Twitter Top 100 for Software Developers

1 February 2009

Posted in Top Lists

Last Friday I sent an email to people in our organization ‘officially’ endorsing the use of Twitter as a way to keep in touch with each other, and as a way to connect with whatever’s happening around the world. And now, two days later, upper management still hasn’t fired me over it. Which is nice.

However, one question our software developers might ask me is: “OK, I’m using this Twitter stuff, but which people should I follow?” Well, that question is easily answered…

Some time ago I published a Top 50 Twitterers to Follow for Developers. That list contained a number of famous people in the software development business, but it was only based on their number of followers. This time I decided to calculate the results using the rank given by Twitter Grader. It is based on number of followers, updates, profile completeness, and several other mysterious criteria.

And I know you will wonder… how did I decide who to put on this list?

That’s easy. I restricted myself to the people I’m following myself. There are probably plenty of heroes and celebrities out there that I haven’t found yet. (But if they make themselves know to me, I will be sure to include them in the next edition.) Oh, and I also discarded everyone who was not clearly and directly involved in software development, in some way or another. (If you think I haven’t treated you fairly in this, you know where to find me…)

These are the results. I hope you like them…

Note: the Twitter statistics are always changing. The rank column reflects the numbers as I found them on Saturday 31th of January.

#	name	full name	rank
1	codinghorror	Jeff Atwood	34
2	shanselman	Scott Hanselman	298
3	al3x	Alex Payne	307
4	wilshipley	Wil Shipley	307
5	elijahmanor	Elijah Manor	355
6	TS_Elliott	T.S. Elliott	460
7	rands	Michael Lopp	482
8	KathySierra	Kathy Sierra	694
9	lazycoder	Scott Koon	767
10	jeresig	John Resig	773
11	bokardo	Joshua Porter	1139
12	jmspool	Jared Spool	1160
13	Carnage4Life	Dare Obasanjo	1200
14	simplebits	Dan Cederholm	1229
15	jasonfried	Jason Fried	1324
16	adactio	Jeremy Keith	1396
17	jongalloway	Jon Galloway	1396
18	robconery	Rob Conery	1520
19	haacked	Phil Haack	1528
20	crazeegeekchick	Dana Coffey	1775
21	judell	Jon Udell	1775
22	migueldeicaza	Miguel de Icaza	1893
23	cspag	Chris Spagnuolo	1893
24	dalmaer	Dion Almaer	2196
25	unclebobmartin	Robert C. Martin	2205
26	twleung	Ted Leung	2302
27	bellware	Scott Bellware	2302
28	meyerweb	Eric A. Meyer	2433
29	rael	Rael Dornfest	2433
30	john_lam	John Lam	2552
31	stevenf	Steven Frank	2653
32	mfeathers	Michael Feathers	2908
33	d2h	David Heinemeier Hansson	3024
34	noradio	Marcel Molina	3039
35	jkottke	Jason Kottke	3613
36	jimweirich	Jim Weirich	3625
37	stevenharman	Steven Harman	3687
38	WardCunningham	Ward Cunningham	4054
39	objo	Joe O’Brien	4233
40	kevindente	Kevin Dente	4246
41	laribee	David Laribee	4439
42	chadfowler	Chad Fowler	4897
43	yourdon	Ed Yourdon	5234
44	davidyack	David Yack	5776
45	spolsky	Joel Spolsky	5946
46	jasona	Jason Alexander	5962
47	ourfounder	Jim Benson	6093
48	nkohari	Nate Kohari	6108
49	pragdave	Dave Thomas	6702
50	tedneward	Ted Neward	6702
51	scottros	Scott Rosenberg	6848
52	jeffreypalermo	Jeffrey Palermo	7054
53	coreyhaines	Corey Haines	7273
54	mcottmeyer	Mike Cottmeyer	7452
55	SteveJobs	Steve Jobs	7680
56	joshholmes	Josh Holmes	7695
57	waku_waku	WakuWaku	8075
58	OdeToCode	Scott Allen	8431
59	qrush	Nick Quaranto	8450
60	jldavid	JL David	9216
61	pro2sell	Dirk Friedrich	9233
62	jblankenburg	Jeff Blankenburg	9422
63	averyj	James Avery	9450
64	renesilva	René Silva	9468
65	Ascendancy	Jake Rocheleau	9839
66	marick	Brian Marick	9907
67	QualityFrog	Ben Simo	10097
68	mraible	Matt Raible	10105
69	pmstudent	Josh Nankivel	10730
70	subdigital	Ben Scheirman	11323
71	askorkin	Alan Skorkin	11323
72	jeremya	Jeremy A.	11895
73	OmarShahine	Omar Shanine	12959
74	robinsgr	Greg Robinson	13068
75	scottcreynolds	Scott C Reynolds	13266
76	tanepiper	Tane Piper	14467
77	KentBeck	Kent Beck	14726
78	engtech	Engtech	14726
79	destraynor	Des Traynor	15574
80	visualrinse	Chad Udell	15609
81	mahmudur	Mahmudur Rahman	15783
82	ntalbott	Nathaniel Talbott	16123
83	RonJeffries	Ron Jeffries	17052
84	burke_eric	Eric Burke	17080
85	venkat_s	Venkat Subramaniam	17496
86	ChrisLove	Chris Love	18063
87	pcalcado	Phillip Calçado	18146
88	robdiana	Rob Diana	18192
89	mastermark	Mark Masterson	18715
90	paul_henman	Paul Henman	18870
91	neal4d	Neal Ford	19203
92	pmarcablog	Marc Andreessen	19218
93	danlev	Dan Leveille	19448
94	robertbasic	Robert Basic	19683
95	skrenta	Rick Skrenta	19910
96	secretGeek	Leon Bambrick	19923
97	pavlozahozhenko	Pavlo Zahozhenko	21017
98	puredanger	Alex Miller	21890
99	jurgenappelo	Jurgen Appelo	22447
100	martinfowler	Martin Fowler	23018