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It's The Algorithm, Stupid!

searchengineland.com — Have you ever wondered what it really takes for a story submitted to Digg to get to the home page? Or why a certain story —even a really good, social media friendly story—never got to the home page?

Bury

supernova17 319 days ago, made popular 319 days ago

909 diggs
digg it

mentol, on 11/29/2007, -7/+47I always knew Digg's algorithm is the most complex from all the social bookmarking sites and if you take away those manual edited sites like Slashdot or Fark I think Digg is the most accurate.

Another great article by Muhammad.
- Matteos, on 11/29/2007, -3/+4If it is so complex, why do we get so many dupes on the front page?
  - kufu91, on 11/29/2007, -0/+9the algorithm seems to focus on avoiding abuse and encouraging community participation instead of finding the occasional dupe
- davidlow, on 11/29/2007, -0/+2Still, I was hoping this article would present the actual algorithm, not just a loose description of the various factors. I guess it'll stay locked in the vault next to the Coke recipe and tomorrow's stock prices.
adresaklumea, on 11/29/2007, -38/+1Digg must be stupid not to edit manual some links
MikeonTV, on 11/29/2007, -5/+35Misconception: "You're doomed if your story isn't submitted by a top-user"
I've experienced this as of late. A top user approached me to submit an article because the algorithm works so heavily against that person and the site the submission was coming from.
hustl3, on 11/29/2007, -24/+5Have you ever wondered what it really takes for a story submitted to Digg to get to the home page?
Not really, I am not a digg-bitch that complains about everything that makes it to the homepage. You don't like digg heh?? Then go to slashdot or arstechnica.

-A guy who likes digg and dislikes people who care about how ***** got on the front page.
nexah3, on 11/29/2007, -2/+27I never understood the 0 comments and 14 diggs on the front page.

Maybe speed really counts?
- TheFoolyCooly, on 11/29/2007, -2/+6perhaps someone with 14 proxied ip's and 14 accounts?
agentsully, on 11/29/2007, -4/+19Digg algorithm is so elusive and difficult to understand. This report is very complete and revealing. Excellent.
gbarberi, on 11/29/2007, -2/+8I knew time had something to do with it. That explains some of the "crappy" articles/videos I see on the front page with practically no comments and very few diggs.
A bunch of users get together and practice "synchronized digging"
bwdd, on 11/29/2007, -4/+18Wow, all it took was 100 Diggs and that story rocketed to the home page!
jerryparid, on 11/29/2007, -14/+8Epic guide for Ron Paul human "paulbots" aka supporters. Dugg up
- mCanada, on 11/29/2007, -1/+1You're getting dugg down, but that's exactly the point
Pizzini3000, on 11/29/2007, -7/+6Shouldn't the comment be more like "It's the stupid algorithm"?
drafhk, on 11/29/2007, -3/+12I think the ironic thing is that this story wasn't submitted by msaleem, the guy who wrote the article and one of the top diggers.
- fuzzmeister, on 11/29/2007, -1/+13As a general rule of social news, it's frowned upon to submit your own articles.
  - floodyberry, on 11/29/2007, -1/+7It took supernova17 a whole 16 minutes to submit it and msaleem was one of the first to digg it, so I really doubt there was any modesty involved. The only ironic thing is that people will believe he has any deep insight into the algorithm or that the circle-jerk and attention the popular users enjoy actually "hurts" their chances of hitting the front page.
WhiteRice08, on 11/29/2007, -5/+4I hope those people working for Bush never learn of this algorithm. Soon we'll get stories proclaiming Bush's brand new haircut is the "hippest ***** 'round town".
- stalefries, on 11/29/2007, -1/+1Bush+mohawk=???
fLUx1337, on 11/29/2007, -1/+3IMO, while algorithms are amazing for whatever reason you do something, they are a curse to developers world wide when out of hours! :(

God knows how long I have thought about them after I've acctully finished with a pretty perfect working project, you can always make them better in some way or another...
iamaelephant, on 11/29/2007, -1/+3Heh I never realised the algorithm took so many factors into account. I always figured it was just the Digg/Bury ratio with factors included for absolute digg number and diggs per hour. Cool article.
scabbers, on 11/29/2007, -10/+4Short answer is that the owners of Digg manipulate their algorithm to get the kind of results they want, this gives the appearance of 'the community chooses what gets dugg' when it doesn't really.
- oneoverzero, on 11/29/2007, -1/+2Did you even read the article?
TheFoolyCooly, on 11/29/2007, -2/+2"The algorithm tries to ensure a level playing field for all users"
"Unlike editorially driven sites like Fark or Slashdot where news is handpicked by a tiny group of individuals, socially driven sites use the votes aggregated by the community to decide what content gets promoted to their home pages to be viewed by the masses."

True democracy is nice. Too bad democracy in government isn't as neatly smoothed out.
- nicolaihel, on 11/29/2007, -0/+3Democracy in government just has the wrong algorithm. Right now, the govt algorithm relies too heavily on donations from large corporations, media buys, and appealing to the conservative middle.
  
  Maybe we need to get some engineers into the govt to improve the algorithm?
d1337, on 11/29/2007, -5/+35Complex algorithm = [BREAKING] Ron Paul puts Ubuntu on jailbreaked iPhone! [NSFW]
- kaelyiesta, on 11/29/2007, -1/+7I dunno if I want to see anything with Ron Paul and [NSFW] together...
likwidfuzion, on 11/29/2007, -1/+1I am now on my way to become Digg's overlord.
Emused, on 11/29/2007, -5/+2God I new I hated math for some reason.
- Bamborzled, on 11/29/2007, -0/+8"new"
  Did you hate English as well? :)
samiam14, on 11/29/2007, -0/+6"Diversity helps prevent people from banding together into "voting-rings" (i.e. circle-jerks) and unfairly pushing their stories to the top."
That was one of the best parts of that story.

I always find it interesting how websites do their dirty work. It's stuff like this algorithm that set Digg apart from other social news sites.
UrinalPooper, on 11/29/2007, -0/+2That fact that entire ad agencies are devoted to maximizing Diggs has nothing to do with it. Nope. Not a thing.
anonymous666, on 11/29/2007, -1/+11http://i3.tinypic.com/8elk4yt.jpg
mCanada, on 11/29/2007, -0/+2Isn't this a little deceptive? I mean on the surface one would think that the article with the most votes gets to the top? This way things become more subjective and slanted towards certain biases. Depending how things are tweaked certain groups get shat on. Shouldn't the majority have the final say? Mind you Stumbleupon / Google / etc all have their algorithms and people all vote in their respective ways, maybe this is no different.
- gr0ver, on 11/29/2007, -0/+1in a perfect world, absolutely...but if you don't have an algorithm looking at diversity, like msaleem says, spammers take over
  - mCanada, on 11/30/2007, -0/+1for sure I guess that's true
emom, on 11/29/2007, -0/+1He forgot to mention the part that makes sure that anything submitted from a blog is buried as spam.
- gr0ver, on 11/29/2007, -0/+3it more often than not IS spam, or simple blog spam re-purposing content (filmwad, gamewad, etc.)
takkie, on 11/29/2007, -3/+1I like this algorithm, and would not like simple ranking home page.
This algorithm tell me the not popular but amazing and fun story.
astrosmash, on 11/29/2007, -0/+3Digg has jumped the shark.
hyperweb79, on 11/29/2007, -2/+0Alright!.... a new potential field for us to look into... DEO - Digg Engine Optimization..
Time for all the SEO to get into this niche market...
msiekkinen, on 11/29/2007, -2/+2great story -- thanks!
spanner, on 11/29/2007, -0/+3Sigh .. I just try to post interesting stories, and watch them die on the vine.

BTW you can't submit a comment in Opera!
nixfu, on 11/29/2007, -2/+4Question? If social networking is soooooooooooo great...then why the ***** do we even need a mysterious algorithm???

The fact is that its all total *****. Digg has simply admitted that this basically impossible to have a decent website with the users providing the content.

The best you can do(and what digg has done with their algo) is filter out ANYTHING even remotely interesting and only let the ultra-populist garbage pop to the top.

Most really interesting content submitted to Digg NEVER HAS a chance to bubble up because it has to compete with the people clicking on the latest Brittany Spears article 1000x in the first 10 minutes.
nixfu, on 11/29/2007, -0/+4Love these two TOTALLY different statements in the same article...
1) "The algorithm tries to ensure a level playing field for all users"

2) If you get a quick succession of Diggs from "high-value" users, you are likely to be promoted faster

The secret is that Digg is VERY BIASED to the 'high value' users and whatever the 'normal' people submit hardly has a chance in hell of getting promoted unless it is pure common drivel that will attract a huge number of diggs very quickly, like "BREAKING: LOLCAT IZ FUNNY!"
knobtwiddler, on 11/29/2007, -0/+2oh ... and:
if (source = prisonplanet.com) bury += 100
cause seriously their articles sometimes have 500-1k digs and never make it to the home page.
Ninjastevo, on 11/29/2007, -1/+0This is great information Muhammad. Thanks for the detailed analysis.
doublehead, on 11/29/2007, -0/+1This all makes sense to me. Social networking is about participation, participation gets appreciated and good participation brings value to it all.
laflair13, on 12/10/2007, -0/+1So basically what I am getting from this site is its a buddy system, If your a new comer like myself who don't have many friends on digg, you are pretty much waisting your time. I have submitted some very unique stories, But I guess it is who you know on here and not how good the quality of your posts are.
- ALyken, on 03/25/2008, -0/+1According to this piece, it's not even who you know. He seems to beleive that if your 'friends' digg you continuously these diggs would count for less. Bottom line seems to be WHO is doing the submitting. For example one top user writes an article about Digg and another submits it in record time.
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It's The Algorithm, Stupid!

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