In the midst of the current US economic slowdown it is clear that the good old days are over. At least for some chunk of 2008, more likely for the whole year, we are in for some gloomy times. Companies are being forced to cut costs and let people go. Some smart people aren’t sitting around waiting to be downsized - instead they’re jumping ship and hopping aboard another. Editor’s note: Looking back over 2008, there were some posts on ReadWriteWeb that did not get the attention we felt they deserved - whether because of timing, competing news stories, etc. So in this end-of-year series, (Read the full post about ‘Are YOU Replaceable?’…)

Over December we’ve published ten top 10 lists of the top products of 2008. We intend to open these lists up for public voting in 2009, to tap into the wisdom of the intelligent crowd that reads our site. But for now, you’ll have to make do with the choices of us here at ReadWriteWeb. In this post we’ve done a megalist, the top 100 products of 2008. Come join us on RWW Live - our live podcast show - at 3pm PST today, as we discuss these products and the big trends of 2008. Of course there are far more than 100 great Web products out there, so there are some excellent ones not included in our (Read the full post about ‘Top 100 Products of 2008′…)

We all tend to think of fax machines as quaint, 20th century products that became irrelevant when the Internet came along. But in reality faxes are still the most efficient way to quickly deliver a signed business document. As with most office tasks these days, you can do faxing over the Internet and in many ways it’s more efficient than using a fax machine. So in this post we take a quick look at some of the e-fax options out there. I have to admit I’ve tried to route around faxes in the past, by scanning and emailing signed documents. But when it comes down to it, scanners are more of a (Read the full post about ‘Do U E-Fax?’…)

Second hand smoke in the home hospitalises 17.000 children a year. www.roycastle.org Advertising Agency: CHI and Partners, London, UK Executive Creative Director: Ewan Paterson Art Director: Clark Edwards, Nick Pringle Copywriter: Clark Edwards, Nick Pringle Photographer: Kelvin Murray Source: www.holgerappel.com

According to a new report by Nielsen Online (pdf), most online videos in the U.S. are watched at work between 9am and 5pm during the work week. 65% of all online viewers use this time to watch their favorite online videos, while only 51% watch online videos during this time on the weekend. Not surprisingly, weekend nights between 11pm and 6am attract the fewest viewers. Nielsen also released its online video ratings for October, which showed YouTube leading the pack with a total of 5 billion streams and 82 million unique users. Hulu recorded the biggest gains since September and now ranks (Read the full post about ‘New Study Says You Watch A Lot of YouTube at Work’…)

Almost every piece of information we access today is stored somewhere in digital form–think iPod, YouTube, digital cameras, mobile phones, not to mention our personal and professional information spread across LinkedIn, social networking sites and blogs. It’s difficult to imagine life without digital data in this information age. But who manages it? And, more importantly, who will preserve it? In this month’s edition of Communications of the ACM, the monthly magazine of the Association for Computing Machinery, Dr. Francine Berman, director of the San Diego Supercomputer Center at the (Read the full post about ‘Who will Preserve Your Digital Data?’…)

The last time WordPress - the popular open source blogging platform - changed their user interface, they got a reaction. And it wasn’t positive. Even diehard fans were questioning the reasoning behind the changes, trying to figure out ways to work within the new construct, or simply throwing their hands up in despair. So, it comes as little surprise that the latest release, WordPress 2.7 - codenamed “Coltrane” - has had a great deal of time and energy focused on improving that interface. But could the WordPress development team win back the adoration of those angry users with yet another (Read the full post about ‘WordPress 2.7: If You Don’t Like It, Change It’…)

Millions of Emotions. No written lines. Advertising Agency: Underground, Buenos Aires, Argentina Creative Director / Art Director / Copywriter: Guido Freiberg Source: www.holgerappel.com

At a time when the online world is continually seen as a more trusted source of news, mainstream media outlets find themselves forced into the position of becoming more and more open to keep their readers coming back. Removing “paid subscription” requirements that prevented everyday users from accessing content was one of the first cracks in the walled gardens. Opening APIs to other developers has been gaining favor. And now, another trend is coming to light: incorporating third-party content to supplement the original content the sites are offering. Today, the Gray Lady joined those ranks as (Read the full post about ‘Times Extra: The New York Times Opens Web Front Page to Outside Content’…)

Do we really need another shopping holiday? Some marketing firms and major retailers think we do. To follow up on the success of Black Friday, the start of holiday shopping season for American consumers, and Cyber Monday, the day when we surf online for the deals we missed at the mall, a mobile marketing firm called Mobigosee is planning to launch “Mobile Tuesday” on December 2nd of this year. The concept for Mobile Tuesday was born out of research that showed that the Tuesday after Thanksgiving was a slow shopping day, as are many Tuesdays throughout the year. To encourage the shopping (Read the full post about ‘Black Friday, Cyber Monday…Mobile Tuesday?’…)