Trends. Bloggers. Commenters. Videos. XXLMAG.com takes a look back at the best—and worst—of everything online this year.


LOVE: ONLINE TRENDS

1. Bloggers Step in Front of the Camera
Between Bol appearing on the Parker Report and the Internets Celebrities covering your favorite hip-hop events, 2007 was the year that your favorite bloggers stepped into the spotlight. Who's hiding behind their computers now?

2. Photoshop Humor
Cam'ron's rhyme book. Tru-Life's hacked MySpace. Bastardizations of XXL covers. Hilarity ensued all year long as rappers and fans alike got their copies of Adobe Photoshop crackin' to get their point across.

3. Rappers Leaking Their Own Albums
Phonte, perhaps following Radiohead's lead, leaked Little Brother's third album Getback himself, thus taking back control.

HATE: ONLINE TRENDS

1. Label Leak Denial
Dear major record companies: your song/album/video has leaked to the internet earlier than you would have liked. Why are you pretending like it didn't happen? Stop wasting time trying to "stop" the leak by removing it from a few websites. Stop planning "exclusive online listenings" for a month from now. Your release date has just been moved up. Deal with it.

2. Trailers/Teasers for Music Videos
Unless you're spending Hammer "2 Legit 2 Quit"-type paper or making a real mini-movie, we don't need a 30 second clip hyping up your 3 minute montage.

3. Releasing Fight Videos on YouTube
Editing grainy footage of your man socking (what appears to be) Papoose in the ear is decidedly not gangsta. Some things should just stay in the streets.


LOVE: VIRAL VIDEOS

1. Cam'ron on Vacation
[View Here]
The summer didn’t turn out to be very hot, but Cam in his drawers has us laughing all year long. So did the pool.

2. E-N-J vs. NYCKZ Round 1 (Real Talk TV DVD)
[View Here]
Underground rapper NYCKZ got slapped by his salty battle opponent after uttering the now-famous line “Oh, you mad ’cause I’m stylin’ on you?” [EDITOR'S NOTE: We know this actually came out at the end of 2006, but no video was more talked about in the first half of ’07.]

3. Cam’ron, Alan Grunblatt & 50 Cent Spar On Hot 97 (NowWutTV)
[View Here]
In this impromptu phone argument, Cam gave 50 the title for his next album. Currrrrtisssss!

4. ’Wich Boy’s "Throw Some Cheese On It"
[View Here]
Before Peter Rosenberg got on Hot 97, we knew from this Rich Boy remake that he’d be stacking cheddar.

5. "Black Mexican/Black Ugly”
[View Here]
This parody of “Black Republicans” captured Wayne and Juelz’s cartoonish personalities perfectly. Ya diiiiiig?

HATE: VIRAL VIDEOS

1.DeHaven's "Jay-Z Exposed" series
[View Here]
We’re still waiting for Jay’s former hustlin’ homie to shock us with this desperate, drawn-out hate fest.

2. J-Hood dragging his D-Block chain down the street
[ED. NOTE: Hood removed all traces of this video from the internet, only to replace it with THIS explanation.]
Biting the hand that used to feed you when you’ve never even had a hit record: bad idea.

3. Kanye Screaming on MTV at the VMAs
[View Here]
We’d seen Kanye throw hissy fits before, but its so much more annoying when he thinks the cameras are off.

4. MC Karl Rove
[View Here]
This mockery of rap was the most embarrassing thing created by the Bush administration since those non-existent WMDs.

5. Diddy's banned "Unforgivable" commercial
[View Here]
Puff shouldn’t have even bothered preserving this anti-climactic, PG-13 sexy.


LOVE: XXLMAG.COM BLOG POSTS

1. YN's 24 Posts In 24 Hours
It Is What It Is, Dec. 22-23
Call Guinness, because YN was breakin' records on the weekend before Christmas. Our sleepless editor-in-chief spilled the beans on classic stories and gave some priceless advice to today's MCs.

2. “Bill O’Reilly Is Mad Doggie”
Ill Doctrine, Sept. 27
Jay Smooth cleverly flipped the Fox News host’s own words to prove how baseless his anti-Nas stance was.

3. “Posse on Trendwatch: Crank Dat Everything”
Posse On Blogway, July 29
Noz compiles over 20 variations on this year’s biggest dance craze—before Soulja Boy even broke nationwide.

HATE: XXLMAG.COM BLOG POSTS

1. "Snitching Will Get You Stitches"
Got The Block On Lock, April 27
A long-running argument (which included Noz naming Billy "Captain Save A Hip-Hop") almost came to blows when Billy threatened, "In the real world, you could get a smack for that." We're headed for self-destruction. Stop the violence!

2. “Are black Muslims with the terrorists?”
Bol’s Saturday Night Workout, May 24
The blogger we love to hate might have taken it too far on this one…

3. “Your daughters can suck it”
Bol’s Saturday Night Workout, Aug. 21
...and this one too. In fact, we ended up forcing Bol to remove this controversial post. "If I had known several of my posts would be taken down, I wouldn't have bothered," Bol remembers. "To think, I could have just as easily spent that time sleeping or eating barbecue or something. Fags."


LOVE: COMMENTERS

1. TPAR a.k.a. these posts are racist
The anti-Bol.

2. The Spaniard
Byron Crawford Says: "The anti-TPAR. It was great fun watching the two of them go at it earlier this year. Then I met him in person while I was out in the Chi pounding 312s and rocking out to the New Pornographers. He bought me my 17th and 18th beers of the evening. Talk about an enabler!"

3. The Underwriter
Billy X. Sunday Says: "He gets it (no homo, of course). Here's another writer who leaves thorough comments and he isn't afraid to challenge status quo mindsets (no Stat Quo)."

HATE: COMMENTERS

1. PURPLE HULK
This is what happens when you keep all that hate bottled up inside.

2. Hannah Smith
Byron Crawford Says: "Like my own personal attack dog. It would've almost been worth keeping Tara Henley around just so Hannah Smith could go off on her. I suppose there's still Elliott, on the rare occasions when he deems the Internets worthy of anything other than links to audio files." [ED. NOTE: Bol actually wanted to include Hannah Smith in the "Love" portion of the list. We vetoed that.]

3. DARK/LOL (tie)
Billy X. Sunday Says: "Dark and LOL are prah'lee part of the after school English as second language class that uses XXL mag dot com as their classroom. That isn't totally a bad thing either if they had the etiquette of people that value education. Discussions that include Dark/LOL amount to no more than pissing in the wind. All that ends up happening is your shoes will get wet up."

BONUS HATE: Everyone who said we were censoring their comments
We weren't. Patience is a virtue.


LOVE: CELEBRITY BLOGS

1. Just Blaze’s The Megatron Don
It's no surprise that this nerd-turned-superproducer has the best grip on the blog format out of any of his famous peers.

2. Stretch Armstrong's Konstant Kontact
His frequency leaves something to be desired, but when he actually blogs, this NYC DJ does it like only he can, dropping links to classic radio shows and unearthing rare jewels.

3. Prodigy's HNIC 2 Blog
He's new to the game, but P had a strong start by jotting down his pre-prison sentence thoughts.

HATE: CELEBRITY BLOGS

1. Mike Jones' YouTube Channel/Video Blog
If we wanted this much contact with you, we'd call. It's not like we forgot your number.

2. Saigon’s MySpace blog
Between hating on his label, quitting rap and then recanting his retirement a month later, this troubled NY rapper's blog was one big nervous breakdown.

3. Jermaine Dupri's Huffington Post Blog
We know you're trying to get your Quincy on, but we're pretty sure no one who reads your music business rants on this left-wing political site knows Jermaine Dupri from Jermaine Jackson.


LOVE: LOW-BUDGET MUSIC VIDEOS

1. Uncle Murda "Bullet Bullet"
[View Here]

2. Plies "100 Years"
[View Here]

3. Cool Kids "Black Mags"
[View Here]

4. Marco Polo f/ Master Ace “Nostalgia”
[View Here]

5. Prodigy “A,B,C's”
[View Here]

HATE: LOW-BUDGET MUSIC VIDEOS

1. Scott Storch f/ Nox “Built Like Dat”
[View Here]

2. Remy Ma "Shesus Khryst"
[View Here]

3. Dame Grease f/ NORE & Styles “Sour Diesel”
[View Here]

4. Swizz Beatz f/ Fabolous & Cassidy "Big Things Poppin'"
[View Here]

5. J-Hood “One Hit Wonder Man”
[View Here]

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