You may have noticed me capturing geeks, technophiles in a significant %age against other niche. But before you apply your judgment, let me tell you it’s not purposeful. The presence of elitebloggers here is governed by their hard-earned popularity of blogs, technorati ranking and above all the choice of elitebloggers themselves. And today we have with us William Barnes, founder, GearCrave who is geared up to carve a new level of success for his blog along with its editor Mike Payne. Lately, I happened to reach William and got the chance to scan the success secrets and future plans about his Mens Buying and Lifestyle Guide.

Here you go:

William, introduce yourself to my readers and take us through your daily flow at work.

My name is William Barnes; I am 28 years old and was born in London. I read Mechanical Engineering at University and now live in Santa Monica Los Angeles. My daily work flow normally involves trying to balance the overload of emails I get and getting to the tasks I have in TO-DO-LIST.

GearCrave doesn’t have any tagline. If asked to produce one, what would that be?

The Mens Buying and Lifestyle Guide.

Time Magazine handpicked iPhone as the invention of the year 2007. What according to you are the prospective candidates for 2008 award in the same category?

Hopefully something like the Tesla the more exposure that gets the better.

With the evolution of green houses and hybrid cars, do you think is technology really becoming green or is it a steep PR exercise?

Some are some aren’t, as with all innovation the price premium it carries is eroded over time. Hopefully mainstream acceptance is possible; VC money certainly seems to think so.

Tell us about WPBGroup. Are you the editor for all the four-sites falling under this group?

Not at all, I have trouble writing the address on a letter, Mike Payne edits GearCrave, Myke Armstrong runs Nerdyshirts and Mali Elfman is the editor for LA.CityZine. There are all-great at what they do and I am very lucky to work with them.

Japan seems to breed robots in huge numbers. Can you imagine a day when robots are efficient enough to substitute humans for all major tasks? Would you depute one to blog for you?

I can imagine a day when robots dream of electric sheep.

What do you count as one factor that attracts readers to your blog besides gamut of gadget-related blogs?

GearCrave; Mike strikes a great balance between finding really cool products every day with, insane editorials, like the GearCrave guide to buying your own missile silo, you combine that with the amazing competitions we run and I am not surprised people come back.

Nerdyshirts: Myke is always releasing sweet t-shirts, they always seem to be conversation pieces. My favorite shirt is “Too Many muth’ uckers“ I am a big Flight of the Conchords fan and every bar I go to people talk to me about the shirt.

LA.CityZine: Mali and her enormous team of writers are constantly finding the cool and quirky of LA, the amount of music and movie coverage on that site is amazing.

What are your other interests besides your work?

Football as in with your feet.

Tell us about your ‘must-read’ or favorites blogs?

Calacanis, Techcrunch, NerdyShirts, Afrojacks, HolyTaco, FluidApp, Twit.tv, Thebachelorguy, todolist.

Provide us with your five favorite posts you have written to date.

How to buy your own missile silo

Family tree T-Shirt

How to buy your own private island

Thalbach wooden USB drives

Flight of the conchords T-Shirts

You’re marooned on a desert island: What gadget you wish to have?

A teleporter?

How would you like to be known as?

Entrepreneur

Quick bites:

Hours you invest digging net: Too many

Biggest blogging mistake you did: I don’t blog

One hidden truth: Not telling

Advice you would have given yourself five years ago? Here is the internet, get on with it.

If not a blogger, then Someone like J.Calacanis or Mark Cuban

Life without Internet: Probably work either in a IT start up in London or in the movie business in LA.

First gadget you kept your fingers upon: Tabletop Donkey Kong

One thing you hate about GearCrave: I don’t hate anything about it, I have ambitions for it that are not fulfilled and we are working towards making them happen.

If asked for giving three tips to a greenhorn blogger, what would that be?

Don’t ask me, email Peter Rojas, Ryan Block or Brian Lam, those guys seem to have it down.

What new features can your savvy readers expect in coming months from GearCrave?

Big changes, by Xmas GearCrave won’t be alone, it would have changed significantly.

Besides content generation, networking comes as a part and parcel of a blogging. What are you doing at this front to maintain the popularity of your blog?

Not as much as I should, two years ago I knew nothing about the commercial side of the internet, much less about web publishing, it has been a great learning curve. The downside though of not having worked in the industry and I am very short on contacts so over the next 12 months I am going to make a concerted effort to attend more conferences and events like the techcrunch meet ups etc.

Beyond the human side GearCrave has a lot of the social networking options covered: we have a page summarizing all the ways you can follow gearcrave at.

Do you think blogs are or can be as popular as NYTimes, Time, NewsWeek are?

They already are and in some cases more so.

Where do you see the future of Blogosphere?

Consolidation of commercial blogs and the development of tools to process the second tier of sites.

Whom would you recommend as my next EliteBlogger and Why?

Definitely Cory Jones at HolyTaco, Mike at AfroJacks, or Eric at TheBachelorguy. I don’t know if they have the time, but I always love reading what they write.

Give us your views on EliteChoice.

I like the redesign, I am not sure the interview with bloggers necessarily matches the consumer female demographic that your ads are aimed at, but then I am guessing they are good for link building.

You can ask me one question.

Why do cats hate me?

Possibly, you may have lately developed a soft corner for dogs as well-:)

Here i thank William for giving us an insight about his blog and wish him luck for its upcoming features.

Gadgets are like pets for geeks and the argument is shielded by the competent geeks and divas residing amongst EliteBloggers. Whilst yesterday we had with us Gina Hughes from TechieDiva ruling the face of our series and today we are in high spirit with another proficient geek. Mark Wilson, associate editor, Gizmodo made an entry into blogosphere in 2006 with a video shoot at E3 for Kotaku followed by running a This Day in Gaming series at Kotaku and “Frankenreviews” over at Gizmodo. During all this time, Mark was engaged in a day job in commercial production. Later in July 2007, he took a call to be a full-time blogger writing half days for Giz and Kotaku. And gone May onwards, he transitioned full time with just Gizmodo.

Lately seen occupied with WWDC to populate us with updates on iPhone 3G, Mark managed to devote time for EliteChoice readers and fellow bloggers’ with his interesting pool of responses. The geek in him is all set to welcome a day when robots would be efficient enough to blog. This is what he has to say: And as long as I have a robot that buys my food and pays my rent, that’s just fine with me

Here is Mark, all set to give vent to his geeky juices so don’t think, just roll over to know more about this tech spy:

Introduce yourself to my readers and take us to the flow of your day at work.
Hey, I’m Mark Wilson, Associate Editor at Gizmodo. I’ve taken a bit of a tour at Gawker Media, having written for about two years at various capacities for both Gizmodo and Kotaku (tech and video games). Now I’ve settled in to a fairly typical routine. I roll out of bed around 6:45 and go right to work on Giz.

I catch up on any news I’ve missed while sleeping before impatiently refreshing my RSS for the next 8 hours. Usually, I write until around 3:00 without any major breaks. Then I’ll take care of any outstanding emails and keep a general eye on my posts for the next half hour or so. Depending on my energy level from there, I’ll make myself get outside for a run. While I don’t formally work for the rest of the day, I’ll definitely check in on the site through the evening or work on various features.

When did you sense an inclination towards blogging? Are you satisfied with the functionality of the blogging eco-system or think there is a need for revamp?
Before I wrote for Gizmodo, I read them incessantly. I found myself linking friends on their stories daily along with my own little quips. After a while it was pretty obvious that I was, to some small extent, blogging already.

Is it there a need for a revamp? I’m not sure. The constant, linear updates of a blog are very addicting to read. And the short to medium length articles are perfect for sneaking a 5-minute break from whatever office jobs our readers are supposed to be doing. That’s not to say things won’t continue to evolve “ but blogs have certainly stuck a chord with what/how the general populace is looking to read at the time being.

What is your take on the growing nature of concept-based products? Considering the advancement in technology, don’t you think these products would be of no relevance by the time they become functional, if ever?
Concepts keep us all excited about the industry. Think about Star Wars “ better still “ think about the works of Jules Verne or Isaac Asimov. These writers predicted all sorts of things we’re seeing happening already. And in some ways, they surely shaped the imaginations of those who made today possible.

Darren Rowse from Problogger has talked about five emerging trends in blogging. Do you agree with him or feel the need to update the list?

I’m really not a blog design expert. I consider myself a writer who happens to write on a blog. But I will say that Multiple Author Blogs and Blogs Converging With Other Types Of Sites aren’t what I’d call emerging trends but things that have been around for years now.

Tell us about your ˜must-read’ or favorites blogs?
Obviously all the big tech blogs are on that list. But I enjoy the micro niche content in my spare time “ stuff like NadShot.com. I mean, here’s a blog totally devoted to illustrations of comic book characters getting hit in the nuts. Brilliant! I have a penchant for foodie blogs as well.

What all innovations in the tech industry have influenced you lately? What is the extreme of technology that you can figure put in your wildest thoughts?
Multi-touch and high speed (3G+) wireless access both have me pretty excited right now. Multi-touch is really the biggest innovation we’ve had in UI since the mouse. As for high-speed tech with areas like the 900Mhz spectrum, how can a constant connection to the world’s knowledge not be exciting? But that’s just a small chunk of it

I’m fascinated by what we’re doing with low-power tech, like LEDs, which keep getting brighter every year. There are plenty of people working on paintable displays. Think about it – you paint your living room and anything can be the TV. And e-ink this list is getting long. I guess that’s why I write about gadgets.

As for the ultimate technology, who isn’t fascinated by the potential of nanobots repairing their bodies, or beaming images straight to the optic nerves in their brains?

Besides content generation, networking comes as a part and parcel of a blogging. What is Gizmodo or Mark doing at that front to maintain the frequent visits of its savvy readers?

We have one staffer who’s in charge of our feature content, Wilson Rothman. He does amazing networking for our site, keeping us in the loop with major companies and their newest products. That means he sends emails, makes phone calls and takes a lot of meetings to check out new gear “ even if he can’t write about it, etc.

I find it’s good to send an email a day beyond my normal social network. Sometimes I email a company’s PR team for info on a product, and sometimes I just email another writer as a hat tip to their work. Wow, I just made myself sound so organized. I’m really not. I just try to follow up with people on the things that interest me. It makes networking a whole lot more tangible and reasonable.

Japan seems to breed robots in huge numbers. Can you imagine a day when robots are efficient enough to substitute humans for all major tasks? Would you depute one to blog for you?
I think it’s pretty undeniable that robots will one day help us with just about everything we can imagine (before overthrowing us, eating our brains, etc). But when Asimo fell, it really put things in perspective for me “ seriously. Here’s the world’s most fawned-upon robot and it falls down staged stairs during a simple demonstration. That’s not to say Honda had failed with the technology; it just showed how freaking hard that bipedal robots are to make.
Sure, robots will be able to blog one day. And as long as I have a robot that buys my food and pays my rent, that’s just fine with me.

How was your experience while writing This Day in Gaming at Kotaku doing Frankenreviews on Gizmodo?
This Day in Gaming (TDIG) was even more challenging than I had imagined. Since it was a daily retrospective on video games (a sort of if today is your birthday horoscope with factual content), it took weeks of nonstop work to develop my game history database (incomplete as it may have been) and lots of additional source checking each day on top of that. That said, TDIG did seem to amass a loyal following. And it did so with the type of original, daily content that I bet could drive growth in a smaller blog.

Frankenreviews started on Gizmodo where we experimented with various new takes on the standard review roundup. We tried all sorts of things to combine these voices into one big review. I was really proud of the work from a technical standpoint, but it was a complicated writing exercise that never really gelled for me or the readers. On Kotaku, we started with a more simplistic list of quotes that worked well from the start. I learned so much about review style after closely reading so many reviews that I eventually wrote an editorial on the topic, Video Game Reviews Are Broken, Please Fix. It was generally well received, and it was a nice way to gauge what I had learned by writing so many Frankenreviews. Anyone can paste a bunch of quotes in succession. Hopefully by putting as much thought and care into this as possible, I’ve been able to construct review roundups better than the average monkey with a typewriter.

Kotaku is a place for Gamers while Gizmodo focuses upon gadgets and technology. What made you switch from Kotaku to Gizmodo?
I’d have loved to continue writing for both blogs indefinitely, but the transition was a depressingly logistical one. Both Giz and Kotaku demand a lot of trade show attendance. If you figure that each site demands 5 trips a year (which might be an underestimate) that means I’m on the road at some point every month and away from one of the two sites. This meant that I was able to double-dip a plane ticket to Germany for back-to-back video game and tech conferences, but it also meant that someone inevitably was covering for me somewhere.

Provide us with your five favorite posts you have written to date.
How my wife castrated my DVD collection
Video Game Reviews Are Broken, Please Fix
Halo3, The Ride, Hands-on
How To Launch an Apple Product in 5 Easy Steps?
Excuse Box: No Reason To Tell The Truth

Introduce us to your three gadgetry possessions that you can’t afford to miss while stepping out.
iPod nano, MacBooke Pro, Samsung A900

Which cell phone do you have right now and what do you love/hate about it?
I have a Samsung A900. It was the phone that Sprint acquired to counter the RAZR (so yeah, I’m about up with my current contract). I love that it’s durable and thin. I hate that it’s not a smartphone and is generally bad at text messaging/email/staying on/etc.

What upcoming gadget you want to possess and are impatient about?
A 3G iPhone would make me very happy as long as it doesn’t get any thicker. I really like to have a pocketable phone. (Note: I attended WWDC in the middle of this interview and it’s here now!)

You’re stranded on a desert island: What gadget do you bring?
A satellite telephone, so I can get the hell off after a few months of relaxation.

How would you like to be known as:
Gadget Guru:
Blogger:
Technophile:
Product Reviewer:
Entrepreneur
Others

Umm entertaining and knowledgeable.

Quick bites:
Biggest blogging mistake you did: It’s all repressed at the end of a day.
If asked to post only on one blog (not Gizmodo or Kotaku), which one would that be? Boing Boing, if they’d have me
If asked to post only on one blog (not Gizmodo or Kotaku), which one would that be? Boing Boing, if they’d have me
Advice you would have given yourself five years ago? It never hurts to ask.
If not a blogger, then A failing screenwriter or poor short story author.
Life without Internet: Not so bad, just inconvenient.
Count of professions you have been into: 3
First gadget you kept your fingers upon: Nintendo Entertainment System
One thing you hate about Gizmodo: Sometimes it feels like Menudo.

Tell us some weird things about you that most of the people don’t know.
Hmm, I met my wife in high school. I guess that’s kind of weird, but it’s always felt pretty normal to me.

If asked for giving three tips to a greenhorn blogger, what would that be?
1. Keep writing (because that’s what makes you better at writing).
2. Writing without first person fallbacks will give you more authority.
3. Read something that’s not from a blog/online at lease once a day.

Is it good to have an individual identity of a blog or run it as a part of a blogging network?

I’ve actually never started a blog “ even a personal one. Gizmodo obviously has a lot of sister sites through Gawker, and it works for us. Aside from convenient cross-site promotion of big events, our head editors have other head editors to consult as needed.
Then again, affiliation with other sites that aren’t very good could hurt a perfectly good site’s reputation. Luckily for Giz, our sister sites set a high standard.

Do you think blogs are or can be as popular as NYTimes, Time, NewsWeek are?
Blogs are inherently on niche topics and this question weighs them against general news publications “ that’s a bit tough to compare by nature. I will say that the fact that all three of those publications have blogs is a testament to the format.

Imagine a day when you are forced to stay away from blogging and gadgets. How would you cope with it?
I did that for a week in the Virgin Islands a few months back. And I didn’t miss it. Then again, I got to sit on the beach all day where nothing was expected of me. To be productive in the current labor force, you need things like Blackberries just to keep up. And the more you like your gear, the more pleasant a day at work will be.

Where do you see the Blogosphere in the future?
Written by robots.

Give us your views on EliteChoice.
I like anyone who likes me.

Whom would you recommend as my next EliteBlogger and Why?
Grab Luke Plunkett or Brian Ashcraft from Kotaku. They work internationally and on a graveyard shift but still manage to draw an audience.

You can ask me one question.
One question in trade for like 50?? I’m not so sure that’s a fair deal!
Zola: But I believe everything is fair in love, war and blogging. Kidding! Mark, I really do respect the time you have devoted in penning down the interesting responses.

And here i personally thank Mark for managing and meeting deadline besides being occupied with WWDC. Mark, we here at EliteChoice love you and your work!

You may have expected my this EliteBlogger to be a die-hard technophile, an efficient gadget reviewer or a geek running a gadget blog but Gina Hughes, the chief editor and founder of Techie Diva falls beyond that by feeding her readers with a fresh dose of stylish gadgets that even a dull geek would respect. So full of life, Gina has the charisma to keep readers stay tune with her by unveiling fun gadgets, iPods, cell phones together with practical services and killer applications. Her presence here onto the EliteBlogger series purely goes to her diverse nature of personality, which is not only techie, or geeky, or Diva, but a complete TechieDiva.

Little were we aware that ‘Atari’ was her first and fortunate gadget and had Gina not being a blogger, you would have seen her in the image of a programmer. Gina, what made you pick Techie Diva amulet for your blog? Well, the term was coined while I was ogling at diamond encrusted cell phones on the Web, and thought ‘what a perfect way to taunt the non-believers.

Roll over to get a feel of how this 30 plus diva maintains equilibrium between her identity as a technology blogger that comes with a sweet and sour flavor of diva’s aspirations.

Gina, introduce yourself to my readers and take us to your daily flow of day.
Hiya Elite Choice readers. My name is Gina Hughes, and I’m the founder of the fabulous Techie Diva technology blog. I launched Techie Diva back in 2005 hoping to entertain readers interested in all things geeky, and have been extremely successful along the way. Besides overlooking all daily operations at Techie Diva, I also write for Yahoo! Tech on a daily basis, so check it out if you haven’t.

My day usually begins by reading lots of blogs through RSS feeds, selecting stories I think would interest my audience, then writing about them. Like most of you, I also have to sort through tons of Spam to get to my email, and take frequent breaks, because you know, it’s good for your back. All in all, I love what I do, and thank the heavens for blessing me with such a fab job!

Are you a born Techie Diva or you developed this personality over the course of time?
It’s been developed, I guess. Actually, I’ve always been more artistically inclined so I’ve always enjoyed writing, drawing, design, photography, film, and anything else that gets my creative juices flowing. Technology just wasn’t as cool when I was growing up (you know, in the 80s). Had it been, I probably would’ve been a bigger nerd.

Your Techie Diva amulet is truly an oxymoron. What made you pick this?
I hate to hear people (women included) say that technology is a male thing, which as you know is a completely gross misconception. Techie and Diva are two words that are on complete opposite sides of the spectrum–kind of the way women and technology still appears to be to some–so joining those words was my way of rebelling against the mindset that women can’t be interested or successful in technology. The name came to me while I was ogling at diamond encrusted cell phones on the Web, and thought ‘what a perfect way to taunt the non-believers.’

Besides blogging on Techie Diva, you are also contributing to Tech Yahoo as a tech advisor. What difference do you feel in writing for a personal blog and on a corporate portal?
It’s a very different experience for obvious reasons. Yahoo! Tech reaches millions of Yahoo! readers’ that come from all walks of life so I try to keep in mind that not everyone who visits the site is a tech enthusiast. As a result, I find myself writing more in depth articles on Yahoo! And try to be more informative for the average reader, which always tends to generate excellent feedback in return. Writing longer articles is not always possible when you have a quota to meet, but we all do our best because we know those are the type of articles people want to read.

Besides gadgets and other electronic products, Japan keeps on delivering variety of robots. Can you picture a day when robots would behave no less than a man and own one to blog as your substitute?
Yes, I’m praying for that day so I can go on longer vacations.

Amidst pool of gadget blogs, what do you count as Techie Diva’s USP that becomes a reason for readers to dig in here?
Well, I can tell you there’s no sexist humor anywhere on our site. It really irritates us, and it serves no purpose other than offend the reader. We try to be respectful and neutral about what we write, and take the time to sift through all the non-sense to bring readers only the most drool-worthy gear/news out there. In the future, do look out for feature stories you won’t find anywhere else, including video interviews and more.

What is your take on the growing nature of concept-based products? Considering the advancement in technology, don’t you think these products would be of no relevance by the time they become functional, if ever?
Probably. Most concept designs are not plausible, but a lucky few make it and go on to be very successful after a few iterations. I love concept designs because they inspire us to think outside the box and create products that change everything like the iPhone.

Bloggers believe besides original content generation, networking comes, as a part and parcel of a deal that cannot be ignored. What is Techie Diva or Gina doing or has done at that front to invite more readers?
Networking is vital for success in the blogosphere, so we try to connect with bloggers as much as we can. We’re also dedicated to interacting more with our readers via whatever means possible including social networks, comments, email, or even social events. That said, satisfying the reader with unique and relevant content is key because we believe word of mouth is a very powerful instrument.

What should be the ratio of style specks to tech features that manufacturers should consider while developing any gadget?
20/80. I want my gear to look and work like it’s from the future. No pink, crystals, or crazy patterns please. Just give me an elegant piece of tech that can do it all.

Can my readers know: Which are those three gadgets (one fashionable) that a Techie Diva like you doesn’t skip to carry while stepping out?
Jawbone, iPhone, GPS

Pen down your daily online-reads.
Yahoo! News
New York Times
Reuters
Yahoo! Tech
Gizmodo
Engadget

If asked for giving three tips to a greenhorn blogger, what would that be?
Find something better to do. Just kidding.
I’d say plan your day, find sources you can trust, and network as much as you can.

Is it good to have an individual identity of a blog or run it as a part of a blogging network?
Everyone will have a different opinion, but I like to keep things simple so I prefer to keep my individual identity. Blogging networks are very powerful and lucrative, don’t get me wrong, but if you’re going to join a network make sure it’s your own.

How would you like to be known as:
Technophile
Gadget Journalist
Gadget Reviewer
Blogger
TechieDiva

Techie Diva, of course

Whom would you count as the top-five male and female geeks each?
Gosh, there are so many to narrow down to five, but my favorites amonst male category are :
Bill Gates, Little does he needs introduction but facts reveal he is the world’s third richest man (as of 2008) and chairman of Microsoft, the software company he founded with Paul Allen.

Steve Jobs, the co-founder, chairman and CEO of Apple Inc.

Jerry Yang, an American entrepreneur and the co-founder, CEO and chief Yahoo! of Yahoo! Inc.


Mark Elliot Zuckerberg, an American entrepreneur and a founder of the online social networking website Facebook together with his fellow Harvard student and is named him as “the world’s youngest self-made billionaire” with a theoretical net worth of US $1.5 billion

The Google Guys: Larry Page and Sergey Brin are the brains behind Google, the world’s most popular Internet search engine.

In the women category:
Mary Lou Jepsen was the founding chief technology officer of One Laptop Per Child (OLPC).

Mitchell Baker (aka Winifred Mitchell Baker), chairman of the Mozilla Foundation and chairman and former CEO of the Mozilla Corporation.

Meg Whitman (aka Margaret C. “Meg” Whitman) was president and chief executive oifficer of eBay from March 1998 to March 2008.

Caterina Fake running her blog Caterina

Xeni Jardin is a tech culture journalist, co-editor of the award winning blog BoingBoing, and co-host of the daily internet video program BoingBoingTV.

Where do you see your blog after five years from now?
Hopefully still going growing, but I’d love to really integrate more video, social network, and more feature stories.

Quick bites:
Hours you invest digging net: Too many to count
Biggest blogging mistake you did: Not starting one earlier
One hidden truth: I’m not that into Sci-Fi movies
If asked to post only on one blog (not Techie Diva), which one would that be? Probably one that’s not tech related like TMZ.
Advice you would have given yourself five years ago? Travel more
If not a blogger then.a programmer
Life without Internet: Unbearable
First gadget you kept your fingers upon: Atari

Whom would you recommend as my next EliteBlogger and Why?
I would have to recommend another geek girl you may know as Cali Lewis (aka Luria Petrucci) from Geekbrief.tv. She’s sassy, sweet, smart, and inspiring all the same time.

Give us your views on EliteChoice.
I love luxury blogs, and Elite Choice is a great way to discover fantastic items.

Your turn! I am ready to answer a question for you.
Will you be buying the new iPhone 3G? Why or Why not?
Yes because it is an affordable luxury.

And at last, i won’t thank my dear friend Gina but would surely wish her luck to keep doing great work so that it gives us enough meat for carrying such interviews. Pleasure having you here Gina.