Hell Yeah Bitch! .com

Is it me, or do 99% of news sites suck? You know my thoughts on Digg, I’ve never been that into Slashdot, and I’m always leery of MSNBC. So when I heard that work on a site called Newsvine was getting close to beta a few months ago I was very interested to see what they had going on. A cross between Digg and a regular news site plus the ability to have users write news on their own was intriguing so when I heard beta invitations were being sent out, I worked to grab one.

I’ve been using Newsvine for a few weeks now and I have to say it is now my favorite news site. New news gets posted quickly and the user-added items are kept separate and out of the way if you don’t chose to read them and just stick with the AP stories. (Which is a good way to keep Newsvine from the sad current state of Digg) Its not all roses though, Newsvine might have more “features” than it really needs. There’s a lot going on at that site and I worry that too much going on for users at the launch of a site might have an adverse effect: People not using the site or people only using the site at its most basic level and ignoring the rest. I would suggest a slower roll out of new features once you gage how people are really using the site first. The good news is that unlike with the other popular social
news sites user work and feedback are required to have the site do anything. AP stories will still pour in even if nothing is happening on the user level other than reading. Of course, there will be plenty of users that will work and help the site, there always is, but its nice to see a site that didn’t put the users up on a pedestal and hope that they do their job. Live by users, and you will die by the users.

Of course, I really didn’t scratch the surface of the whole Newsvine scene, but there is no question Newsvine is gearing up to be the next “hip site”. The buzz is growing, and it will no doubt continue to grow, until its too much buzz and then it will shrink down to a lower level of buzz which will be just about right. Hopefully the Newsvine will make it through and continue to be as strong as it is now.

If you are interested in checking out Newsvine for yourself, I happen to have some invites to hand out. If you would like one drop a line in the comments (be sure to fill out the email field) or email me: mike [at] hellyeahbitch.com