Want to improve your Twitter Ninja skills?  Want to impress all your friends with your twitter abilities? Ever wondered how some of the Twitter elite do some of the crazy things they do with twitter? Whether you are new to twitter, or have been using twitter for a while, you are guaranteed to learn something new and cool in the next 5 minutes.

1. Twitter Tracking

One of the best things about twitter is it gives you the ability to get off of the computer, take your cell phone, and still feel connected to the world.  While all of you probably know how you can track your friends online, how do you track concepts?  When you are at a conference, how do you track what people are saying about you?  I recently launched twitterdevs.com and I was curious if people were talking about it on twitter!  Bring on twitter tracking!

Simply add TweetTrak as a friend, then text tweettrak with the keyword “track” and pick something to track.  so for example:

d tweettrak track twitterdevs

TwitterTrak will now send me a text message every time someone texts something with “twitterdevs” in the message.  How do you get rid of it?  Simply use the “untrack” keyword.  Another great example would be if you’re in an airport and wondering who uses twitter at the airport?  Just type “d tweettrak track Atlanta Airport”.  Try it next time you are looking to see what everyone else is doing out there.  It’s a blast.

2. Digsby Makes Staying on Top of Everything Easy

One of the biggest reasons that I hear people don’t want to try twitter is "I already way too many Social Networks to keep up with, tied together with my email, IM applications, adding twitter is way too much effort".  With Digsby you get all your social networks including twitter under one application.  You can easily create new twitter messages by clicking the twitter icon, or replying to your friends twitter streams.

3. Twitter Search

Have you ever wondered what people are saying about a specific topic on twitter?  Ever wondered how people at conferences know what’s going happening on twitter so easily?  Twitter Search makes it possible for you to easily type in a few keywords, and see what people are saying about a certain topic.  In the screen shot below I was looking for what people were saying about the Blackberry Storm.  I ended up finding some exclusive pictures of the new phone coming in October!

4. Share Pictures with your tweets

Have you been wanting to add pictures to your twitter stream?  twitpic is the tool you want to use.  Simply sign up to twitpic, and start uploading pictures instantly.  Once you upload a picture, twitpic will post a new message to your twitter feed, so you don’t have to.  Want to send pictures to twitpic through your cell phone?  Not a problem!  twitpic supports mobile devices quite easily in a few different ways.  There’s a bunch more features as well like tagging, geotagging, rss feeds, and a Google map mashup.

5. Track Your Packages

Wondering when you are going to get your package?  Like being able to check the web site but wish something would just let you know when the package changes status or location?  Just send a quick direct message to trackthis and trackthis sends you a direct message any time your package location changes. Trackthis currently supports FedEx, UPS, USPS and DHL tracking codes.  Just tweet your cracking code and package name, and that’s it!

6. Post Your Blog Updates to Twitter

Do you have a blog or RSS Stream that you wish could automatically be published to your twitter stream?  Then Twitterfeed is your answer.  The Twitterfeed server will check your blog’s feed at a specified interval and post any new items to your twitter account. You just sit back and relax!

7. Thread your Twitter Conversations

Tweader is a new way to view twitter conversations. Long gone are the days of going through all of a tweet’s @replies to get a grasp of the conversation. All you have to do now is enter the tweet’s ID below and have it all done for you. Try it!

8. See any conversations people are having about you

This one can be somewhat confusing to a lot of people.  By default, if you do not turn on all @replies in your twitter options, you will not see @replies that people send to you if they aren’t following them.  This can be pretty bad, especially if someone that wants to tell you something thinks they sent you a message, and you are just being rude and ignoring them.  Make sure you turn this on.  Just go to twitter and click settings.  On the Notices tab in the @ Replies section, change the drop-down to: all @ replies.  You are all set!

9. Update Multiple Social Networks in Seconds

If you are using a couple different social networks then you probably would love to have a simple way to update all the social networks in one shot.  Enter Ping.fm.  Ping.fm is a simple service that makes updating your social networks a snap. You can use AIM, GTalk, iGoogle, Windows Live Messenger, Yahoo! Messenger, WAP, iPhone/iPod Touch, SMS or even E-mail to let Ping.fm do the job for you.  It’s super simple and saves me a ton of time throughout the day.

10. See Twitter Posts from Around the World

If you have been to any high tech conferences in the last few years, you probably saw Twittervision setup on an LCD panel somewhere.  Twittervision is a real-time geographical visualization of tweets that are occurring on twitter at any given time.  It’s a pretty neat representation of what’s going on in the world.  Now while you’ve probably all seen the 2D Map, have you all had a chance to check out the new 3D Map view of Twittervision?  Pretty wicked.

I woke up this morning, and I was thinking, wouldn’t it be cool if a Software Development Blog became number 1 on the Technorati Top 100?  After all, without software developers and software development, we would not have the Internet at all.  Right now, the top sites are “Boing Boing” and a site about making money!  Let’s change that!

If you have spent some time on my blog, you will see the purpose of this blog is to improve software development, and more importantly, try and help everyone improve their lives.  Help me spread the word, and let’s put Software Development on the top of Technorati!

Win an iPod

To motivate everyone and put everyone into action, I will be giving away a free Apple iPod (80GB Brand New!) when Software Development in the Real World makes it to the top spot!  With the amount of readers we have and daily visitors, this should take no time at all!  All it requires is 2,700 or so people to add the site, and it takes less than one minute to do it!

What to do.

1. Click here to add this site as your Technorati favorite.
2. Once you have added the site, just leave a comment behind with your email address.
3. When Software Development in the Real World is number one, I will add all the valid email address’s in the comments into a random draw application, and pick the winner.
4. The winner will be emailed, and I will send them a shiny free iPod!

Pretty sweet eh!

I will be checking hourly over the next few days, and the second we are number one, I will post the winner on my blog!

Add Software Development as your favorite here.

Are you one of those people that creates to do list’s, action plans, project plans, and seems to have millions of things to do?  There is actually a simple “Hack” you can use today to get your life back on track.  I just finished reading David Allen’s book Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity: Books: David Allen, and have taken some great ideas from the book!  I highly recommend reading it. Follow along with me on this journey to getting more stuff done than you ever imagined, developer style!

Set Yourself Up For Success

Before we start, the whole idea here is to process things fast!  If you can’t do something in two minutes, figure out what you will do with it.

Create 5 folders on your computer.  Inbox, Action Items, Incubate, Current Projects, Archive.  Create shortcuts to these folders on your desktop.  Get the same 5 folders in front of your desk in physical folders.

The Inbox Folder

The Inbox Folder is where you want to put things you haven’t processed yet.  What goes in here? New music you downloaded that you haven’t had a chance to put away, files you are sent from colleagues, software installations you’ve downloaded, random text clippings, bookmarks you want to keep track of and don’t know where to put them, meeting minutes, invoices to pay, etc. Your main goal for this folder is that at the end of the day, this folder is completely empty!

Action Folder

Anything that will take you more than two minutes to complete should go in here.  This could be files that you need to clean up, but can’t delete until you read them, HR forms that need to be processed, etc.

Incubate

Here you will put things that you might want to do at some point, but aren’t totally ready to do at the moment.  You can even create a file within the folder that says “The Incubation List”.  This is where you can write out anything you might want to do at some point, but are not getting to.  You will want to review this folder regularly.

Current Projects

These are current projects you are working on, live projects if you will.  On my computer I keep an expenses folder, a client projects folder with all the clients we have, a research folder for current research I am doing, and I keep some employee files in here as well that are current and pertinent.  The idea here is that you keep everything you could use in an instant on hand and readily available to you.

Archives

This folder is easy.  Once things in current projects are completed, we would move it to the Archives folder.  For example, you can keep Archived Clients, Achieved Projects, Resumes, etc in this folder.

Now Kill The To Do List

Now that you have setup your computer, and physical folders, you are ready to rock and roll!  This part is actually fun.

1. Take every file that you have on your computer, important emails, anything lying around, and place it into your Inbox.  Do the same with papers that are lying around your office.
2. One by one, go through each item and ask yourself if you can do something with it right away. 
3. If you can, do it right away!  Then once you’re done, put it in Archives if you want to keep it around.  If not, dispose of it!
4. If you need to delegate the item, send it to someone else and forget about it!
5. If it’s something you need to do, but will take more time, put it into the Action folder!
6. If it’s something you need to do, but want to do later, put it in the Incubate folder.
7. If you don’t want to do anything with it, throw it out or delete it!

Every day, make sure you never end a day with your inbox full.  At the end of the week, move any competed projects in Current Projects to Archives.  Go through the Incubation folder and see if you want to take action on these items now.  At the end of the month, go through the Archives folder and delete things you won’t need anymore.

This process is discussed in detail in “Getting Things Done” which I highly recommend you read.  The book goes into much more detail of course, however this should be enough to get you started.

Quick Recap

Create these folders on your computer and desk:

Inbox –> Action –> Incubate –> Current Projects –> Archive

Follow the process:

Take Action Now –> Take Action Later –> Delegate –> Archive –> Incubate –> Delete / Trash

Review Process:

Daily –> Weekly –> Monthly

Follow these steps, and you will be on your way to destroying that to do list that you can’t seem to complete!

How do you rate a software developer?  That’s a fantastic question!  There are so many theories out there, and there are so many forms that HR teams try and come up with to help you conduct performance review.  However, what really makes a great developer?  And if you are a Software Developer, how can you improve your career today!  Below is my bible for rating the developers on my team.  By following these tips and rules, you will improve your status from “good developer”, to “great developer”!

1. Time spent writing great code
   It’s not about the quantity it’s the quality!  However a twist to this is: It is about the quantity, and the quality.  Far too many times you will get one of two scenarios. 

   In scenario A, you have a developer that pumps out code like mad, things seem to be working… then bugs start happening, you don’t know why, seems to take forever to fix!  Or they fix 10 and cause 5 more!  But you get a lot of code…

   In scenario B, you have a developer that seems so smart!  You interview him and he knows everything about everything, can speak the theory up and down!  Yet for some reason, you have assigned him three features, and three weeks later, he is still working on something that should have been done in 3 days!  You are so confused!  He is so smart! He knows everything about generics, multi-threading, and can explain pointers to your grandmother and make her excited to want to code! Why is nothing getting done?!

   In your dream scenario, you get great code!  Great code is done by a great developer that is super smart, knows what quality code is, and writes code like Tony Hawk rides his skateboard.  It looks so natural!  He or she is almost entertaining to watch!  They also get it done at blinding speeds!  They know how long each problem should take, and do not get caught up in finding the world’s best solution, that has multiple threads and layers, to write a game of pong.  Bugs are nonexistent because they write unit tests for themselves, and just plain can code in their sleep!  These guys are worth their weight in GOLD! 

2. Interpretation of the problem
   So there is a problem out there, with millions of ways to solve it.  Some people are just natural quick thinkers and can come up with multiple solutions instantly.  However, what a great developer would do is totally define the problem before doing anything!  A great developer will create a document or whiteboard the problem out.  They will email their managers and say things like “Can we meet so I can explain to you how I understand the problem?”  Next they will start giving you various solutions, etc.

   See, a great developer knows that the way they see the problem and interpret the problem, is probably not the way that the problem creator intended it to be understood. This is a key point, commit this to memory! A great developer will want to understand it fully, before attempting to approach a solution.  Do you understand the problem 100%, no?  99%?  Go ask more questions and be sure you are 100% clear!

3. How the problem is approached
   So once you have clearly defined the problem, you start coding right? Wrong!  A great developer will look at the layout, and start thinking of various options, and based on the problem, will start thinking about the best approach to solve the problem.  I view this like a game of chess.  You can know how all the pieces move, know all the rules of the game, but do you just start moving?  No!  You analyze the board, come up with a game plan, look at your opponent, and look at what he or she usually do.  It’s the same case when you approach a problem. 

   Look at the problem, figure out what the outcome needs to be, what kind of time you have, the quality being expected, the tools you have to work with, etc.  Then, start solving the problem. 

4. Confidence in code
   As a manager, how confident can you be in their code.  Some developers you can say “I need this completed by Friday”  come Friday, you get an email saying “I have checked the code into the branch, it is ready for testing” and you  just know that there will be very little, if any, bugs found by the quality assurance team.  On the flip side, there are some developers that will email you instead and say “I am still not done, and it will be done on Monday morning first thing.”  And you are nearly 95% sure that it will be there, however it will be ridden with bugs, and basically unusable for days, if not weeks, until bugs are completely ironed out of the code. 

   Bottom line: The higher the confidence you can have in a developer, the closer they get to being great developers!  Imagine being your manager, and the weight you lift off their shoulders if he doesn’t have to worry about your code!

5. Confidence in the solution
   It’s one thing to be confident in the code.  If you have a great developer on your hands, you are confident in the solution.  These great developers will be great architects.  They are able to dissect the whole problem, and figure out how the problem needs to be solved. See it’s not just about coding with great code, it’s also largely about how you architect the solution!  This is a key point, and really what separates the good, from the great in the software world. 
6. Meets user requirements
   At the end of the day, you can have the best code, and the best solution possible, with all the best architecture, but does it meet the user’s requirement?  It’s possible not!  And you have completely failed.  Now there are various degrees of missing the mark, but a great developer will hit the bull’s-eye consistently!  They find out exactly what the user wants, come up with a great approach, show the user what they will get every step of the way with weekly builds that have no bugs, and continue to build upon the last version.  Requirements are bang on, and the users do the jig!
7. Staying up to date
   Great developers are constantly updating their skills independently and proactively!  They thirst for new knowledge and perfection like a cat with milk.  They don’t wait for their managers to come to them and set goals, ask them to take courses, or are given books to get up to speed on.  They go and get these things on their own! 

   They find the conferences they want to go to, and send emails like “I would really love to go to Tech-Ed This Year!  I will learn <insert reasons here>, and I will be able to contribute to <insert projects here>.  I foresee this saving us <money/metric reasons here>.  If it’s at all possible, can the company help me pay for this trip?”  If someone sent me this, I would not only help pay, I would pay the entire trip! 

   Great developers are always attending all the user groups, like a .net user group for example, or a Java user group.  They go to the “free local” meetings, and do whatever it takes to feed their brains!  Do you read all the latest blogs and magazines?  List your top 5 favorite development blogs right now!  Can you do it? You should be able to drop them like you can do the actions to the YMCA!  Stay up to date, it will stretch your mind!  You will have the next big idea!  You will be rewarded! 

8. Contributes to team
   You can be one of the best, if not the best coder, architect, most brilliant guy on the team, but as far as I am concerned, if you are not able to share and contribute to your team, you are losing about half your value, if not more!  A great developer makes others great around them! See, a good developer keeps getting better and better, but doesn’t share the knowledge they obtain, or how they obtain it. 

   They learn new things, find out about new technologies, but don’t let anyone know about them!  A good developer finishes their projects on time, but when push comes to shove, is not there for the rest of the team.  A great developer is in touch with all the projects that are going on within the team, and is ready to lend a helping hand when needed! They will say things like “I noticed team A is working on <issue>, and I think I can help out, do you mind?”

9. Makes great meeting minutes
   This is incredibly important!  There is nothing worse than calling a meeting, taking the time to explain new concepts, new ideas, brainstorm, come up with great designs, and not have anyone taking meeting minutes!  Even if you have a designated meeting taker, I want to see everyone showing up with a pen, and paper (developer notebook is preferred).  A great developer takes great notes!  They write out all meeting minutes, and at the end of the meetings can be heard saying “So just to confirm, my action items are:  <action items here>.  Did I get everything?” 

   Next, a great developer will send their meeting minutes to the manger, listing the date of the meeting, the topic, and attendees.  Following this, you will have the action items at the top, with who is the champion of the item.  Below that, you have the detailed meeting minutes.  A good developer, takes no meeting minutes, says yes every time you add something to his list… and hopes that his memory will serve him well.  He then later emails you to check out his changes, and you cringe as you see he forgot a few things, but got 90% if it correct.  This is a HUGE WASTE of time!  For no reason at all!  Take Great Meeting Minutes! 

10. Teachable and takes criticism well
    If you have read this far, then hopefully you are taking all this in and will be trying to implement some of my suggestions in your day to day development efforts.  See, another key area is the developers’ ability to learn from others, and take criticism well!  By making yourself a teachable person, you turn into a sponge, and absorb enormous amounts of knowledge faster!  Your seniors are there for a reason!  Sure, they might be rusty at day to day coding, but they have gone through the trenches, and been through hundreds of battles, and have the wounds and scares!  They have the “Blink” instinct to make great decisions, and make you great!  They are in the position they are in because they LOVE to see you succeed, and want to make you grow! 

    Of course, this is the ideal work environment, but that’s where you want to be anyway if you are a great developer!  I absolutely guarantee you, and promise you, that the better you can improve this skill, make yourself extremely teachable, make notes on suggestions and criticism, and make a point of improving them, the better chance you have at becoming greater than you have ever imagined possible!  If you on the other hand, choose to think of yourself as “elite”, and have nothing more to learn, you will always be stuck where you are.  If you are not growing, you are not even staying at status quo, you are dying!  Grow! 

11. Always available when needed
    This is a give and take.  If you are working for a great company, they will be flexible with you.  They should never question doctor’s appointments that you couldn’t schedule after work, start times, end times, or lunch breaks.  They should encourage you to go to the gym at lunch, pay for lunches when you go out with the team, etc.  They should give you a few days off after some crunch time work.  This list goes on and on. 

    However, with all those perks, comes responsibility, no question!  If it’s crunch time, a great developer will suggest to you that he will come in on the weekend if needed.  They will stay as late as possible and as late as is needed to ensure the job gets done!  See, great developers take responsibility for their creations!  Now, this is not a necessity of course, but it is the mark of a great developer. Some people just want the 8-4:30, and will be good developers, but they will never be great. Great developers are team players to the end, and view their work like art, and view their team, like a family.

12. Dress’s professionally every day
    You never know when a client will come by on a tour.  You never know when you will be called into a meeting, not everything is planned.  And when that time comes, you have to be ready to dance!  A good developer wears normal clothes Monday to Friday, even stretches it with black jeans, and runners that look like dress shoes.  On casual Fridays, they wear shorts, runners, and a T-shirt.  When the tour comes by on Friday with a new huge account, you can’t call on him to join you for lunch because he is not dressed appropriately.

    A great developer dresses in great business clothes Monday to Friday. They dress for success!  See, by looking the part, you become the part!  Of course, if you have no skills, you will not be promoted to a manager or team leader just because you dress sharp.  But if you have great skills, and dress in a suit and tie, you have just catapulted yourself up in rank, no question.  The 400 dollars you will spend on a decent suit and tie will pay you back within the year.  I promise you! 

13. Communication Ability
    This is another critical category!  There are so many good developers out there, but there are not a lot of great developers.  Why?  Because a lot of the good developers, are terrible communicators.  There are many levels of communication, ranging from email, to small SCRUM meetings, all the way up to large executive meetings and your ability to contribute at the executive level.  Then you get to “The Show” where you are presenting for hundreds of people, showing off software.  While you don’t need to get to the final stages, you need to be able to at least communicate your ideas clearly and effectively in meetings.  The better your communication, the farther you will go. 

    Bottom line:  If you want to be an executive, you have to be a 9 or 10 at communication. Even when you take meeting minutes, or send out status reports, you need to communicate extremely well!  Don’t just say “I fixed bug 1371″ on your daily report!  Show off; explain how hard it was to solve the problem, how long, or how quick you solved it!  Explain the technology you used!  And explain how you will ensure the problem doesn’t happen again.  Your status reports should not be a bad thing you don’t like to do!  They should be an exciting part of your week where you get to show off to your manager!

14. Goal Setting Skill
    Good developers can get things done, and go throughout their day to day by doing what you tell them to do.  They don’t really think far ahead and think of what they want to be doing in a year, five years, or even 10 years.  Some good developers know what they want… but have no real plan to get there!  A great developer has the goals for the year, the next five years, and knows roughly where he will be in 10 years.  

    Great developers also take it to the next level by not only thinking about their goals, but also visualize it!  They can see exactly what they will be doing in five years, to the level of where they will be doing it.  Even more, a great developer will create a detailed plan for his next year, complete with courses he will take, projects he will complete, and relationships he will build. 

15. Organizational Skill
    The final key component that really brings everything together is organization.  You may be the best developer in the world, but if you are not organized, you will fall apart and become bogged down!  Eventually you will be overwhelmed and start losing your edge.  Great developers keep an extremely clean desk, they keep all their notebooks, and write very clearly.  They print out their daily outlook calendar of meetings and tasks.  They have an inbox process to deal with emails, meetings, and new assignments.  They keep file folders and can instantly pull up projects, meeting minutes, and other details when asked to produce them.

Bonus Tip:  Passion!
One of my team members read my post and reminded me of something that every single person on my team has in buckets!  Passion!  Without passion in what you do day to day, you will not be a great developer, or great at anything for that matter.  Lack of passion is the number one reason so many developers never become great!  It is also the number one reason people do not succeed! A passionate developer will outperform even the best technical developers if they are not passionate about their job, their role, and their project.  Think about it, if you have read this far, are you going to make an effort to make all the changes I listed?  They seem simple, but without the passion to do these things, are you really going to commit today and be successful?

So there you have it!  These are some of the key principles I am using in rating my development team during the review process.  Mind you, I provide my team members with the best environment I possibly can, and in return I want great developers!  And they want to all be great developers!  You can use these rules to rate your developers, or if you are a developer yourself, please use this list to make changes if needed, and catapult your career past your peers! 

Follow these tips, and you will get the promotion you want, the increase you have been waiting for, and you will overall be happier with your achievements!  Try it out and post your results in the comments below!  I’d love to hear from you!  Also if have other points you think I should add, let me know!

1. 
   For the second month in a row, Facebook is ranked at number one for Web 2.0 companies and web sites.  With traffic growing at a ridiculous rate, new users signing up by the thousands every hour, Facebook is perfectly poised to be the reigning king of Web 2.0.  While myspace still has the most traffic on most accords, facebook with launching its new development platform has really propelled itself ahead of the competition.
2. 
   

   One of the world’s largest social networking sites, Fotolog is an ever-evolving global network where members communicate and connect through photographs.  A simple and fun way for anyone to express themselves on a daily basis, Fotolog allows members to easily publish an online photo diary, or photo blog, and share it worldwide.

   What makes Fotolog special is not just the ability to post photos, but the ability to connect with people. While many people use Fotolog to stay in better touch with their friends and family, others use it to explore the wider Fotolog universe, discover the photos of new people from around the world, participate in group projects and, perhaps most importantly, receive personal feedback on their photos.

3. 
   As flickr’s tag lines states, flickr is the best online photo sharing application on the Internet today.  It by far has the best tools for uploading your photos, organizing your photos, and sharing them with your friends and family.  You can use your browser, mobile phone, PDA, and literally any device that can take pictures, to upload your photo’s to flickr.  flickr then takes it to the next level by allowing you to share your pictures in a million ways! 

   Friends and family can search the pictures on the web, subscribe to an RSS feed to be notified of new pictures, sending emails from the site, and other crazy ways that you might want to suggest!  If you want to share pictures, flickr is your tool!

4.  
   del.icio.us is a social bookmarking website — the primary use of del.icio.us is to store your bookmarks online, which allows you to access the same bookmarks from any computer and add bookmarks from anywhere, too. On del.icio.us, you can use tags to organize and remember your bookmarks, which is a much more flexible system than folders.

   You can also use del.icio.us to see the interesting links that your friends and other people bookmark, and share links with them in return. You can even browse and search del.icio.us to discover the cool and useful bookmarks that everyone else has saved — which is made easy with tags.

5. 
   In the old days, Google Maps would still be the new kid on the block, however, in Web 2.0 days, Google Maps is ancient.  However, there is no better way to help you get from A to B quicker.  Sure there are other tools on the market, some of which have been around even before Google itself, but they are terrible in comparison to the speed and ease of use!

6. 
   Because everyone shouldn’t see everything.  What a great slogan, and a great way to compete with YouTube and other clones.  vimeo is extremely clean and easy to use, and I love it and enjoy the experience much better than YouTube.  If I want to see ridiculous videos, and read comments with people bashing each other, I use YouTube.  But when I want to share a video with my family, I use vimeo.  Check it out today, I guarantee you will love the site and visit it daily!

7. 
   People have known for years that making a list of goals is the best way to achieve them. But most of us never get around to making a list. 43 Things is great for that! Make a list on 43 Things and see what changes happen in your life. Best of all it’s a way of connecting with other enthusiasts interested in everything from watching a space shuttle launch to grow my own vegetables. So the next time someone asks you, “what do you do?” you can answer with confidence, “I am doing 43 things!”.  Check out 43Things.com today!

8. 
   Zillow is an amazing real estate site!  It not only provides you with actual housing value for millions of homes across the country, but it also provides an extremely visual and easy to use interface for finding the data!  With its integrated mapping capabilities, you can even zoom in on the area the house is located in, and see visually the location! 

   Zillow really gives you the edge and a great high level overview on homes and their values.  If you are in the market, or just curious to what is going on in real estate, check out Zillow.com.  You won’t be disappointed.

9. 
   Chances are you haven’t even heard of Farecast.  Too bad.  It’s awesome!  Farecast.com is the first airfare prediction web site. They help online travel shoppers save money by answering the question; should you buy now or wait? They offer airfare predictions from over 75 U.S. departure cities to top domestic destinations.  So next time you start wondering, should I buy my ticket now, or later, and what timeframe, just go to Farecast.com!

10. 
    Do you love podcasting?  Do you love finding new and exciting podcasts to listen to?  Are you a publisher of podcasts?  If you answered yes to any of those questions, this is the site for you!  What they are trying to build here is the ultimate podcast center on the Internet, and from the looks of things, they are succeeding!  If you need to find fresh content to listen to on your iPod, or want to promote your own new podcast or music, check out Odeao.com today!