Two Minnesota-connected websites are among Time magazine’s 50 best websites of 2008. Let’s hear it for the currently hot Gas Buddy and the ubiquitous TinyURL.

Gas Buddy has been getting hammered because of everyone’s need these days to find the cheapest gas prices. Volunteers monitor gas prices in their area and then post the real-time data on Gas Buddy — also known as Twin Cities Gas Prices locally.  Even with the news-driven reason for visiting Gas Buddy, the site’s cofounder, Jason Toews of Brooklyn Park, says the Time accolade has created a bump in traffic.

“We’re very excited to be recognized by Time magazine as one of the top websites,” Toews said.  “Most of the credit should go to the users of the website, since they are the ones that make GasBuddy.com a valuable resource.”

TinyURL was created by Kevin Gilbertson of Blaine. The site takes long URLs and gives them a shorter alias link for easier reposting in email, blogs and the printed page. The Star Tribune has its own shortcut URL service based on Gilby’s concept. The funny thing is that if you visit his personal website, it doesn’t even mention TinyURL, one of the Net’s great innovations. He’s mostly concerned with his passion for unicycling.

“We’re not quite sure how TinyURL works its magic, but why question a good thing?” Time said. ”We can’t live without this ultra-handy tool; you’ll get hooked too.”

This entry was posted on Friday, June 20th, 2008 at 9:21 am and is filed under Internet. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.