I take a look at Techmeme once a day. Usually that’s all it is but sometimes I’ll check it out again later in the day. Especially if I see something breaking on Twitter.
Lots of folks have speculated how Techmeme actually worked under the hood. The claim has always been that it is 100% automated. Sometimes I wondered about that since you would occasionally find stories on Techmeme that didn’t have any supporting posts below the anchor.
In any event, today Techmeme announced they are going to have human editors in addition to the automated system.
Few thoughts:
-Too many people are constantly trying to game Techmeme or write to Techmeme. Human editors should be able to help fix/reduce that one.
-Techmeme sources seem to be a bit limited these days. I’m seeing more and more “corporate blogs” (my least favorite) and large mainstream media dominate techmeme. I’d like to see their human editors now find new sources from Twitter updates or lesser blogs or comments or maybe even videos. I’ve also seen some individual blogs break a new story but the larger blogs get the anchor post instead of the other way around.
-And best of all, I like humans :) Take for example the Tumblr Explore page. It’s a page that presents the most interesting things happening across the Tumblr network and updates several times a day. There are a few automated variables that determine which posts make it to the Explore page but there is also a human element to it as well. As a result the Explore page is filled with a fantastic & diverse collection of photos, audio, video, quotes and text posts. I know David Karp wants to do more with the Explore page but even in it’s current state it’s my default home page in Firefox.
I’m looking forward to the new Techmeme.