Last week I switched over our RSS feed to Feedburner so that we could get some accurate stats on how many people read Coolest Gadgets via a feed reader (breakdown above).

The stats show we’re currently averaging 1,950 subscribers (hi folks), I think that’s pretty cool but would like to break the 2,000 barrier so if you’re a feed follower and enjoy reading about gadgets please feel free to subscribe.

If you’ve never heard about RSS readers before, they’re a great way to follow your favourite sites without visiting them to see if they’ve been updated (the feeds only update when the sites do). A cool and simple online reader to start off with is Bloglines. See you in the feed .

I’m an active member (dct) of the webmaster community Digital Point, over the last month there’s been a contest for which member has the best blog and I’m happy to say we were joint third.

In first place was ShoeMoney which is all about making hard cash on the web (Jeremy who runs it makes $100K+ a month so certainly knows what he’s talking about)

In second place was my friend Jason’s blog www.yfs1.com. Jason writes about a variety of entrepenuarial subjects and his Starting a Business tutorial is a must read for anybody doing just that.

We shared third place with ProBlogger (IMO the #1 read for all active bloggers) and Find in Forums (not one I’d heard of before but I’m now a subscriber ).

Considering all the other blogs are webmaster related I’m pretty chuffed (not used that word in ages) that our gadget blog was up there.

So thanks to all 10 people that voted for us, Blogmaster for starting the poll and Humm for nominating us.

We’ve just received a big batch of competition prizes from Brando (thanks again), the 8″ LCD TV looks particularly cool. If you haven’t entered our big gadget contest there is still plenty of time, check out the contest rules here and prize list.

We will be running competitions on the community forums every month, if you have any contest ideas we’d love to hear them.

One of my good friends is the IT director over at Just Buy Online Ltd (a Surrey UK based online retailer). They’ve just merged 5 of their 6 niche shops into one mega store with products ranging from fish tanks and mattresses to massagers and heart rate monitors. What’s that got to do with gadgets you might be asking?

Well to celebrate the launch of the new site as well as CG’s anniversary, Just Buy Online are giving away one Polar FS2C heart rate monitor (£34.50 or ~$60) and one Timex Ironman Sleek 50 triathlon watch (£39.99 (~$70)) with 50 lap memory and 100 hour chronograph. The FS2 is great for those looking to improve their fitness in a casual type of way, the Ironman Sleek helps serious runners to plan their exercise and reach their goals.

Both prizes will be added to our $1,000 (more like $1,500 now) gadget contest that we have going on in the forums, everybody that joins and posts has a chance of winning something, so if you fancy a chance of free gadgets and chatting to like minded gadget friends please join and be part of our growing gadget minded community.

And now a quick message from our sponsors

Good luck to all Coolest Gadgets Forum members and we look forward to seeing you, your friends, colleagues and/or family shopping with us on justbuyonline.co.uk. You gadgeteers know what’s easiest… Just Buy Online!

I’ve just been interviewed by the lovely Nandini over at Born Rich as part of their new Geek of the Week series (I never knew I’d be geek of the week before doing the interview :rollseyes:).

If you’re interested in reading about why the gadget forumswere started or opinions on blog networking then trundle over to the full geeky interview.

For future interviews please speak to my agent .

The official launch of our Gadget & Technology Forums exceeded my expectations yesterday, we got well over 100 new members who staggeringly made over 1,000 posts. It’s looking like being a very entertaining and knowledgeable meeting place. Though I’m not sure about some of the avatars (see above) .

We are still adding prizes to the $1,000+ gadget give-away with the latest addition being a Bendi Board coutesy of Gadget Box, thank you very much.

I’d also like thank the following sites for wishing us a Happy Birthday and sharing their visitors with us:

• Gizmodo (thanks Travis)
• Shiny Shiny (thanks Star)
• Crunch Gear (thanks Blake and John)
• Thanks to any sites that we may of missed (please let us know if we did)

The final thank-yous must go to some of the new forum members who have contributed immensly. Big thanks to:

• amitpatel_3001
• azn1art
• Johan
• kadhal
• keith
• Mike
• Case
• Tim
• Colleen
• Scott
• Humm
• I could go on for a while but I’ll stop at 11

If you’ve not signed up at the forums please do, 139 geeks cannot be wrong .

With the launch of the forums it’s been a very hectic day so I’ve only just found the time to write this, my 10 favourite gadgets from the past year. So in no particular order we have:

10 – LED Keyboard

This was probably the gadget that made me start Coolest Gadgets, it just looks so cool. Each key is it’s own little LCD screen which opens up a phenomenal list of uses.

The full keyboard is still not available to buy but you can get a 3 key version from Think Geek.
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Coolest Gadgets is one year old today. To celebrate our blogiversary (thanks Star) we have launched our own Technology and Gadget forums where members can chat and get advice about the latest in geek toys, gadgets and technology. Every active member in the forums has a chance to win various gadgets with the total prize pool totalling over $1,000.

In order to have a chance of winning a Wicked Laser, an 8″ LCD TV or one of the many other gadgets we have to give away, you’ll need to register in the forums, read the competition rules and drool over the prize list .

I’m really looking forward to meet some of our readers around the forums and here’s to year 2 of Coolest Gadgets.

I will be doing a few more site news type posts today but normal gadget reporting will resume shortly