The 10th best read Technically Philly story of the year focused on broadband adoption in Philadelphia.

What is the end of December if not full of inevitable year in reviews?

We at Technically Philly are always interested in seeing what were the 10 best read stories of the year, so we collected the 2011 batch.

10. Where will broadband competition take Philadelphia?

See the rest of the top 10 below.

9. myYearbook sold for $100 million

8. Play Eternal becomes Philly’s first high-budget video game studio

7. Naked Philly outed as OCF Realty, to launch real estate tool

6. Apps for SEPTA hackathon features new data sources and mass transit projects [VIDEO]

5. Adel Ebeid: Meet the first ever Chief Innovation Officer of the City of Philadelphia [and our follow up Q&A]

4. This is Not a Cheesesteak: new Tumblr follows the worst cheesesteak variations

3. Philadelphia Media Network Android tablet Arnova 10 G2 hands-on [VIDEO]

2. Google’s Philadelphia office hideout

1. TransitView: SEPTA unveils real-time bus and trolley app, also SMS and smartphone schedules

EVEN in Philadelphia, with its 40,000 vacant properties and a quarter of its population living below the poverty line, the Kensington neighborhood still shocks. On a frigid afternoon, a prostitute lingers in the shadow of the elevated train tracks, waiting restlessly for customers. Husks of long-closed factories stand amid thigh-high winter wheat. Streams of garbage flow down the streets, as if both the people and the city government had agreed to forsake the effort of propriety.

We’ve pulled together a list of our 11 most trafficked stories from 2010.

You can notice things like:

• Oh, yes, people like lists. You know, in case you didn’t already know that.
• Original reporting really drives traffic: Five of these 11 posts involved actual reporting, two were lists and one was the winner of a contest we created and just one was mostly aggregation, by way of posting a video someone else created. Doesn’t that bode well? We think so.

11. Science Leadership Academy: A new model for schools — Feb. 9

Below find our 10 most trafficked posts in 2010.

10. Smart home technology increases automation while lowering energy consumption — May 4

9. 10 Twitter users every Philadelphian should follow — July 27

8. Ten most followed Philadelphia Twitter users — March 30

7. Comcast COO makes most expensive Philly rowhome purchase ever — Aug. 11

6. 10 ugliest websites in Philadelphia — voter’s choice awards — Dec. 7

5. myDunkTank.com makes a cowboy out of Blake Jennelle — July 23

4.CEO: Inquirer to host startup incubator next year — Nov. 3

3. Review: Sprint 4G WiMAX wireless service in Philadelphia — May 5

2. 10 coolest (mostly interactive) online maps of Philadelphia — Sept. 28

1. Our City of Philadelphia logo design contest winner: Sara DeMarco — Jan 5.

Any favorites of these stories?

The creative economies of Philadelphia are still small but jobs in those sectors held relatively stable during the build up to the Great Recession, according to a William Penn Foundation-funded report released last week. The creative economy included jobs like graphic designers and animators and spanned from 2006 to 2008.

Commissioned by the Mayor’s Office of the Arts, Culture and Creative Economy and its chief Gary Steuer, the Nutter administration quickly trumpeted the research as showing a vibrant creative community.

The report showed a region that spent money on the creative arts above the national average but was still behind in those sector jobs. More up to date numbers, which will reflect more of the pains from the current recession, are due out in the spring.

From Inquirer columnist Mike Armstrong’s take:

So, over the past couple weeks, we sought your opinion for the ugliest websites in Philadelphia.

South-Philly.com

Our nominator says: part of an empire of bad templates from a quick hit web design firm in town, as noted by tweeted:

As submitted privately.

WMD Hotsauce

Our nominator told us: “Actually had a convo w owner, “You don’t like my logo? I designed it myself!”" Visit here

As tweeted:

Green Jobs Philly

Go ahead, pick a call to action. Visit here.

As suggested by tweeted:

Rembrandt’s restaurant

It should be noted that Rembrandt’s suggests that it had the first website of any restaurant in Philadelphia, so they’re perhaps maintaining that shtick. Visit here.

As suggested by tweeted:

Fishtown.us

Competing palate of pastel colors with two top and at least one left-hand side navigation bars. Visit here.

Submitted privately.

Mentortech Ventures

A serious venture capital firm shown off by what looks like a phishing site. Visit here.

As submitted privately.

Ted Silary

High school sports, Yahoo! search and Google ads. Visit here.

As submitted by tweeted:

Eye Candy Vision

As tweeted:

As submitted by tweeted:

NEPhillyOnline.com

Navigation. Everywhere. Visit here.

As submitted privately. [Full Disclosure: This author contributes to NEast Philly, another news site for Northeast Philadelphia.]

Friends of Pennypack Park

Yes, that’s a ticker message and a menorah and pixelated branding and a Myspace-stylized textured background, and it doesn’t have its own domain at all. Visit here.

The most suggestions we received? –More than two dozen calls for Philly.com but that seemed more like punchline than a fair assessment, even if we’re still competing with pop-up video. Other bigger name suggestions came for tweeted:

So, more importantly, what other awful, ugly Philadelphia websites have we missed? And what is the worst that we did find?

This is a semi-regular department we may or may not call Top Ten Tuesdays. There’s no judging in brainstorming. See others here.

This 1838 map of Philadelphia from the Historical Society of Pennsylvania didn't make our list of the 10 best maps of Philadelphia.

We love maps.

For hundreds of years, they have helped us better understand our world. That understanding has grown wildly with time and technology, but, still, maps help.

In a place as inwardly focused, we have plenty of maps in Philadelphia. You also may know that we have something of a technology community here.

So there are resources like the Pennsylvania Spatial Data Access, or PASDA, which offers just a wild glut of GIS shape files for mapping geeks. We’ve seen cool mapping tools that are of broader scope though Philly got some love: from the addition of bicycle directions to Philadelphia Google Maps to the Google Building Maker to mapping the homes of those in the U.S. armed services who died in the Mideast this decade and many more.

But we wanted to highlight the coolest maps made for Philadelphia of Philadelphia.

Taking into account our own map obsessions, suggestions and tweeted:

MAPPING ABANDONMENT

Today, city development news site PlanPhilly released this Flash-map tracking the estimated 40,000 abandoned properties in Philadelphia.

It’s part of a major research project funded in part, like PlanPhilly itself, by the William Penn Foundation, that features heavy reporting from former Inquirer City Hall reporter Patrick Kerkstra. Yesterday’s feature includes an even more detailed, though more geographically targeted data-tracking map, seen here.

[Full Disclosure: TP co-founder Brian James Kirk is the Plan Philly web editor and was involved in the mapping development of this project.]

Find it here.

COMMONSPACE

In August, Technically Philly told you about CommonSpace, the web application designed to help uncover new businesses within walking distance of a location, and the excitement hasn’t worn off.

CommonSpace bumps off another similar project from Callowhill-based GIS software company Azavea: the cool, walkability map tool largely built by developer Aaron Ogle called Walkshed, which we’ve also covered.

Find it here.

PHILAPLACE

The dynamic and interactive oral history platform PhilaPlace from has recently unveiled new features and continues to seek more stories.

Find it here.

PHILLY HISTORY

The online home of two million archived photos from an array of city agencies and organizations is one of our greatest assets.

Its mapping feature could use a tune up, but it still offers a location-based search of photos that extend more than a century in age.

Find it here.

PHILADELPHIA SAFETY MAP

An entirely subjective map started by PhillySpeaks user dorydorado, this Google Maps overlay suggests what neighborhoods are safe, what are OK in the day and what should be avoided. …Let the condemnation and controversy continue.

Find it here.

H/T PhiladelphiaSpeaks

REDLINING IN PHILADELPHIA

The previous map brought about conversations on whether labeling some neighborhoods as ones that should be avoided was its own form of ‘redlining,’ the early 20th century practice of banks, insurance companies and other institutions mitigating perceived risk by increasing costs or avoiding service altogether in poorer neighborhoods with greater risk of crime.

Why not check out one of those very redlining maps, like this one from 1936 that is a clear enough example that it’s the image on the very Wikipedia page of redlining.

See it here.

1847 PHILADELPHIA

So, we’re not sure if this is, like, well known, but Philadelphia has something of a reputation for its American history.

It figures, then, that historians, academics, cartographers and hobbyists have more historical maps than we can keep track of. Scour the databases and websites of the Library of Congress, Temple (like MPIP) or Penn, historical societies and the like, and you will find plenty.

It’s hard to choose one to represent this world of maps, but here’s one, a beautifully preserved 1847 map of Philadelphia and its 10 mile environs — which includes most of today’s city because the map predates the 1854 county and city consolidation. Scan and zoom, scan and zoom.

You can find it here, as part of the David Rumsey Map Collection, where reproductions are sold.

PHILADELPHIA GEOHISTORY MAP OVERLAY

As suggested in the previous section, there are too many cool historical maps to see them all, so sometimes it’s best to get a bunch together and see how they compare.

Like how the Greater Philadelphia GeoHistory Network allows you to see more than a dozen maps in action.

Play with it here.

Also check out their specific maps, like this 1930 aerial survey of the city. The Free Library also has a very cool online map overlay collection of its own.

NBASE NEIGHBORHOOD MAP

The Cartographic Modeling Lab at Penn Design has a ton of interesting maps, none of which might be as controversial as one project breaking down the neighborhoods of Philadelphia.

Just like you won’t, Technically Philly can’t say we agree with all of the distinctions but, then, would it be fun if we did?

Find it here.

MAPPING DUBOIS

At the end of the 19th century, legendary historian and sociologist W.E.B. DuBois famously led a research project on behalf of the University of Pennsylvania to create a deep census of the 7th ward, then one of the densest collections of black Philadelphians of varying education and social levels.

More than 100 years later, Mapping DuBois was launched, bringing his research and 1900 U.S. census data to the friendly confines of web maps.

Find it here.

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This is a semi-regular department we may or may not call Top Ten Tuesdays. There’s no judging in brainstorming. See others here.

DEFINITE READS

• How Philadelphia’s Navy Yard could lead the way in energy efficiency [Smart Planet] — A Q&A with Hank Foley, the Penn State dean who will help lead the $129 project in South Philadelphia.
• Economists reveal Philadelphia’s economic identity as ‘thinking’ region [PhillyInc, Inquirer] — A report puts Philadelphia in the ‘thinking’ category, one of 12, along with cities like New York City, San Diego and Portland, Maine, as opposed to, say, the ‘innovating’ cities of Boston and Raleigh, N.C.

Below, NPR takes on Harrisburg university’s social media experiment, four in region make Forbes’ richest list and more.

MIGHT BE OF INTEREST

• Pa. University Bans Facebook, Twitter For A Week [NPR All Things Considered] — Harrisburg University of Science and Technology school gives it a try.
• Science of NFL Football: #3 Vectors [Science Cheerleader] — The site from a former Sixers cheerleader and Penn alumnae dives into the deep science of football, one subject at a time. Fascinating.
• visitPA and Foursquare In Numbers [Geekadelphia] — We reported on the state tourism agency using the social platform here.
• Philly Organizations in the Running for a Free iPhone Application [Geekadelphia]
• In this digital age, a cycle begins when businesses relocate [PhillyInc, Inquirer] — Columnist Mike Armstrong is skeptical of the announcement of an Illinois company coming to the region with 50 jobs.

GIVE A GLANCE

• Center City is the center of Philadelphia’s work world [PhillyInc, Inquirer] — 216,000 private sector jobs, fewer than the 250,000 sometimes estimated, but, of course, the dominant power of the region.
• Four from Phila. area make Forbes’ richest list [Philadelphia Business Journal] — The founder of Urban Outfitters, Richard Hayne, was the only one of the four who lives in Philadelphia proper.
• Win Passes to an Advance Screening of the Social Network! [Geekadelphia] — See a screening of the Facebook movieThurs., Sept. 30 at the Ritz. Must comment TODAY.
• Chamber Names the Best of the Region’s Small Businesses [Chamber of Commerce blog] — Including Revzilla, whom we have covered.

Every Friday morning, we make sure you didn t miss anything with Friday Tech Links.

Some people count how many friends they have, and some people count the value of their friendships. On social media — and the web generally — we have the same kind of experience.

We can count just about everything online, and so it should surprise no one that as social media has boomed, so too have the comparisons between Facebook friend counts and Twitter followers.

But there’s so often a nuance that raw numbers can’t show.

It’s easy enough to track who are the most followed Twitter users in Philadelphia, but everyone is trying to figure out how those figures measure in influence — or ‘resonance.’ Suppose we want to see who are the biggest Philadelphia voices in the Twitter conversation — not spam accounts with big follower numbers, but those people who you should be following, whose opinions matter and are being heard.

Simply, what Philadelphia Twitter users matter most?

Find the rest on the Philly Post of Philadelphia magazine.

Traffic estimates from Compete.com for Philly.com, NBCPhiladelphia.com and CBS3.com, likely three of the most trafficked websites in Philadelphia. Click to enlarge.

July marks the middle of the calendar year, quarterly reports and time to evaluate progress on yearly goals.

At the beginning of 2010, we looked at 10 competitors and their relative web traffic. With six months done, we wanted to make the first attempt at listing the most trafficked websites in Philadelphia, using monthly unique visitors as the metric of choice.

To make the comparison, we’ve used public traffic website Compete, but, by way of disclosure, we’ll always offer that any public web metrics are notoriously controversial. It’s also important to note that there is often a drag in such traffic estimates being pulled, so the surest figures are from the end of May.

So, consider this a comparative start and nothing more.

1. *PHILLY.COM | PHILADELPHIA NEWSPAPERS | 1.9M

The region’s dominant web force has long been Philly.com with 1.9 million monthly unique visitors. See the stats here.

2. NBCPHILADELPHIA.COM | NBC 10 | 712k

Last year, the NBC affiliate competed with Philly.com, now they’re closest with 712k monthly unique visitors. See the stats here.

3. Phillies.MLB.com | PHILLIES | 702k

Interestingly, the website of the Pittsburgh Pirates gets more traffic. See the stats here.

4. CBS3.COM | CBS 3 | 500k

See the stats here.

5. Flyers.NHL.com| Flyers | 415k

Traffic for both the Flyers and their Stanley Cup competitors, the Blackhawks, both saw dramatic increases. See the stats here.

6. PhiladelphiaEagles.com | Eagles | 287k

It’s offseason, so it’s tough to pin the Eagles down at 287k, but it’s the game we play. Give them an annual average of more than 400k monthly.

7. SEPTA.org | SEPTA | 280k

SEPTA’s traffic has ranged as high as 380k, but settles on average somewhere above 300k, slowing down in the summer despite that redesign. See the stats here.

8. MyFoxPhilly.com | FOX 29| 245k

Fox just may be the least trafficked TV website in the region**. See the stats here.

9. Phila.gov| City of Philadelphia | 219k

The city’s website, which includes subdomains for the library and PGW, is at a year-long traffic low, but remains among the region’s most visited — despite that logo fiasco. See the stats here.

10. CSNPhilly.com| Comcast Sports Net | 131k

Comcast Sports Net has made a dramatic charge up the traffic data, perhaps with the help of purchasing the 700 Level and Beerleaguer recently. See the stats here.

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The remaining Philadelphia websites regularly exceeding the 100k unique visitors mark are VisitPhilly.com (122k), PECO.com (116k), Citypaper.net (107k) and WHYY.org (102k).

*Comcast.net and Comcast.com are far and away the most trafficked websites maintained in Philadelphia but because the overwhelming majority of their traffic isn’t from the region, they were not included.

**6ABC is part of the ABC Local portion of the Go Network and, as such, its individual traffic cannot be publicly verified using Compete.com.

This is a semi-regular department we may or may not call Top Ten Tuesdays. There’s no judging in brainstorming. See others here.

Web design firms — from the boutique to the satellite offices — abound in Philadelphia.

They’re into branding and functionality and crafting sleek, sexy, modern websites for the city’s businesses, nonprofits and groups. So, what if a 13-year-old in 1996 had designed their own sites?

We find out by using the meme-worthy Geocities-izer that has made its way around the interwebs lately.

Be sure to send screenshots of your Web design firm’s site after its gets Geocities-ized to info [at ] technicallyphilly.com.

HAPPY COG

See the faux 1996 Geocities site  of this Center City firm here.

O3 WORLD

See the faux 1996 Geocities site  of this Northern Liberties firm here.

P’UNK AVENUE

See the faux 1996 Geocities site  of this East Passyunk firm here.

WELL FED

See the faux 1996 Geocities site  of this Fishtown firm here.

Send us screenshots of other Philly design shops getting the Geocities treatment, by e-mailing us at info [at] technicallyphilly.com.