Kevin Rose writes on the Digg blog:
Some of our top users are being blamed by some outlets as leading efforts to manipulate Digg. These users have been listed on the “Top Diggers” area of the site that was created in the early days of Digg when there was a strong focus on encouraging people to submit content. The list served a great purpose of recognizing those who were working hard to make Digg a great site, as well as a way for new users to discover new content. Now, as the site has matured and we regularly get 5,000+ content submissions per day, we believe there are better ways to discover new friends based on your interests and what you’re digging.
After considerable internal debate and discussion with many of those who make up the Top Digger list, we’ve decided to remove the list beginning tomorrow.
It’s obvious that Digg is removing the “Top Digger” list exclusively to try and thwart companies that aim to recruit Digg’s top users into some kind of Digg payola scheme, and I don’t blame them for trying to stem that tide. They shouldn’t, however, claim that they’re getting rid of it because it will no longer serve its purpose of helping users “discover new friends.” The purpose of the “Top Diggers” list is to recognize the Top Diggers – plain and simple. Users may have added the top Diggers as friends, but most likely as an attempt to get more recognition for their own submissions.
It’s an exercise in futility. A competent programmer could easily throw together a page scraper to determine the top submitters, so when the dust settles, Digg will still have problems with pay-for-play, but the most prolific users will no longer be recognized by Digg for their work that makes the site so successful.
This is an exercise in futility. Diggers will still add friends based on the names they see next to submitted front-page stories. I should know- every time I submit a front-page story, a few more people befriend me. Kevin Rose is shooting himself in the foot.
I’ve written about this in my blog as well:
http://neomeme.wordpress.com/2007/02/02/digg-stops-ranking-top-users-gentlemen-we-have-finished-the-digg-race/
I agree that this isn’t a perfect move but is one that will help in the short term.
I do have a question for you though, on this blog you have a digg this button but not for netscape. Why aren’t you pushing your own product while at the same time pushing your competition?
Hornswaggled: Two reasons:
1. My content is more suitable to the Digg demographic.
2. I’ve been working on the Netscape API this week and didn’t want to include the vote buttons on my blog until I had them just right. :-)
I have been fascinated by the series of events and have tried to reason out why/why not this was a right step by Kevin on my blog post here: http://www.technacular.com/2007/02/02/top-digg-users-page-removal-was-it-right/
Would appreciate your thoughts on the same.
What a bunch of losers.You need a list to show how many posts you provided to Digg? Its called a life, get one.And yes there is a big slant at digg im sure you losers and your anti windows,bush or Christian posts have nothing to do with it. You just post what sells and make you more digg?
digg allow spamming. digg is for seo people.
even google encourage it by giving more PR to digg stories.
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http://www.youyap.com
There is still one online statistics. we are lucky.
@YouYap
digg isn´t for seo people
Oh please, sure it’s for SEO people. It’s so easy to game it! But: the real success only cames when you work with it, honestly. It’s maybe gaming too, but with respect :-)