ReadWriteWeb

Hello, ReadWriteWeb readers! As Richard noted earlier, I am joining ReadWriteWeb as its new Editor-at-Large, and I am very excited about it. I'll start writing for the site in January, but in the meantime, I have some planning to do. And I'd love your help.

First, a brief introduction: For the past six years, I've been writing about the tech industry every day. Most recently, I launched SplatF, a one-man tech analysis and commentary site, which I'll continue to write. Prior to that, I helped create Business Insider in 2007, when it was a small tech blog. And before that, I was a tech reporter at Forbes.

Coming up on November 15, some of the best conversations locally will converge in your town at the ReadWriteWeb Worldwide Meetup.

There are almost two dozen meetups already set up and there's still plenty of time to get one of your own local meetups ready. Take a look at the list below to see if there are already local meetups happening in your area. If not, check out the ReadWriteWeb Meetup page and start one of our own with just one click.

Photo: Marshall Kirkpatrick, VP Content Development and Lead Writer, and Richard MacManus, Founder and Editor-in-Chief

Last week we had our first official ReadWriteWeb meetup at the Green Dragon in Portland, OR. Why Portland? Well, for starters, it's got the highest concentration of ReadWriteWeb staff, but also because Portland is a great city, with one of the most active tech scenes out there. The meetup was great, with just the right mix of people, conversations and beer.

But not everyone can get to Portland to talk tech, so we wanted to make sure we gave you all a venue to do just that in your own area.

Spam Comments

Like most blogs, ReadWriteWeb assumes the best about our commenters. We don't pre-moderate because we don't want to slow down your ability to contribute to discussions. If we see a comment that we aren't sure about, we do assume your comment isn't spam.

That said, when a comment is clearly only made to pimp your blog, your startup, your product or an affiliate offer, we'll remove it. Spam includes folks who call themselves 'Free iPad', 'Low Cost Mattresses' and other SEO stunt names.

Today, April 20, marks the 8th birthday of ReadWriteWeb. Like a self-titled debut album, the first post on April 20, 2003 was simply titled: The Read/Write Web. It began: "The World Wide Web in 2003 is beginning to fulfil the hopes that Tim Berners-Lee had for it over 10 years ago when he created it." I started ReadWriteWeb as a way to explore Web technology. The first tagline was: "Richard MacManus' weblog about the Two-Way Web." This was well before the term 'web 2.0' came along, so back then I used Dave Winer's term two-way web to describe my interest. I was really referring to what's next on the Web, which I had a passion for and wanted to write about.

Ever wondered what RWW looked like 8 years ago? In this post I nostalgically look back on 8 years of homepage designs for ReadWriteWeb.

ReadWriteWeb's founder, Richard "Chuy" MacManus, announced this morning that the publication has accepted its first major investment. The infusion of cash, to the tune of $14 million, came from OZJ Investments, a subsidiary of Ozark Jimmy's Global Enterprises Holding Company. OZJ CTO and Spokesman, Carlos Canulas, explained some of the changes ahead for the publications.

"The Internet is a fad. We're one of the few companies who have realized that hard truth. Plus, 99.2% of the content is pictures of ladies in tube tops but you can't read it on the can! Look, we're marshaling the shift of RWW from a doomed online fad-publication to a perfect-bound, four-color slick. What's it gonna be? Sick!"

ReadWriteWeb is looking for a part-time, late-afternoon/evening news writer. It's a great opportunity to make a name for yourself, to work with an awesome team and to learn a whole lot about the web and new media journalism. We'd love for it to turn into a full-time job, if you prove successful. Your geographic location is not important. Your work will be syndicated to the New York Times technology page online, so your family will understand what you're doing. (To some degree.)

I (co-Editor Marshall Kirkpatrick) wrote up this job description and Founding Editor Richard MacManus said, "We'll do it live!" So here you go. Read on for our description of what we're looking for in the next addition to our team.

Last Friday, ReadWriteWeb hosted our second unconference event in Mountain View, California as experts from around the world gathered to discuss the mobile Web and its future. One of the hot topics I was eager to discuss going into the event was augmented reality (AR) - a top trend that we are tracking here at ReadWriteWeb. In case you weren't able to make it out to the summit, here is an overview of the discussions surrounding augmented reality from the event.

The ReadWriteWeb Mobile Summit got its nerd on in Mountain View, CA on Friday. Firing up the unconference engine in the Computer History Museum, the ReadWriteWeb staff entertained a full house of what Jason Harris called "the thinkers and do-ers inside the companies who are innovating in the mobile space."

What did the attendees and press think about the summit? One thing that struck me reading through the coverage was that each writer seemed to find a specific topic to be dominant, though none of them were the same. Perhaps the unconference is a good format to give participants a sense of focus on the things they value the most.

There's a reason why vanity URLs, personalized profile pages and recommendation systems are so popular. To a customer or site visitor, there's nothing more interesting than themselves. As the CEO of web tracking and sales conversion site Genius.com, former CMO of online meeting tool WebEx and author of Sales 2.0 for Dummies, David Thompson knows a thing or two about the customer psyche. Thompson spoke to ReadWriteWeb and explained why today's landscape makes it the toughest in history to make a sale. And for once, it's got nothing to do with the down economy.