Ever heard of Mario Lavandeira, Pete Cashmore or Heather Armstrong? Probably not – yet they are among a select group of web celebrities, who have shaken up the entertainment industry and even changed how we talk to each other.
They were included by Forbes magazine in the top 25 biggest and brightest stars on the internet. People unknown in the real world who had gone on to hold huge sway online.
They vary widely from stay-at-home mothers to technology entrepreneurs and bed-ridden films enthusiasts. The fourth annual survey reveals how the world wide web has become a massive levelling force this century.
No. 2. Michael Arrington-Techcrunch.com
David Ewalt from Forbes.com, said: ‘A kid with a webcam can become a movie star; an entrepreneur with a smart idea can get on Oprah; a tech blogger can reach a bigger audience than a bestselling novelist.’
Forbes calculated their influence in four areas. How many web references they had, the traffic ranking of their home pages, how much TV and press interest they provoked and their number of followers on micro-blogging site Twitter.
Mario Lavandeira, a.k.a Perez Hilton topped the chart for the third time in a row. The controversial gossip blogger writes what he calls ‘Hollywood’s most hated website’, and has become something of a celebrity himself.
Every so often, venture capitalist Larry Cheng puts out a list of the top VC blogs. Previously, he ranked the blogs by how many subscribers they have on Google Reader. But now he’s changed his methodology and is ranking them by average monthly unique visitors, based on Compete data. He just came out with his new global ranking for the fourth quarter of 2009. Below are the top ten blogs from that list.
Cheng is a managing partner at Volition Capital, which was Fidelity Ventures until it was spun off on Monday. His own blog, Thinking About Thinking, ranks No. 12.
The List: Top 10 Venture Capitalist Blogs based on Average Monthly Unique Visitors for the 4th quarter of 2009
Fred Wilson, Union Square Ventures, A VC (100,279)
Prince Al-Waleed bin Talal bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud (also spelled Al-Walid)is a member of the Saudi Royal Family. He is the nephew of the Saudi Arabian King Abdullah.
An entrepreneur and international investor but without real political power within the House of Saud or in Saudi Arabia, he has amassed a fortune through investments in real estate and the stock market.
As of August 2009 his net worth is estimated at US$16.3 billion, down from $21 billion, according to the Arabian Business rich list published August 29, 2009.
The AB have also ranked him as number 1 on their Rich List. They state on their website “We have deliberately not included royalty, with the exception of HRH Prince Alwaleed given that his wealth has been achieved through his business dealings.”
He is ranked by Forbes as the 22nd richest person in the world. He has been nicknamed by Time magazine as the Arabian Warren Buffett.
William Henry “Bill” Gates III (born October 28, 1955) is an American business magnate, philanthropist, and chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen. He is ranked consistently one of the world’s wealthiest people and the wealthiest overall as of 2009.
During his career at Microsoft, Gates held the positions of CEO and chief software architect, and remains the largest individual shareholder with more than 8 percent of the common stock. He has also authored or co-authored several books. Gates is one of the best-known entrepreneurs of the personal computer revolution.
In 2009, the 24/7 news cycle cranked up to hyperspeeds. Online news and celebrity blogs exploded—it seemed—in inverse proportion to the rate that mainstream outlets were withering away and (in some sad cases) dying out. These are the most popular blogs and sites—as determined by search demand on Yahoo!—for their take on ‘09.
Harvey Robert Levin (born September 2, 1951) is an American television producer, lawyer, legal analyst and a celebrity reporter. Levin is a managing editor at TMZ.com, a celebrity news and gossip site launched by Time Warner-AOL in December 2005. He also executive produces and hosts TMZ on TV. He is a frequent guest of the Kevin and Bean show, and CNN’s Larry King Live.
Wealth Dynamics is a wealth profiling system which uses a psychometric test to assess your personality, strengths, productivity, values and group behaviour, to determine your most natural way to build wealth.
“If you are doing anything that feels like hard work, you are already doing the wrong thing”