It’s funny how things work out. Yesterday I wrote an article based on feedback from many disgruntled DIGG users. I didn’t want it submitted in DIGG because I simply thought the DIGG staff would bury it. It was going to be submitted on REDDIT instead. A DIGG user got hold of the article and submitted it. It got about 70 Diggs in 2 hours and hit the front page after about 21 hours. It currently has 572 Diggs.
Kudos To Digg?
So, the article seemed to fly under the radar. It hit the front page. There were many people agreeing, many disagreeing and plenty who didn’t get the gist of the article at all… The point is that it was written based on some experienced DIGG users and their opinions about DIGG. Of course there is no conclusive evidence but repeated experience by dozens of experienced users is a finding of real results. Anyway, I was about to write an article giving Kudos To Digg.
Then they totally removed the article from their frontpage stories. Gone!
DIGG Censored Information?
Bugger! Here I was about to write accolades to DIGG and thanking them for proving me wrong and not burying an article that critisised them – and then they blatantly shat in their own nest (pardon the french). Shame! So the point still stands that only DIGG censored information gets to stay in public view stands strong. Sounds a bit like our newspapers actually.
Frontpage Story Buried By Digg
The article got 572 Diggs. Imagine how many people Buried it – Lots! That is just based on their comments. That’s cool. It is a democratic process and the readers vote on their opinion. Just the way it should work. But where does it break down? DIGG steps in and removes the story from their front page listings because… why?
Obviously they didn’t like it. (Sarcasm alert) Ah, the thought of a perfect world where anything we don’t like we can remove, hide, destroy and kill. The point of having a successful social network is to have the people in it shape it to their needs – based on the framework that the founders supplied. Of course there needs to be rules, but those rules also need to be fair and consistent. The people will weed out lies, untruths and discrimination themselves.
Feeling Guilty?
Here is the screenshot of the article in Digg after it was Buried By DIGG. The search will only find the article if the “Include Buried Stories” box is ticked. With 572 Diggs and being on the DIGG front page, I believe it can only be buried by DIGG staff. Personally, I see it as an admission of guilt when removing any critcism like this. That’s my opinion anyway 
Someone please correct me here. Can a story be buried from the DIGG Front Page by users only? Please respond in the comments. Your feedback is appreciated.
For the record, I’m not a poweruser. I have 14 Front Page stories in my entire history since 2005. I have not had my own articles buried by DIGG (until now). I’m not disgruntled but I like people to be responsible for their actions when they put themselves in the public eye, just like I am responsible for my own actions.
Just Accept It
Some people are conformists and others aren’t. Some people say: “Just Accept It. That Is The Way It Is“. Well, that is not the way to improve anything. If you find something that smells fishy, you can either speak up – or you can walk away. We all have that choice. But if you choose to walk away, don’t come back when the changes have been made for you by the ones that spoke up
In completion, yesterday my blog didn’t cope with thousands of people all arriving in 1 hour from the DIGG front page. I’ll take that on the chin. All my WordPress Blogs have WP Super Cache installed, except for this one…. my mistake. It’s there now. Thank you everyone that pointed out this point to me.
See you around
About Sean Rasmussen
This has been a perennial problem with Digg. Good articles get pulled of the home page especially if they are against digg.
I had written series of articles on this a while back. Check out Why the Digg Mafia will cost Kevin Rose millions and How Reddit beat the Digg mafia
And, sadly, I don’t think there is anything we can do about it.
Your post worked for me. I read it the whole through!
Yes stories can be buried off the front page. I had 4 stories buried a couple of days ago right off the front page. None of them were critical of Digg. One was critical of Google, while another was just a plain science article.
What happened is that I got 3 stories promoted to the front page in a row, so Digg’s home page had 3 stories in a row by ME. Diggers didn’t really like that, and buried all 3. Shortly they were removed. None of them got more than 200 diggs.
However in your case, i think it would need a huge amount of buries to offset the 500+ digg count. I would say it’s censorship.
You’re all just a bunch of whiners trying to get onto the front page of digg. Your posts are neither interesting or insightful.
You don’t know how the algorithm works. Getting to front page doesn’t matter on how many diggs it gets. It counts the diversity of those diggs. If the same 200 people always diggs a certain story, then it’ll never reach the front page.
3 out of 4 aint bad. Thanks for the feedback and insights.
@Anon. You complain about whining, while you whine? Thanks for your comment anyway
Your RSS feed seems to be down at the moment, I get:
XML Parsing Error: XML or text declaration not at start of entity
Location: http://seanseo.com/feed/rss/
Line Number 2, Column 1:
Sorry to use your comments but couldn’t find another ‘contact’ option.
Thanks Jono!
That is the first time I heard something like this. I never knew Digg would do such a thing. Anyway, digg is not the only way to get traffic. If your story was digged 500 times than you wrote something interesting. As long as you keep up the good work, you will get the traffic you deserve and you don’t have to worry about Digg removing your story at all.
Good Luck
And so the saga goes on.
I thought that social media was supposed to be about the users. Obviously not.
Looks like I will have to grin and bear my problem with Reddit.
Sean. is the situation still the same?
It sort of is. Digg buries SR.com every time I hit front page on Digg, either just before it goes front pages or just after. Once buried, nobody can find you in their listings anymore.
So is it worth continuing with them and only using Reddit, or better to hang in there?
It certainly has not stopped me from using digg, it is still a great site that I enjoy regardless of the censorship.
Gotta love censorship! And what’s better is seeing that Digg feels ‘picked’ on & booted you. Boo hoo… let me play tiny violins for the Diggsters at Digg.
It’s funny how certain people/corporations react to criticism. Even if it’s tongue in cheek! Sensitive… not like you were trying to bring them down with one article…. oooohhhhh!! Sorry, can’t help with the sarcastic ooohhhh’s, boo hoo’s and such nonsense!!
I love Digg too – although I am still new at it all. This was a great example of what can happen even if you think nothing can possibly happen – words can come back & bite you in the bum!
Hi Sean,
Okay, that’s really interesting. So, Digg still buries your stories as soon as they hit the front page? How is that right? I’m surprised that you still use Digg knowing what they are going to do to you. Or am I missing something?
Hi Sean
I think it is really sad when something with so much potential like Digg is using dictator tactics on the very people that support it and keep it viable.
There would probably be only one person behind this who has a chip on their shoulder. Obviously he/she does not like Clint Eastwood or maybe their parents did and he or she was sat in their bouncinette in front of the TV watching re runs of Clint Eastwood films until they were 5 and went to school. Now they have a vendetta on all Clint Eastwood lookalikes!
Sorry Sean, you should have picked Darth Vader as your persona.
I got to read the article in question anyway!
Blessings
Elly
Digg are not far off making some big changes (although it seems to be taking them quite a while!), it will be interesting to see how these changes effect user experience and general site popularity.