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Thoughts on Digg’s Latest Features: Thumbs Up

December 17, 2007

Thumbs UpWhen I was at Pubcon last week, Digg launched its highly anticipated images section. And while you’ve all come to expect my rants about Digg, I simply cannot deliver that this time around.

I’ll start by saying that I was at first skeptical about the pictures section. Truthfully, I understand the reasoning behind separating videos and podcasts from news: videos and podcasts require more attention whereas many news stories already include pictures and adding an images section can be construed by some as redundancy. However, I’m not complaining about the new changes — at all. In fact, the new Digg pictures launch has been bunched up with other great features that I’m quite happy about. For example, Digg has finally acknowledged that productivity and lifehack websites deserve a section of their own, so they launched a “Lifestyle” section with its more universal taxonomy. I’m glad I no longer have to put those stories in “offbeat news.” :)

Let’s walk through the new features and what has changed on the Interface.

First, when you go to Digg’s submit page, you’re now greeted with three options. Are you submitting a news story? Is it an image? Is it a video?

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Mixxing In, and Why Early Adoption is Important: A Review of the Newest Social News Network

November 28, 2007

Mixx LogoI’ve been pretty vocal about Mixx, the newest “Digg clone,” on TechCrunch’s recent review of the service and on a submission that hit Digg’s front page the other day. It’s about time that I bring the dialogue here since it’s evident that I’m already starting to grow fond of the brand new social network.

The Early Adopter Appeal

Mixx is a new social news site that went into private beta a mere two months ago. Already, however, it’s gaining momentum among “Digg refugees” and folks who don’t feel comfortable on other social networks. And for that reason, you should join–now.

Earlier this month, I wrote a blog post about how you cannot be a participant of a community without understanding the community members therein. I later illustrated what I meant in a short parable: if you’re an immigrant in a well-established country, you have to contribute first to be an acknowledged and respected member by your neighbors. Social media involves people who work together, not alone. In other words, if you don’t speak the same language and you’re not willing to speak the same language as the rest of the residents, you’re never going to be accepted and you’ll be a minority voice forever.

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Kevin Rose: Digg’s Biggest Hypocrite

November 7, 2007

You know what I find funny? When rules of a website say one thing and the founder of the website goes against everything the Terms of Service stand for.

Kevin Rose, I’m talking to you.

I left this alone (save for a comment on a recent submission of yours) because I thought you might learn. However, it’s sadly not the case and clearly your fan base is clouding your judgment.

Allow me to point out two infractions made, perhaps intentionally, on your part.

Infraction #1:

Digg’s FAQ (Submitting Section, Question #3) says that duplicate submissions are bannable violations. Here’s the exact wording:

# Is it a duplicate story if I submit a similar story but from a different source?
That isn’t for us to decide. Sometimes there is a better story from another news outlet. We let our users determine that aspect of duplicate submissions. It is, however, a duplicate story if you submit the same story from the same source. We strongly discourage the submission of duplicate stories as it only steals credit from the first submitter. If we find abusive duplicate submission behavior from users, their accounts may be banned.

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Top 6 Ideas for Incredible Viral Content

October 29, 2007

As many of us alluded to earlier this month at SMX Social Media, viral content is king. Viral content is what people look for. Viral content is what people bookmark. Viral content is what people talk about. Viral content can spark memes. Viral content is the foundation for linkbait. Indeed, viral content is a wonderful concept and especially important when you’re looking for traffic or attention. But if you’ve never traversed along the road to viral content, where can you get started? What is makes good viral content? I’ve talked briefly about great lists. I’ve talked about videos. I’ve talked about pictures. Now I’m going to talk a bit more about six solid foundations upon which you can build viral content and I’ll illustrate how they’re used in today’s social media.

The Motherload of Lists

Let’s face it. People like lists. Lists win for a variety of reasons: they’re easily digestible, they’re typically short, and they contain a lot of good information in one single article. Lists also take a great deal of research, and the return is typically a resource that people will turn to time and time again.

Here are some example lists that totally rock:

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Please Don’t Ask Me to Sphinn Your Stories (and How to Use Sphinn and Similar Social News Websites)

October 26, 2007

Sphinn LogoThis is a difficult post to write because I feel that people will already take offense to it before reading what I want to offer. First, the full disclosure: I am a moderator at Sphinn.

Many of you, whether close friends online or folks I’ve met at conferences, ask me to Sphinn your stories. Sometimes you’ll be very discreet and throw in a subtle request every so often. Others are a little more forceful and excessive. With all due respect to my friends in the industry, compared to the amount of Digg requests I get (and you’d think I get a lot of those) and the amount of stories submitted to Sphinn in a given day, Sphinn has spiraled out of control.

Let me say that I don’t like rejecting Sphinn requests. But we all may have to start doing that sometime. After all, if stories that hit the front page are not voted because people like them but rather because people want to do favors for their friends in the industry, Sphinn becomes a popularity contest, but not for reasons previously stated. It’s no longer a “the familiar faces dominate the front page” mentality. Instead, it’s the “please Sphinn me” requests that are overflowing on other communication mediums, particularly Facebook and StumbleUpon, that is causing this to happen. You ask me on IM/Facebook, I appear to be active, and I am not the type of person to ignore your request so I feel obligated to comply. However, it’s not fair to other people who may not know me or other community members so well and don’t solicit votes like you do.

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