Which Memetracker to Use?

July 23, 2007 in Web by Carsten Pötter | View Comments

Back in January I have compared three memetrackers specialising on tech news: Techmeme, Tailrank, and Megite. Since then all three competitors have gone in slightly different directions.

Techmeme seems to put even more focus on big tech blogs and especially tech news sites. It’s still a must read if you want to catch the latest news but don’t expect much discussion originating from smaller blogs.
I don’t know exactly what’s up with Tailrank; I like(d) it a lot. Though it has been down more or less for the last two months. Its founder Kevin Burton has denied major problems on TechCrunch but it looks not very healthy to say the least.
Megite looks much better now because most issues that could be criticised about it have been resolved over the last couple of months. While many discussions also originate from tech news sites Megite links to more blogs than Techmeme and therefore offers readers a wider spectrum of opinions. It has become a viable alternative to Techmeme by now.

Though I am wondering if the memetracking concept can survive; Tailrank being almost dead and Techmeme heading for a tech news site. So is Megite the only good one remaining or are there any other ones I am missing? Of course, there is Rivva which has improved greatly since its launch in March but it is focusing on German blogs.

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  • http://www.frankwestphal.de/ Frank Westphal

    Carsten, on a related tangent, have you any experience yet personalizing a memetracker with your own OPML?

    Two weeks ago, I launched the first vertical Rivva (thanks for the mention, btw) for Ruby on Rails topics, and I was somewhat surprised by the (relative) ineffectiveness of the algorithms I’ve evolved for the original Rivva. As you know, the whole concept of tracking memes thrives on a certain degree of echoes (i.e. repetition) to self-reproduce the (important) ideas, messages and conversations.

    To make a long story short, I was wondering how well a custom Tailrank or Megite would work, given the fact that most of our OPML lack the duplication/redundancy a memetracker needs to come up with interesting stories. I was curious about your insight, though I might just as well give it a spin myself …

    Frank

    PS: Bummer that Rivva is missing out on your blog ;) good stuff, keep it up!

  • http://www.frankwestphal.de/ Frank Westphal

    Carsten, on a related tangent, have you any experience yet personalizing a memetracker with your own OPML?

    Two weeks ago, I launched the first vertical Rivva (thanks for the mention, btw) for Ruby on Rails topics, and I was somewhat surprised by the (relative) ineffectiveness of the algorithms I’ve evolved for the original Rivva. As you know, the whole concept of tracking memes thrives on a certain degree of echoes (i.e. repetition) to self-reproduce the (important) ideas, messages and conversations.

    To make a long story short, I was wondering how well a custom Tailrank or Megite would work, given the fact that most of our OPML lack the duplication/redundancy a memetracker needs to come up with interesting stories. I was curious about your insight, though I might just as well give it a spin myself …

    Frank

    PS: Bummer that Rivva is missing out on your blog ;) good stuff, keep it up!

  • Carsten Pötter

    Well, I tried customising Tailrank (which isn’t working as well at the moment) though actually it was hardly more than a reflection of my Google Reader subscriptions. But maybe I’m just too stupid to really understand it all. ;) Never tried Megite’s customisation, though.

    Maybe Grazr (http://grazr.com) is worth a look but I have not tested it so far and it’s probably not suitable for memes (maybe I should do that the next couple of days).

  • Carsten Pötter

    Well, I tried customising Tailrank (which isn’t working as well at the moment) though actually it was hardly more than a reflection of my Google Reader subscriptions. But maybe I’m just too stupid to really understand it all. ;) Never tried Megite’s customisation, though.

    Maybe Grazr (http://grazr.com) is worth a look but I have not tested it so far and it’s probably not suitable for memes (maybe I should do that the next couple of days).

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