This whole internet thing will blow over as soon as nerds get tired of arguing about Star Trek

*Note: Blogger can go to hell. It deleted this whole thing the first time around*

I've been on and around the Internet for about 7 years now, so I've seen as things have changed from AOL's splash page to all the shiny, upload it, leave comments features of "web 2.0." The only thing that all these new bells and whistles have granted us as is a faster, easier, way to act stupid and waste time without the fear of repercussions.

The Internet does in fact, make you stupid.

One of the most visible outgrowths of the Web 2.0 era is the blog. Which gives every person in the world the ability to be heard and endlessly frustrated by the lack of user traffic. Blogs are not entirely new inventions, they have existed since the beginnings of the Internet. One of the most famous, and most ugly blogs out there is The Drudge Report. A conservatively focused news blog that aggregates all the conservative focused news into three columns. These headlines are usually in a fixed width 10 point font, and stacked one upon another giving the reader no idea where they are supposed to go. Usually a few pictures will be thrown in randomly. Bigger news stories will either be posted above the main header and below the featured ad.

The website actually dates back to 1994, and is notable for it's breaking of the Monica Lewinsky scandal when Newsweek decided not to run the story, since then the Report has done little reporting, and instead focuses on posting links. Though the Report's writer, Matt Drudge, will occasionally post an article based on tips and rumors he has received. In the 90's, the simple design made it easy to run the website using just HTML hyperlinks and minor formatting, but now the website looks hopelessly antiquated next to shinier politically radical blogs such as The Huffington Post.

Yes that is really what the website looks like.

Despite all the limitations of the non-Flash, non-Java, format and the overall immature look of the blog, The Report attracts almost 7 million visits a year, and is the 184th most popular website in the United States.

Enough on ugly websites.

As a soccer fan, I usually have no where to turn in the mainstream media to get all the scores, highlights, headlines, and scandal for my beloved sport. ESPN, who specialize in 24 hour coverage of all the above has heard the plight of the American soccer fan, and as an outgrowth of their already extensive website, created ESPNsoccernet.


The current front page.

The website features all the things a soccer fan could want, except video highlights which are incredibly hard to get the rights for. In the top is the obvious name, and a constantly scrolling guide to coverage offered through their online video service ESPN360. The large picture accompanies the most compelling picture of the day, and a short wrap up of scores and stories in the English Premier Leauge. Directly below is the opinion and features sidebar, which offers indepth coverage on everything from interviews with retired stars to fantasy soccer strategies. The features also automatically scroll from page to page of 3 featured stories, giving more space on the main page for fan written collumns and coverage of other leauges.

In the center there is a current scoreboard for every leauge that is playing soccer anywhere on the planet. Directly below that is the headline roll out, with the most recent story getting a summary and a picture to accompany it. On the far right is the videobox, which offers a miniture version of SportsCenter that reports on the scores from the big leauges, and the main stories of the day.

The website is very clean, easier to navigate than most ESPN websites, and offers an extensive comment system, as well as SportsNation polls, scoring tables, and limited customization options.

The website is focused on Americans and other English speakers, but offers full coverage in Spanish, German, Italian, and French. The language change also changes the coverage to the top flight of the corresponding leauge and other national team centered news.

For an ESPN website, it runs incredibly well, and is constantly updated. Most of ESPN's mainstream sports pages can't even boast that.

Despite just how thoroughly well designed and maintained the website is, it is seldom visited in the United States, as it lags far behind Yahoo Sport's Soccer website and several British soccer websites (BBC Sport, Daily Telegraph, and several club run websites) in terms of visits from around the world, but it has seen a 20% increase in traffic in the last 3 months.