The 50 “Loudest” Websites of 2006

Information Architects of Japan lists its 2006 picks for services, news, social networks, social links, corporations and blogs. Its heuristics: content, design, usability,  behavior and marketing. For reference, it includes a website’s Alexa rating, but that’s not a measurement.

Some sites that might be new to you:

• 37signals – I would have put this in the services camp. Time called the company a “rising star.” Their online (Web 2.0) services: Basecamp (project management); Backpack (information manager), Campfire (real-time group chat), Highrise (a simple CRM tool). Unlike many Web 2.0 technologies, these are free only for a trial (30 day) period — except for Campfire, which is free for four simultaneous connections.
• memeorandum  – My personal favorite for finding out what the political blogosphere is talking about right now. Recently added an achieve feature. Maybe they were thinking about academics, researchers?
• reddit.com – IA’s “clear winner” in link lists trumped digg as well as de.licio.us (but not by much).
• subtraction – A blog written by the (35 yo) creative director at the NYT online.

Note, I found IA because of their Web Trend Map.  I no longer remember how I found out about it, though!