Kevin Rose is getting called out again today for the mob-like behavior of the "digg kids."
For those of you who haven't been on the receiving end of the "digg kids mob," it's basically a fanatical group of digg users that will attack and bury any good story about someone they don't like, while promoting bad ones about the people they don't like. This group is also known as the Bury Brigade.
I've been beat on constantly by these kids, as has Danny Sullivan. Today, LittleGreenFootballs gets beat up.
The way this works is that stories on digg can be buried (voted down), but unlike positive votes, negative votes don't have names attached to them. This was done in the early days, from what I was told from insiders, so that the staff of digg could kill stories they didn't like and blame it on the will of the community. This kept the digg staff's fingerprints off of things that were killed so the staff of digg could say "we didn't kill it, the community did." Very smart... but now it's coming back to haunt digg. I'd love to see the buried votes on some early anti-digg stories... you can be sure digg will never release that data.
When I was running Netscape--which is doing really well right now--I insisted that our negative vote (called a "sink") was tied to a name/user account. This means that if 20 of the staff wanted to kill something the community would know and them out on it. We made people own their sinks/burries/negative votes--accountability.
LitleGreenFootballs posted a story asking Kevin Rose to add accountability for sinks and--as you might suspect--the story was sunk!
Kevin Rose will, of course, not responded to this request and not bring up on the digg blog--which doesn't have even have comments!!! Hello!??!!? How can you be for social media and audience empowerment and not let folks have a discussion on your blog?!
Frankly I think Kevin is painting himself into a corner that's making digg's credibility spiral downward... you can't say you're an open community then do things like have covert negative voting and no comments on your blog. Unless of course you want to limit your audience to your fanbase--which is exactly what's happening to digg. They are pushing anyone out who's not a 10 to 25 year old male who loves the Wii and LOTR.
Who knows, maybe that's the goal?
Social Bookmarking 101: You gotta own your bury/sink. (or How Kevin Rose is painting himself into a corner).
Reader Comments
(Page 1 of 1)2. please, digg is just another echo chamber of pseudo left-wingers who hate anything that is not endorsed by the democratic party, michael moore, or doesnt sound "liberal". when they're not geeking on tech stories, of course.
LittleGreenFootballs shines a light on the racist, hateful, murderous actions of muslims, arab governemnts and arab media and their western enablers. stuff that no one else talks or reports on.
when this country is anna nicole and britney obcessed, LGF is reoprting on stuff we all need to see.
sure, some commenters are hateful and bigoted, but that is not the voice of LGF no more than the anti-christain, anti-semetic, "liberal" nutjobs that populate daily kos speaks for that guy.
the bury brigade is a bunch of teenage losers who probably live with their parents, blaming the world for their troubles. Anything that goes against their reflexive notion of "good" gets buried. Content and substance dont mean anything, you know. nor does "right vs. wrong". everything is viewed through the "left vs. right" prism. in many ways, digg is basically just another representation of the larger political landscape. so... it must be working correctly.
Posted at 4:38PM on Feb 26th 2007 by bryan
3. LGF aside, the Bury feature (in particular the "Lame" button), and its attendant Brigade, has long been the thing I hate most about Digg. I'm made happy every day that Netscape has chosen to build accountability into all of its features, including the Sink button and the comment rating system. It makes me put actual thought into each of my knee-jerk (re)actions on the site, and (as supported by your anecdote about Digg's "early days") keeps everyone honest.
4. Speaking of social bookmarking, any thoughts on Weblogs adding a Digg widget to the front page on certain stories. No love for Netscape?
Posted at 5:04PM on Feb 26th 2007 by Adam Cains
5. Actually if you dig a little deeper (no pun intended) they do put that info in the JSON arrays that are returned for the Digg Spy. Or at least they did a few months ago. Had I the bandwidth, space and time I would consider keeping a log for all to see. Actually I have the code from an earlier project - maybe I will.
6. I'm with you 100% on this but like Charbarred said, there's something even more shady about it. Maybe putting all that info public would show us who on the payroll's really burying stories. Having said that I've seen Kevin Rose Digg a story, have it hit the front page, and then get promptly buried so it's probably a mix of hyperactive kiddies and Digg staff. Either way it sucks because we simply don't know. Heck we don't even know when a story is buried once it hits the frontpage unless it just dissappears.
Another thing is there's no penalty against people who's only activity is to bury stories. They're mostly scum but their bury is the same weight as real contributing members. It's sad. I see lots of stories in the queue losing steam and this charade could come to an end when submitters get thoroughly demoralized.
8. They just added a US Presidential Election 2008 section this evening - this would be great to have for the inevitable bs that's bound to go down there.
Posted at 8:56PM on Feb 26th 2007 by Marshall Kirkpatrick
9. It's as if he read this post:
"As always, leave comments about this post on the related Digg story."
http://blog.digg.com/?p=65
Posted at 9:28PM on Feb 26th 2007 by Joost Schuur
10. Jason - all great points, but you make one incorrect assumption: you think that there is a public perception that Digg is "an open community" and that it has "credibility". Neither perception is accurate.
When you take a single step away from this space, it becomes instantly clear that (1) Digg is controlled by a small group, (2) their interests do not reflect the masses, and (3) when you get Dugg all you get is a traffic spike and nothing more...
Posted at 10:19PM on Feb 26th 2007 by Jeremy Toeman
11. Jason, you may already know about this, but you have a fellow ex-Netscapee (from your ex-team?) doing something that, from what I read, it sounds vaguely interesting:
http://startupsquad.com/2007/02/21/corank-digg-alternative-in-making/
Posted at 2:19AM on Feb 27th 2007 by Riosul
12. I don't believe in the bury brigade. I'm quite sure it's the digg modders doing what they are paid to do.
Heard about those sites that got un-banned a few days ago?
The trick is that stories from those sites get auto-buried just before they reach the front page. Nice way to say "Hey we don't ban quality sites, it's the digg users that bury the stories"
And you expect them to introduce a sink feature and own up to all the buries?
Posted at 4:29AM on Feb 27th 2007 by Charbarred
13. Jason, I know you're a fan of Edge, but if you hadn't read this already:
http://www.edge.org/3rd_culture/lanier06/lanier06_index.html
It's fantastically relevant.
Posted at 6:58AM on Feb 27th 2007 by Wil Harris
14. Proof of concept (Quick set of data I gathered last night):
http://www.lemieuxster.com/digg/expose
16. I wrote about the Digg Mafia (or the Digg Mob) as you call it and had the post instantly buried. But, it hit the frontpage of reddit and before we knew it the post had 332 diggs, but didnt appear on any list! Emails to Digg were useless, because their suport is questionable.
I've made an update post on the situation
17. URLs didn't show up:
1st post : http://techtites.com/2007/02/17/why-the-digg-mafia-will-cost-kevin-rose-millions/
Followup post: http://techtites.com/2007/02/24/how-reddit-beat-the-digg-mafia/
18. http://www.pronetadvertising.com/articles/the-bury-brigade-exists-and-heres-my-proof.html
^^^
Posted at 8:51AM on Feb 28th 2007 by Wil Harris
19. Louis Vitton replica handbags Monogram Alma delivered to anywhere
This stunning bag is roomy and fashionable which is why it's JayLo's favorite. The full cowhide leather bottom and handles, Classic Monogram canvas, and brass YKK zippers reflect the superior quality of this handbag. The LV dustbag, LV tag and date stamp are included just like the original. The Alma is available in White Murakami and Classic Monogram. * Comes with: Dust Bag * Care Book * Serial Number * Receipt Actual size 10â€x12.5â€x7â€
Please check out our website:
http://www.fashionhause.com There are top quality of replica handbags for sell
with perfect weight, feel, and like the originals.or email us : info@fashionhause.com
Posted at 11:14PM on Apr 3rd 2007 by fashiontrends
1. I think it's actually working well in this case. Little Green Footballs is a hate site specializing in anti-Arab and anti-Muslim diatribes. It's been shown many times in the past to be a hotbed of racism. In this case, enough people in the community can't stand the site, and don't want it on Digg. I think that's a choice a community can make.
Posted at 3:57PM on Feb 26th 2007 by Ted