My favourite blogs of 2007

It is Christmas holiday week, so clearly a time for self-indulgent lists rather than proper blogging. Although, of course, it isn't like I haven't been producing self-indulgent RSS subscription lists all year - ho hum.

I don't have a 'blogroll' on currybetdotnet. If I was doing a site feature comparison charts of the blogs I read, I'd have to give myself a red cross for that - but if I did have a blogroll, these are some of the sites that would have been on it in 2007.

On a music front, I've been enjoying No Rock And Roll Fun. By virtue of the fact that it mixes slagging off vacuous popstars and rounds-up the latest releases by people I consider to be cool, I can get my quotient of Holy Moly / Popbitch style gossip, whilst pretending I still wouldn't pick up a copy of Heat / TV Quick / Slebs With Cellulite if you dropped it next to me on the tube and then got off. I've also enjoyed LP Cover Lover this year as well.

For things that make me laugh, you can't go much wrong with subscribing to the RSS feed of I Can Has Cheezburger?, but you get a more sophisticated brand of humour from CMM News. It is quite a dark take on advertising, but has given me several genuine LOL moments this year.

Of all the media blogs I've been reading this year, the one to make me laugh most was VickyWatch. I was upset to see it discontinued in the wake of the oh-my-god-you-couldn't-make-this-up promotion of Victoria whatserface to a more senior and responsible role within The Sun editorial hierarchy, apparently on the strength of lies, plagiarism, and dressing up reading stuff on the internet from really obvious and well known places as 'exclusives'.

More seriously on the media front, essential reading has been Martin Stabe (and the Press Gazette blog stable), Adrian Monck, AndyDickinson.net and Lloyd and company's Messy Media blog.

I've also enjoyed Shane Richmond and Ian Douglas blogging for The Telegraph, a site whose development I have been hugely impressed with this year.

MediaWatchWatch has also been a good read, even if I do have to look over my shoulder in internet cafes when they are happily re-publishing cartoons that have inflamed Islamic public opinion across the globe.

On the politics side of things, I increasingly find myself divorced from what is happening in the UK, and unable to grasp the back-story of what is going on in Greece. In terms of keeping track of the UK, I've been steering clear of the usual political blogging suspects, but have stuck with Westmonster. I also like the modestly titled 'Some Stuff'. Written by someone I first encountered whilst jousting on the Biased BBC blog, it consists of short pithy posts pointing out the inadequacies of British politicians - mostly at the expense of Labour, but not afraid to name and shame idiots from the ranks of the Lib Dems or Conservatives either.

My theoretical blogroll would also feature friends like leeharker.com, ia play, eyedropper, Frankie Roberto, Nic Price and James Cridland. Plus the people I gave a mention to in last year's blog round-up: The Daily WTF, Davblog, Diamond Geezer, Robin Hamman's cybersoc, Teacher Dude's Grill and BBQ and This Is Not My Country.

I haven't been putting these blogs into an order of merit, but if I had, then these last three would be very near the top.

I adore Paleo-Future. It must be a symptom of being a thirtysomething geek I suppose. As a student of history I constantly wonder how historians will write about our current era. The pictures and stories of Paleo-Future capture a mix of the wide-eyed optimism about the future that I felt as a child interested in sci-fi, and the horror that we might all be engulfed in nuclear armageddon at any moment that you got from growing up in the eighties. And that wasn't just from the haircuts, honest.

The Tour de France Lanterne Rouge blog is probably the most specialist interest in my RSS subscriptions. It focuses on the people who are coming last in, IMHO, the world's most drug tainted greatest individual sporting event. It doesn't just concentrate on the TDF, there is also a look at who is distinguishing themselves by coming last in other major cycling routes. Apparently in the Giro d'Italia at one point you actually had to wear a black jersey to denote that you were in last position.

Finally, it is a simple premise, but spEak You're bRanes regularly makes me laugh, and wish that I'd thought of doing it first. It basically takes self-evidently stupid posts from the BBC's Have Your Say site, and then mercilessly swears at them for their stupidity. Which can surely only be a good thing.