Ever since Digg raised to popularity, community-based voting/bookmarking sites pretty much spawn into every corner of Internet. After all, in the age of Web 2.0 user-generated/user-moderated content rules. There is no exception in the realm of bargain hunting and sharing. What was once dominated by forum communities, many Digg-like sites have also emerged over the last 18 months into the bargain sharing scene. Check ProBargainHunter’s list of social bargain hunting sites in US for more samples.

I must admit that OzBargain, my own site launched last November, is not the most original idea (which I believe everyone would have known that). There are in fact a few pre-build software that can get you bootstrapped with a working Digg-like site very quickly. With OzBargain, I went with Drupal + Vote Up Down module for the built-in flexibility of Drupal. However, for the best “out-of-box experience”, Pligg is probably the best open source software if you want a turn-key Digg-like site.

In fact I have just discovered two more Australian bargain sharing sites over the last couple of weeks. Both are less than 3 months old, and both are powered by Pligg — in fact little has changed from the default Pligg template.

Dealicious.com.au	TopBargains.com.au

Not really sure whether it is a good idea to link them because (1) they might be in “beta” like most other Web 2.0 start ups (2) oh they are actually my competitor. But what the heck.

Dealicious —

Dealicious [Delicious Deal], is a web 2.0 community where members can find, submit, share and vote for the latest hot deals, voucher, bargain, freebies, and all other hot deals which can be used in Australia.

TopBargains —

It’s a social bargain hunting network for Australia where everyone recommends and rates bargains.

Well done guys (if you don’t mind me cross-linking some of your hot deals)! I guess the more bargain sharing sites the better for the bargain hunters in Australia. Now we just need more bargains to populate these bargain sites :)

Oh by the way, OzBargain does run weekly contest of real cash give away to encourage participation, although the contests seem to be won by the same group of guys…