1. Reddit: Popular social news website with a large user base. Covers a wide range of news. Includes several topical sections called subreddits, which focus on specific topics like programming, science, politics and business.

2. Digg: The largest and most popular social news website on the internet. Covers all topics including politics, entertainment, technology and general news. Includes a separate video and image section.

3. Propeller: A social news site that covers all topics from technology to politics and entertainment. Operates in a similar fashion to Digg.

4. Fark: A community news site which allows users to comment on news articles. User submitted links will be posted on the main page once they are approved by the administrators.

5. Slashdot: Primarily a tech news site, Slashdot also covers topics like books, games, politics and entertainment. Users can submit stories and they may be published after editors approve it. A popular site that can send a large amount of traffic.

6. Metafilter: A community weblog which allows users to share links and discuss interesting websites/topics. Moderation is done through editors as well as peer pressure in order to prevent gaming.

7. I am bored: Covers general topics with a strong focus on weird and offbeat news. You can submit a link which may be posted after the editors approve it.

8. Mixx: A general social news sites which has a category for all types of news. Topics covered include business, entertainment, sports, health and tech. Includes the ability to create groups to share news with other users.

9. Shoutwire: General news site that is well populated with a loyal group of users. Topics covered include technology, politics, entertainment, lifestyle and sports.

10. Newsvine: A website consisting of community-driven news stories and opinions. Users have their own blogs and can write articles, save links to external content and vote/comment on other user stories.

11. IndianPad: A general social news site that with a large indian userbase. Topics covered include entertainment, sports, videos and tamil news.

12. Linkfilter: Covers all sorts of news. All links are posted and moderated by users. Links can be ranked on several levels: clicks, votes, age, or a combination of all three called points.

13. NewsCloud: A general social site with a focus on news in all topics. Similar to Newsvine, each user has their own blogs and can publish content to be voted up by other users.

14. Hugg: Hugg is a social news site with a strong focus on environmental issues. Also includes other categories like politics, science, fashion and technology.

15. Plime: A general news site which features a wide variety of topics ranging from religion and sports to technology or business. Odd news performs best in this community.

16. C2NN: An active social news site with a variety of topics including environment issues, business, politics, animals and offbeat. Similar to Hugg in focus but much more populated and active.

17. Kirsty: A general news site with a focus on fashion, entertainment and design on top of other topics like technology and food. Has a strong female user base.

18. Nowpublic: A participatory news network which focuses on citizen journalism. Each user has their own individual profile blog/page and can upload videos, images and news stories.

19. Stirrdup: General social news site with four broad categories: politics, technology, news and entertainment.

20. Searchles: A hybrid social news sites which covers all topics. Includes a video section and offers personalized filtering features and the option of joining groups made up of other users with similar interests.

21. Linkinn: A social news site that specializes in pictures and video. Covers a broad range of topics, particular offbeat and weird content.

22. Earthfrisk: Covers topics like humor, politics, entertainment and business. Combines a social network and group features with digg-style news voting.

23. Truemors: A social rumor news site which focuses on the publication of “true rumors that are relevant, informative, and interesting.” Users can post links anonymously via text, voicemail, web or email. Editors moderate content.

24. StumbleUpon: A social network and browser toolbar which allows users to channel surf the internet. Technically not 100% a social news site, although users can submit webpages to be rated by other users. Here is a guide to StumbleUpon.

25. Linkswarm: Covers a wide range of topics from celebrity gossip to funny media, science and politics. Focuses on pop culture and bizarre news as well.

Niche Social News Websites

Here are social websites which focus on a specific niche. For best results, only submit to them when your site falls within the same niche or covers the same topics. Or else you’re likely to be marked as spam.

26. Sphinn: Sphinn is a social site for search and interactive marketers. It’s designed to allow you to share and discover news stories, read and take part in discussions, discover events of interest and network with others.

27. Dzone: DZone is a free link-sharing community for developers. Other topics commonly featured include web design and programming.

28. Tweako: A user-powered site and social network with a focus on guides and tutorials in all categories like computing, technology, and the Internet.

29. Autospies: A social site that focuses on automotive news, car reviews, auto show photos and videos.

30. Design Float: A social news site for design-related content. Topics covered include business, freelancing, advertising, digital art and branding.

31. Ball Hype: A site that aggregates content from thousands of sports blogs. Users can submit stories and votes will determine if they make it to home page.

32. YCombinator Hacker News: A news site that focuses on technology, startups, business and entrepreneurship.

33. SWiK: A community driven resource for people who use open source software.

34. Buzzflash: A user driven progressive political news website that allows you to submit political stories.

35. DNHour: DNHour.com is a user-powered news portal built specially for the domain name industry. Most members are generally from the domain name industry, which includes domain name owners, companies or professionals.

36. PlugIM: PlugIM is a user driven internet marketing community. Topics covered include search engine optimization, products, business and marketing.

37.Showhype: Operates in a similar way to Ballhype. Stories come from two sources — users and aggregated content. Users can also submit a link to a story that they’ve found or write their own article on ShowHype.

38. Small Business Brief: A niche social site which focuses on small business news. Topics covered include marketing and sales, website development, management and entrepreneurship.

39. Hypediss: Social news site with a focus on design, fashion, urban culture and art.

40. Chictini: Product-oriented social site which a focus on new trends and styles. It’s possible to submit news stories although most of the submissions feature products from online retailers.

41. DotNetKicks: DotNetKicks.com is a community based news site that focuses on topics like NET development techniques, technologies and tools including ASP.NET, C#, VB.NET, C++ and Visual Studio.

42. Lipstick: Reddit-style social news site for celebrity gossip.

43. Hubspot: Social news site for marketers, entrepreneurs and business professionals.

44. Winelifetoday: A niche social site for wine lovers. Topics covered included news and opinion articles to do with wine.

45. iliketotallyloveit.com: Allows users to publish and share products with the broader public which they find cool, innovative, exceptionally beautiful, or just weird. Included with every item is a link to an online shop where it can be purchased.

46. Wordsy: A niche social news site for people who love reading and books. Topics covered include small presses, fiction writing, authors, book awards and poetry. (Note: Wordsy has suspended its site since Dec 2008)

47. Value Investing News: A niche social news site that covers stocks and investment news. A small but active community.

48. Teenwag: Focus on celebrity gossip. A hybrid social network with digg-style voting. Users can submit links to be voted up by other users.

49. Muti: Muti is a social bookmarking site inspired by reddit and Digg but dedicated to content of interest to Africans or those interested in Africa.

50. Tip’d: A social media site for finance, investing, and business topics. Tip’d users vote on stories they like by clicking the ‘Tip it’ button that appears next to each story, and then can comment by pressing the ‘Discuss’ link below the story.

Violent ethnic unrest in Xinjiang, China may be the next stop in the “Twitter Revolution.”

The power of social networking and new media to change the world was evident in Iran last month and is proving to be a force in the ethnic turmoil in Xinjiang, China, as well. Intended for users to keep track of what their friends or favorite celebrities are doing minute by minute, Twitter has become the social network of political change.

In an attempt to quell the chaos and prevent rioters from organizing in the Xinjiang province, China has cut off mobile phone service and attempted to block Internet access.

Chinese versions of YouTube and Twitter (Youku and Fanfou) had text messages and video scrubbed from their sites.

But some gruesome images posted to Twitter got out, including several shots showing dead bodies, apparently of ethnic Chinese men and women, lying in the streets.

According to Reuters, a Fanfou search for posts with the key word Urumqi turned up zero results while Twitter, which is hosted overseas, yielded hundreds of comments in Chinese and English.

Last month’s protests against the results of the presidential election in Iran was referred to as the “Twitter Revolution,” as the opposition relied heavily on Twitter and YouTube to get the message out to the world. Neda Soltan, a woman killed while attending a demonstration in Tehran by state militia, became a martyr after a graphic video of her death was posted on YouTube.

Like China, the Iranian government uses Internet filtering and has shut down several key bloggers who were providing riveting coverage of last month’s protests. The U.S. State Department even got involved, asking Twitter at one point to delay a scheduled software update to protect Iranians who were using the service.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/news/us_world/2009/07/06/2009-07-06_aaweraweraweraraew.html#ixzz0KlNbnYLF&C

Almost half the nation’s Internet users now take part in online social networks such as Facebook, MySpace and LinkedIn, almost twice the rate of a year ago, The Conference Board reported Tuesday.

Of Web users, 43 percent use a social networking website, up from 27 percent last year, the nonprofit global research group said. in its quarterly Consumer Internet Barometer.

The most popular site is Facebook, used by 78 percent of social network participants, followed by MySpace (42 percent), LinkedIn (17 percent) and Twitter (10 percent).

The survey tracks about 10,000 Internet-equipped households nationwide.

It said seniors age 55 and older are quickly increasing their use of social networks, up from 6 percent last year to 19 percent this year.

Women are more likely than men to use social-network sites (48 percent versus 38 percent).

The majority of users log on at home, The Conference Board said, with a quarter logging on at work, and 10 percent connecting through their phone. More than half say they log on at least once a day.

“Online social networks are more than just a fad among the younger generation,” Lynn Franco, director of The Conference Board Consumer Research Center, said in a statement Tuesday. “They’ve become an integral part of our personal and professional lives. They’re an effective way to keep in touch with people, connect with friends and family, and network with colleagues.

“Social media will also transform marketing as we know it. They’re powerful communication tools, and are becoming an essential part of successful marketing strategies.”

The survey said Facebook is equally popular among men and women, while women are more likely than men (47 percent versus 35 percent) to use MySpace and more men than women (21 percent versus 15 percent) use LinkedIn.

Users of the micro-blogging site Twitter say their top reasons for “tweeting” are to connect with friends (42 percent), update their status (29 percent), look for news (26 percent) and for work-related reasons (22 percent)

Maybe it is a good time to check your Facebook page right now, whether your boss is around or not.

The same with Bebo, Twitter, LinkedIn, or any of your online social network profiles.

Because if you believe what a British think-tank has to say about social networking, it just might be a good thing for your employer, too.

The London-based Demos has released a report that suggests social networking sites may benefit the workplace by helping employees establish new contacts, strengthen ties with clients, or learn more about what is happening in other parts of their industry.

These same workers may use social networking sites to keep in touch with former co-workers, who can pass on useful tips and information to their former workplace.

Nurturing and hosting networks can bring benefits in terms of productivity, innovation and workplace democracy,” reads the report written by researchers Peter Bradwell and Richard Reeves.

Bradwell told CTV’s Canada AM on Friday that the report “Network Citizens: Power and Responsibility at Work” has probed a subject that has become an issue in workplaces in recent years, but has yet to be fully explored.

“The kind of focus of our report was looking at a lot of the very real benefits that people and organizations find from social networking,” he said. “But also to just bring out some of the challenges that might have been ignored so far.”

The report, released Oct. 29, also points to the difficulties of trying to ban such networks from the office.

It is becoming difficult to separate workers and social networking as they become increasingly intertwined, the report argues, and “smart businesses” recognize this.

“Bans on Facebook or YouTube are in any case almost impossible to enforce,” reads the report. “Firms may as well try to put a time limit on the numbers of minutes allowed each day for gossiping.”

But the report does warn that social networking can also pose problems for the corporate world: Such as online clubs and cliques that are the antithesis of what social networking is supposed to be about.

Bradwell said workplaces should keep open lines of communication about the way these sites should be used, but there is no need for “strict, overt surveillance” of the ways employees are making use of social networking.

Social networking is going corporate. The popular technology used by millions of people to share ideas and photos on MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn and others is catching on at companies to improve productivity and communication among workers.

Private, internal social networks make sense as companies grapple with a slumping economy that has made travel cost-prohibitive even as workforces are spread out as never before, tech analysts say.

“Companies are asking, ‘How can we make our workforce more productive?’ ” says Kevin Martin, an analyst at market researcher Aberdeen Group.

Corporations increasingly are “exploring and experimenting” in the use of social networks to improve business operations, says Gina Bianchini,CEO of Ning, a social-networking site for businesses and consumers. It makes revenue from Google AdSenseand premium services.

“There’s been a definite shift the last two months,” she says. “There is a genuine interest now rather than a casual curiosity before.”