He also founded Little Fluffy Industries, a review site and repository of free online games (I think people here have mentioned it before). He doesn't work on that anymore -- he passed it on and it hasn't been updated since January.

This goes beyond scope of this thread, but on the right-hand side of his blog, he has a "More Lore" box with links to all his humor projects. A lot of it is a continuation of Brunching Shuttlecocks stuff, and whenever there's something new he mentions it in his blog, but the archives are worth perusing if you have time.

-McGee

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

http://www.upforanything.net/poker/

http://badbloodonpoker.blogspot.com/

these are the only 2 i regularly read. i like them because they are guys that ive gone up in the same limits while reading them. i feel like we have similar skill levels and ride the same roller coaster. they are also cool because they are brutally honest and dont try to be "ballas".

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Marginal Revolution

a blog run by a couple of GMU economics professors. both libertarian/classical liberal types. political aspects of the blog are relatively minor. but several posts a day ranging a wide variety of topics

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

wow, i thought rss feeders were old hat to most. I'm more tech savvy than others? wow!

http://www.bestweekever.tv/ is a must-read if you're into pop culture snark.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

How is Brad credited for telling you about Google Reader but I'm not credited for telling you about awesome blogs?

scrub (reads blogs for a living)

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

http://www.luxist.com/ is a good one from Weblogs, Inc. (The people who do http://www.engadget.com a good tech blog). It has stuff that even the 2p2 ballers can lust over. Think of it as the blog version of Robb Report.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Here is a list of top blogs by links and by traffic.

The Poker Mom...who's pretty much given up blogs and blogging for poker

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

I've never really read any blogs. Just figured they are lame, like journal entries from people I dont care about. I Cant really think of anyone in the world whos journal entries I would want to read anyway

Am I missing out? Sounds like maybe its more than that. I dont follow sports or celebrity gossip otherwise id check out the ones on your list.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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I've never really read any blogs. Just figured they are lame, like journal entries from people I dont care about. I Cant really think of anyone in the world whos journal entries I would want to read anyway

Am I missing out? Sounds like maybe its more than that. I dont follow sports or celebrity gossip otherwise id check out the ones on your list.

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I'm with you. I never understood the whole blogging thing. Sure, I understand why people write them; everyone wants to feel like people care about them.

Who's going around reading all these blogs and why? Do I really care that my friend is depressed that the sandwich he had for lunch was a little more dry than he's used to? Or that some some guy is having trouble with getting his cable bill straigtened out? WTF?

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

The Sartorialist

The best food blog.

Gambling. I hope he comes back.

Meaning of life.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Blogs are more than just some dude's online journal. Tons of blogs are based on a subject (a sport, technology, liberal news, cars, etc) and are basically just newsfeeds. Some are comedy writing. The blogs mentioned in this thread aren't 1000 LiveJournal clones, they're actaully well written news and entertainment sources.

Think of it like reading a magazine that comes one article at a time throughout the course of the day/week/month.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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[ QUOTE ]
I've never really read any blogs. Just figured they are lame, like journal entries from people I dont care about. I Cant really think of anyone in the world whos journal entries I would want to read anyway

Am I missing out? Sounds like maybe its more than that. I dont follow sports or celebrity gossip otherwise id check out the ones on your list.

[/ QUOTE ]

I'm with you. I never understood the whole blogging thing. Sure, I understand why people write them; everyone wants to feel like people care about them.

Who's going around reading all these blogs and why? Do I really care that my friend is depressed that the sandwich he had for lunch was a little more dry than he's used to? Or that some some guy is having trouble with getting his cable bill straigtened out? WTF?

[/ QUOTE ]

Did you check out the links?

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

http://static.flickr.com/90/279219332_2a505495b3.jpg

The blogs I read, from the sidebar on my own [censored] blog.

The first two are personal blogs of my friends.

The next two aren't really blogs, but awesome cartoon sites.

Then a litany of sports blogs

Salon.com's gossip column, the Fix is fun.

More sports blogs.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

I like uncrate.com. It's kind of a shopping/gadget type blog that updates daily. Kind of like gizmodo or engadget.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

It's interesting to me that you didn't use Technorati rankings for this.

scrub

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Talking Points Memo

TAPPED at American Prospect

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

I've been ignoring RSS as long as possible. Maybe this thread will spurn me to jump in.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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I've never really read any blogs. Just figured they are lame, like journal entries from people I dont care about. I Cant really think of anyone in the world whos journal entries I would want to read anyway

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You don't think reading Mark Cuban's personal thoughts on why David Stern is his archnemsis would be interesting?

While blogs may have started as personal Livejournals or whatever, they've increasingly become an alternative news source. You can get a lot of different perspectives that, without blogs, you'd probably never hear about.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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I've never really read any blogs. Just figured they are lame, like journal entries from people I dont care about. I Cant really think of anyone in the world whos journal entries I would want to read anyway

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You don't think reading Mark Cuban's personal thoughts on why David Stern is his archnemsis would be interesting?

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no not really. I dont care all that much about sports or other peoples self perceived important drama, that just sounds like both [img]/images/graemlins/smile.gif[/img]

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While blogs may have started as personal Livejournals or whatever, they've increasingly become an alternative news source. You can get a lot of different perspectives that, without blogs, you'd probably never hear about.

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yes, apparently so, i was unaware of this. I found masons magazine analogy very interesting. Ive decided to check out this whole "blog" thing a little more. (wow, I sound like a crotchety old man, heh)

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

[ QUOTE ]
Blogs are more than just some dude's online journal. Tons of blogs are based on a subject (a sport, technology, liberal news, cars, etc) and are basically just newsfeeds. Some are comedy writing. The blogs mentioned in this thread aren't 1000 LiveJournal clones, they're actaully well written news and entertainment sources.

Think of it like reading a magazine that comes one article at a time throughout the course of the day/week/month.

[/ QUOTE ]

I feel really dumb for saying this, but until today I thought that blogs were just random people writing. anyway, what mason says.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

thanks evan, great post.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

Evan,

A bunch of tech/business ones for work, marketing analysis, competitive analysis, etc. Most of these are pretty niche and wouldn't be interesting to most folks.

Here are a handful that some here might find interesting:

www.venturebeat.com - venture financing blog

www.valleywag.com - from Gawker folks, Bay Area tech industry gossip column

Some other VC blogs:

http://www.ventureblog.com/ - check the left sidebar here for a long list of other VC blogs
http://avc.blogs.com/a_vc/
http://www.feld.com/blog/
http://redeye.firstround.com/

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

diablo-

can you teach me to be rich?

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

I just added google reader to my customized homepage, so this is definitely going to rule.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

[ QUOTE ]
I've never really read any blogs. Just figured they are lame, like journal entries from people I dont care about. I Cant really think of anyone in the world whos journal entries I would want to read anyway

Am I missing out? Sounds like maybe its more than that. I dont follow sports or celebrity gossip otherwise id check out the ones on your list.

[/ QUOTE ]
There's a big difference between blogs that talk about when some girl is getting her braces off and blogs that are news/opinion sources that you can't get in other media outlets.

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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Here is a list of top blogs by links and by traffic.

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This seems like a poor way to find interesting blogs. The top listings are dominated by politics, and I don't see any way to look for a specific topic.

Do most sites support RSS now? I added slashdot, slickdeals, and magicthegathering, and they all seem to work. (Or is Google reader smart enough to somehow massage and present sites that don't even support RSS?) I was surprisingly even able to add a subscription to "http://www.cnn.com/TECH/". I guess those wouldn't be considered "blogs" though.

Anyone know any good xbox360/PC game RSS?

Re: Blogs: What do you read?
 

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It's interesting to me that you didn't use Technorati rankings for this.

scrub

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When I started blogging, (Sept. 2003), everyone used the Ecosystem to monitor where they stacked up against other sites. It also has more depth than Technorati.

For those who thought blogs were basically online journals, it's not uncommon for major political stories to begin their life on a blog. For example, Powerline and Little Green Footballs broke the Dan Rather / Bush / fake National Guard memos 60 minutes story that led to Rather's retirement. The Reuters photographer who was fired for photoshopping pictures from Lebanon was busted by blogs. I'm too lazy to go research which site broke the story, but an example is here.

Other useful sites:

Memeorandum highlights which news stories are being followed by blogs and links to blog posts about those stories.

Blogs Now tracks link popularity which can be interesting to find random stuff you might have missed, for example, pictures of the shuttle launch from space; or did you know that Scott Adams, or Dilbert fame, had lost his voice 18 months ago? His doctor says no one has ever been cured, but as of yesterday, he had his voice back.

You young pups need to get with this internet age. [img]/images/graemlins/wink.gif[/img]

The Poker Mom