Pinderkent

I know Digg is becoming a pretty popular web site. Links to several of my articles were submitted there recently, so I went to take a look around, but I didn't bother joining. In many ways, I find it is a site full of contradiction.

On one hand, the attitude seems to be that it's up to the general public to decide which stories are interesting, and which are not. The community is further used to help limit duplicate stories and spam stories from making the front page of the site. Anyone can apparently submit submissions, and immediately have them show up, as opposed to a site like Slashdot where stories only appear after an editor has accepted them. Digg is an interesting concept.

But then we have other aspects of the site that appear to contradict the openness and community spirit. For instance, it's shown who "dugg" a story. That is, for each story there's a list of users who support it that can be viewed. But there is no such list for users who disliked a story, and chose to "bury" it. This is an issue I wrote an article about recently. It was suggested that this was the policy to prevent retribution. But my feeling is this: why can't the problem of possible retribution be addressed by the community itself?

I was confused further when today I read an article about Digg removing its list of top users. Apparently, this was done in an attempt to "fight spam and gaming of their system". I find this confusing, however. My understanding is that stories can only make it to the front page if enough of the people at the site choose to "digg" them. That is, if a story makes it to the front page, it's because enough of the user community does like it, and finds some interest in it.

I don't see how getting rid of the top users list has any benefit. If these stories that are deemed "spam" or are submitted in a way that "games the system" end up making the front page, it's because of many users at the site want the story there. I suppose it doesn't matter why the people "digg" the stories that they do. If it was because the story looks interesting, so be it. If it's because the story's submitter has a good reputation or is popular, so be it.

Digg seems to strive for the utmost community involvement in the judging of stories. But then they take actions that seem to minimize the community involvement, such as keeping "buries" anonymous and trying to influence which stories readers "digg". So I'm confused: is or is not Digg about maximizing the community involvement?