ReadWriteWeb

Like the popular flight-finding service Kayak, a new startup called Sparkbuy, launching at the Web 2.0 Expo today, wants to make the process of finding the perfect gadget easier using a similar simplified interface. Although consumers already have a number of gadget-shopping services at their disposal, including everything from Google Product Search to Amazon, Sparkbuy is innovating through its easy-to-use website design and its manuallymcurated collection of data.

The result is a gadget-shopping site that even the most woefully un-tech-savvy consumer could use, while still appealing to gadget geeks looking for an easier comparison shopping tool.

Eric Ries, the driving force behind the lean startup movement, announced Sunday on his blog Lessons Learned the creation of two scholarships for lean startups to attend upcoming conferences. A lean startup is one that takes advantage of various techniques and technologies to produce a product at minimal cost, while continually revising and iterating based on customer feedback.

One role of the government is to protect the country and make its citizens feel safe through policy and regulation. But in today's digital era, policy making is moving to the people, and we are witnessing individual corporations - be they for profit or not - getting more involved in Internet standards.

A panel of industry experts convened at the Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco earlier this month, and moderated by ReadWriteWeb's Marshall Kirkpatrick, discussed the issues surrounding Internet standards. We've written up our notes below and hope to begin a conversation about whether Internet standards should be administrated by private organizations or our leaders in the White House.

At this week's Web 2.0 Expo in San Francisco, we set out to find some of the most interesting companies who had set up their booths on the Expo floor. This was no easy feat - the Expo is not a place where new and innovative companies tend to launch - it's more of a place for established companies to showcase who they are and what they do. A lot of the companies used the event to bring attention to their latest announcements, be that a new partnership, a new version of their software, or a new feature set. That said, there were a handful of companies that really got us excited. Here are our favorites.

This year the Web 2.0 Summit conference (5-7 Nov) is hosting an auction to benefit a few innovative organizations that are solving big problems.

To show our support for this initiative, ReadWriteWeb is running a competition in this post. We have 2 full conference passes to give away to the New York Web 2.0 Expo 16-19 Sept (value over $1000 each), as well as a free Expo hall pass (value $100).