What is Digg?105 Comments
- triplehelix, on 10/12/2007, -1/+45i welcome opposing views to mine. i just wish people could present them as adults and not slander truethful items just because they don't like what it says.
- Crass22, on 10/12/2007, -3/+34The thing I feel is greatest about digg political stories, is that people will add political stories that otherwise wouldnt be picked up by the mainstream media. Digg allows for user-driven exposure on topics and stuff that we care about, not what Faux news or the white house wants us to care about. It helps out the grass-roots type blogs. But I do agree there is a problem with people abusing the bury feature just because that story doesnt fit well with their political views.
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -12/+42 @flag564 - Wait because I'm a vocal Democrat you immediately think I'm an anti-American loon? And if I called you a greedy corporate can't think for yourself beer drinking redneck biggest diesel gas guzzling pickup driving think your better than everyone else cause you found Jesus asslicking prick you won't take offense right?
- BloodJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -5/+27The comments in the buried stories back up that statement. If you need proof, look at the story titled: "Fox News Airs Call for 'Muslim-Only' Line At Airports." It was marked as inaccurate despite being completely true and including a video of them doing just that.
http://digg.com/politics/Fox_News_Airs_Call_for_Muslim_Only_Line_At_Airports - SmokedL, on 10/12/2007, -8/+30The article goes on and on about how digg is biased and then supplies the `solution` at the end: use netscape instead that is apparently not biased.
He claims he has no agenda and he is posting this at a site called neothoughts.
Draw your own conclusions. - BloodJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -3/+18The solution is not to use Netscape. Netscape's Politics channel is by no means problem-free.
- BloodJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -2/+17@triplehelix, people would probably argue that that is a pro-quality bias.
- triplehelix, on 10/12/2007, -3/+18so you don't think there might be a pro apple, pro nintendo, anti sony bias in the tech section?
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -8/+22"The political section is infested with radical leftist and anti-American loons. No one takes it seriously. After many of the leftist there called for the murder of the president, I think it is time for Digg to get rid of that whole section."
Aww. looks like all flag564 knows how to do is repeat the same ridiculous, tired neocon propaganda as all the rest of them. I guess that article about conservatives being followers was right. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -15/+28@flag564
I disagree; the reason most stories that make the front page are anti-bush/pro-peace is because most Americans and almost the entire world think that way.
I think the bias in digg is actually right leaning. Almost all left wing stories are marked inaccurate even though most aren’t. If that isn’t bias I don’t know what is. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+15more like a minority rule..
small groups are pushing ideas and making them look popular. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14People need to give wikipedia a break on accuracy.. sure they have had a lot of problems in the past, name a news organiation or encyclpedia that hasnt.
Wikipedia has made great strides to increase the level of accuracy, blocking ip's. closing contravercial subjects, requiring citings. Many studies have been done that show wikipedia to be as accurate as any of the print encyclopedias out there and yet they still cant seem to improve their reputation with many people online. Lesson, never get all your answers from one source, but dont assume wikipedia is useless for study. - AhmedF, on 10/12/2007, -2/+14Ahh politics and the abuses.
- BloodJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -3/+13@tocard: Netscape has a way to mark stories inaccurate.
- Crass22, on 10/12/2007, -0/+10cant forget the pro-linux anti-microsoft bias as well. lol
- tomboy501, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11No it's not. It's Bloodjunkie's blog - posted by Aidenaq. Not the michellemalkin or mises.org/rockwell crowd by any stretch.
- blixel, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10Do what I did.
Click the Profile + History button from the left side main navigation menu
Click the Profile + Settings tab
Click the Manage Topics link below the tab area
Uncheck Political News and Political Opinion under the World & Business section
Then enjoy digg as if those sections don't exist. Trust me, you'll be a much happier person.
(While you're at it, uncheck Celebrity under the Entertainment section and uncheck the entire Sports section. Not that those are inflammatory, they are just boring.) - triplehelix, on 10/12/2007, -3/+12the same thing happens on the other side of the fence. any anti bush, anti neo con news gets tagged innaccurate as well.
i hope the powers that be figure out a system to minimise this. - kp3469, on 10/12/2007, -1/+10Bloodjunkie said: "The solution is not to use Netscape. Netscape's Politics channel is by no means problem-free."
okay, but you must admit your blog post does kind of lead the reader in that direction. you say digg's system is being abused and then immediately say that netscape had none of the last 100 political stories marked as inaccurate.
plus, in the interest of full disclosure for those that don't know, bloodjunkie = neophile = paid netscape bookmarker.
that said, i've been enjoying your blog ... keep it up. - gdogg1078, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8I bet some people just don't like seeing political news on digg in the first place. I turn off political subjects in my profile. Occasionally I will skim through Google News feeds headlines, but there will always be bias everywhere you turn to though.
- joshreed104, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10Well, he did say that either 33% of the top political stories on digg are inaccurate (which would be a problem in and of itself), or that the bury feature is being abused. The comments on the stories seem to point to abuse.
- titlesaysitall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8Bias does not only apply to politics, it applies to anything that can have an negative or positive opinion about it, people with either agree or disagree with it and pump their view about it.
- Shinta, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8I did that but they still all land in my RSS agregator.
- ai42, on 10/12/2007, -0/+8The same thing happens on other sites as well. On YouTube where there are countless politically motivated videos out there it happens everyday. And especially those who are very politically charged (either way) such as Bill Maher, Michael Moore, Bill O'reilly, Rush Limbaugh etc often the comments are just complete flame wars, and videos often get reported as inappropriate.
- BloodJunkie, on 10/12/2007, -2/+10@kp3469: I did not intend to lead the reader in that direciton, but I understand how it could be read that way. They pay me to bookmark over there, not to evanglize :)
Sorry for any confusion. - inactive, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8The problem with politics on socially driven website is very simple:
You can not give the community the power to moderate OPINIONS.
Look at any political discussion that happens on Digg in the comments section. Person A posts a comment that political group X agrees with. Person B posts a comment that political group Y agrees with. Since most people use the comment moderation system as a way to show agreement with a particular comment, everyone in group X will vote up Person A and vote down person B. Everyone in group Y will vote up Person B and vote down Person A.
Whose comment gets more diggs? It depends entirely on the SIZE of group X and group Y.
If you follow any discussions here on political submissions, you will notice this quite fast. As soon as someone posts a comment, there will be an instant tug of war, at which point the person's diggs will keep going up and down, over and over. After about half an hour, the diggs finally start shifting decidedly either into the positive or the negative territory. The reason? One of the two groups participating in the comment voting is LARGER.
Now obvious this does not apply to just comments. Article submissions work in exactly the same way because, unless you've been brain dead and haven't been paying attention, the VAST majority of political submissions to Digg are blogs and OPINION pieces. They're essentially one long comment that, instead of being in the comments section on Digg itself, is hosted on another site, and the same tug of war ensues over the merits of this opinion as over the merits of the user comments. The groups either "digg" the article (vote up) or mark it as lame or inaccurate (vote down). Whoever is the larger group on the site is the one who wins. Always.
The political section of Digg should be removed because community moderation does not work in this context. It's INCOMPATIBLE. It's like trying to stick a square peg into a round hole. - daonlyfreez, on 10/12/2007, -1/+7Digg is probably not a good hangout for political discussions anyway... If you need that, seek a forum. I think it does serve a purpose for providing information on politics, especially since both (extremely) biased or very accurate information pop up regularly, which gives a lot of not-so-politically-interested at least the opportunity to learn.
I too feel the 'inaccurate' option poses a problem, but maybe simply adding a new option, for categories like politics (... imagine having a category religion ...), like: 'extremely biased' might do the trick.
Another issue: digging down comments in general can rid out the swearing/nonsense, but in politics often useful comments get buried too.
Dunno... I guess we all get a chance to lie, flame, troll, spew and spit on digg, but not for long ;-) (which is good...), and yes, sometimes some sincere comments die because of that (which is not good..., and should somehow be handled in 'discussion-like' categories).
Digg is a fast paced source of information, any discussion on a digg dies out quite quickly anyway. - OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -5/+10flag564 - likely one of the other right-wing trolls this article is referring to.
Do you trolls realize that anyone can look at your posting history and see exactly what you're all about? Shall we take a look at flag564s recent submissions?
No Liberals in My Foxhole!
‘World Opinion’ is Worthless
MORE OF JOHN KERRY'S RETROACTIVE CAMPAIGN PROMISES- By Ann Coulter
Lieberman Leads Among Likely Connecticut Voters
DICK McDONALD:The Left Is So Dumb, its Paralyzing the West
Liberals are a major threat to our security
Democrats Using Dead Americans as Campaign Props - turricanz, on 10/12/2007, -3/+8flag: you are not a conservative, you are a radical. or stupid. or both.
- jgtg32a, on 10/12/2007, -1/+6Please take into consideration that I avoid politics on the Internet like the plague but ...
I've never understood this fascination w/ grass root blogs. Are these people really the root or are they loud and it seems like a lot of people listen to them. Therefore they are?
Another thing that has always bothered me about blogs is it is very polarizing because if everyone at the site hates everything that you say you can just go to another site where they love you.
Question why does the word 'blogs' come up on spell check?
if you know any sites where there are well moderated, IE stupid flames aren't tolerated tell me I personally haven't had any luck. - Shivetya, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5Too bad people abuse other channels to get their political tripe in.
Digg needs to not only have inaccurate tags but the ability to force a story back into the appropriate category. - jefree, on 10/12/2007, -0/+5I do not believe there is a conspiracy of major media, however: There is some sort of formula in use about what is important news to sell advertising and a certain assumption about what most people want to hear. Now with a social driven site I get to read lots of interesting news that isn't necessarily about the soap opera of the day. Often, the news on a social site is more constructive and on a deeper root level of the problems of the world.
What I truly do not understand is why every media outlet seems focused on the same topic. I really don't care about the Joan Benoit (sp?) case, yet it's plastered everywhere. I guess I want more detail on more minor things and more intelligence. Maybe it's that major media are into entertainment verse good informative programming.
Also, the ability to comment and read what others have to say is great! - triplehelix, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7i'd say the dirtiest word in the english language is "money".
- inactive, on 10/12/2007, -4/+8Since the traditional media has reporters pretty much everywhere, it's kind of hard for a big story to fall through the cracks. Would only happen if there was a massive conspiracy between all the news agencies.
There's generally a reason the stories posted to digg don't get picked up. Assumptions, generalizations, and lies get a wonderful audience here with no really structured moderation. On the bright side, ridiculous stories get modded down eventually, but they spend too much time on the front page before that happens.
In theory this could be a good system, but a few asshats are ruining it. - OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6Politics and money are both not inherently evil. Corruption is evil. Corruption is motivated by $$$. Politics is a method used by corrupt individuals.
- reiggin, on 10/12/2007, -5/+9Now if I could only uncheck "Stephen Colbert" from the Comedy Videos section.
- blixel, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5"i happen to be interested in the events of the world."
As am I, but I think digg is a lousy source for political news. Obviously I'm not alone in my thinking or this article wouldn't exist. - spinchange, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4There are many times when I am tempted to mark something as inaccurate because I feel like the digg user's customized headline and/or description is intentionally misleading from what the actual underlying story is or is saying.
In my opinion, that's what comments and blogs are for = post the story, call it what it is (or what the actual author did) and then share your interpretation and/or comment. - tekmonkey, on 10/12/2007, -0/+4I just stumbled upon this website: http://spinr.org -- a self-proclaimed "digg for politics". Spinr allows readers to vote on how politically-slanted a story is. Seems interesting.
- JulianMorrison, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5Although they suck in almost evey other way, I rather like BBC news's voting solution: they have no downvote. You can digg, but you can't bury. The result does tend to drag both sides' controversial opinions to the top, with partisans competing to overtop the opposition.
- OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -3/+7elebrio -- apparently one of the right wing trolls this article is referring to.
- JulianMorrison, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Not entirely. It amplifies the majority's sway, because they don't only get to upvote, they also get to bury the comments and even the articles they disagree with. In other words, it behaves like an Athenian democracy rather than a constitutional democratic republic. In Athens they had downvotes, whose name has survived into modern English as the word "ostracism".
- CrackHappy, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3@kp:
in the interest of full disclosure for those that don't know, bloodjunkie = neophile = paid netscape bookmarker.
and bloodjunkie = neophile = paid netscape bookmarker = bloodninja?
Wizard Hat! - montagg, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4@BloodJunkie: You could also argue that it's a bias towards the underdog, too. =c)
- dougs55, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2You (directorblue) wrote that blog entry in January and one side hasn't left yet so maybe the system here works better than it's being given credit for. I don't watch Fox News but if I could click the bozo button when O'Reilly speaks and check the popularity rating in his profile I would.
Flagging stories and users as liberal or conservative seems wrong to me. Isn't thinking that way falling into a propaganda trap ? Is it really not possible to criticize the President without being a Democrat ? Is everybody who says something negative about a large corporation has to be a hippie or a commie ?
Also how would that flagging account for people from different walks of life or countries ? Would being from Iraq or China or Europe make someone a liberal or a democrat ?
I don't think making it easier for people to ignore other viewpoints is necessarily a positive thing. There's already ample opportunity for that. I also remember the self appointed Internet pundits of 10 years ago saying the Internet was bad because people would always separate into common interest groups, funny how things work out.
What I would like to see is for Digg just to disable the inaccuracy flagging for political just for appearances sake. People who didn't like a story could still flag it as lame.
Digg could also make unofficial suggestions on moderation like slashdot does. (I realize that many would not read or follow them.) This could be along the lines of please refrain from name calling and ad hominem personal attacks. Try to get people to think rather than just call them liberal or conservative. Also make it a practice to read hidden comments and moderate up if you think the negative rating was unfair.
I'd also like to be able to see the total up and down counts if I wanted and not just the sum. - titlesaysitall, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2Definitely both.
- triplehelix, on 10/12/2007, -6/+8:::Trust me, you'll be a much happier person.:::
no i won't. i happen to be interested in the events of the world. thanks for assuming your tastes and preferences are shared by all.
if you stopped to think about it for a minute you'd probably realise that these catagory's were created and their pipelines active because people are interested in them. - codyman, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4The most dirty word in the English language is "politics"
- OBKenobi, on 10/12/2007, -2/+4"Digg is probably not a good hangout for political discussions anyway... If you need that, seek a forum."
No way. Forums are far worse than Digg. Every political forum I've been to has bias towards a particular viewpoint or is censored so strictly that it is just a collection of conformant Talking Points. - Tarvok, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2I don't think it takes a reader of the political section too long to realize that the "marked as inaccurate" indicator actually means "someone disagrees with the conclusion." With that understanding, the political section really isn't that bad. Admittedly, majority rule on digg is no better than majority rule anywhere else, but it is interesting to see what diggers tend to prefer. I'll openly admit I'm a pretty stereotypical digger: pro-libertarian, anti-bush, pro-linux, pro-nintendo, etc. etc. etc.
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