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Netscape Snags 3 More Digg Heavyweights
netscape.com — Calacanis continues to woo top submitters from social networking sites. In the latest round of additions, Calacanis appears to have added Digg top submitters Aidenag (Mark Johnson), GregD (Greg DeMaderios), and Geekforlife (John Page) to the list of navigators. All GREAT submitters in my book and their contributions on Digg will be missed.
digitalgopher- 104 diggs
- digg it
- richsipe, on 10/12/2007, -7/+11They might be missed but quickly replaced. No one person makes a social site such as Digg succeed or fail. It is the total contributions of many people submitting stories and thousands of others digging and commenting on those stories that make the site work.
Calacanis might have a few submitters but until he gets the thousands of people promoting the stories and visiting the site, Netscape will continue to flop.
Although I guess it doesn't matter for them because since their editors determine the stories not the people, the thousands of readers and casual browsers are worthless. Right? Because, according to Mr. C., if they were worth something they should get paid for their efforts and since only the super users are getting paid the rest must be, by his definition used in comment of digg, worthless...- digitalgopher, on 10/12/2007, -1/+22""No one person makes a social site such as Digg succeed or fail. It is the total contributions of many people submitting stories and thousands of others digging and commenting on those stories that make the site work.""
Absolutely agree with you. I think the challenge for netscape and calacanis will be to continue to build a critical mass of users because, at the end of the day, submitters are only one side of the equation. That's where Digg has a significant advantage. - inboxnews, on 10/12/2007, -9/+1dg - it's true submitting is one side of the equation, and another side is the fact that Netscape edits all submissions. That's a big turn off for me.
- Gregd, on 10/12/2007, -1/+13@inboxnews
Netscape does NOT edit all submissions. It's my understanding that the Anchors may edit the URL of a submission, to point to the original source, if it points to a blog that adds no real value to the story. The Anchors can add Anchor commentary to a story which I feel adds real value to the submission itself. - Geekforlife, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8I have never had a submission edited
- inboxnews, on 10/12/2007, -0/+3Thanks for the clarification gd.
- Doggpound, on 10/12/2007, -5/+4Netscape is owned by AOL. Anyone with any intelligence should not be using AOL products. Every tech person knows that.
- jdawg, on 10/12/2007, -4/+9We actually have more users coming to Netscape a day than digg, but the digg users are many times more active. This makes sense since:
a) digg users are very, very technical
b) digg has grown up only as a social new site
Netscape has a much more diverse user base by gender and age. Many of the folks have been coming to the site for years (like 2-10!), and social news is a very (very) new concept. We're teaching mainstream folks about the social bookmarking concept.
99% of folks out there don't know what digg, delicious, reddit, and furl are... we're bringing the concept to those folks.
You can see it's working as the number of votes, comments, and story submissions have gone waaaaaay up.
The point of hiring Navigators (aka top users) is that they:
a) teach our users how social news works
b) consolidate stories (i.e. we close dupes)
c) remove spam
d) help shut down sock puppets/voting rings
e) add great content to the system faster than normal users
The top users on digg are AMAZING at what they do. They know how to find great stories, they know how to name them, and they are very social.
I don't see why they shouldn't get paid... social news sites are highly profitable because of the low content cost, and I think that the top users should be rewarded for that.
Now, I know Kevin doesn't think so, and that's fine... but I don't see an end to how many people we can hire to be community leaders/Navigators. We have over 20 now and some day we might have 200. - Doggpound, on 10/12/2007, -4/+2@jdawg
Once you start paying people it defeats the whole purpose of a community news site. Posts are no longer by the community and now by employees. - curtissthompson, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2I still believe if you are to pay users for their contributions to a social news site, that it is a far better method to do so by means of ad revenue sharing for all users.
Meaning the users gets a minor portion of the ad revenue for each page that is created by their submissions with ads on that page. Furthermore, this idea could be expanded to account for users who make valuable contributions via comments, etc. I think if you are to grow a community you must provide incentive to all members accordingly, which in turn will motivate them to contribute positively to the community in whatever way they can, and solve many of the community's problems, whether it be duplicate submissions, or inflammatory commenters. Surely this model would require much more detail and thought to make it work, but I think it would be a far better motivator for all community members, and wouldn't ignore what I would consider the most vital and important users, the ones who digg/vote, comment, and report stories....regulating the quality of content for the site's homepage.
By taking this route, you avoid alienating the majority of your user base, and convince them to become more active contributors to your social news site, rather than staying "social freeloaders," as some would say. The problem in paying only frequent submitters, is you are segregating them from the rest of the community or population.
People need to realize that while top submitters do contribute a lot of quality content for the site, they by no means regulate the site on their own. The diggers who actively search/digg through upcoming stories/on desk stories are the the ones who help decide what is quality content, and what deserves to be on the frontpage. Further they help decide what stories are inaccurate, duplicates, etc. as well as add valuable information to a story in the comments section either from personal knowledge or alternative sources with further information to a story.
It's important to realize that their isn't only one kind of contribution community members can make to a social news site, but many different, and if one is to be rewarded for their work, the others too should proportionally/accordingly.
- digitalgopher, on 10/12/2007, -1/+22""No one person makes a social site such as Digg succeed or fail. It is the total contributions of many people submitting stories and thousands of others digging and commenting on those stories that make the site work.""
- axecollector, on 10/12/2007, -3/+1They aren't allowed to be on both sites at once? Is that some kind of law or something?
- Gregd, on 10/12/2007, -1/+14Totally not true. I have never been told that I cannot keep my presence here on digg.
- Geekforlife, on 10/12/2007, -2/+6You will see that a lot of the Navigators submit to both sites
- ryland2, on 10/12/2007, -0/+2@ gregd
I think axecollector is asking if Netscape allows you to still submit on digg, it seems they don't allow it seeing as you have not submitted a story in 6 days. - Gregd, on 10/12/2007, -2/+11@ryland
I'm allowed to post anywhere I damn well please. Inferring that they don't allow it simply because I haven't posted in 6 days is ridiculous. I've simply been busy with this thing called "work" and frankly the last algorithm change fiasco along with the lack of communication from the digg staff, pissed me off. - tweeto, on 10/12/2007, -5/+1You got pissed off so you are leaving... mm... way to go!, what will happen when you'll get pissed off on Netscape or AOL? and I can assure you, it will happen sooner then you think.
- schestowitz, on 10/12/2007, -2/+8You're thinking of an Iron Fist, but Navigators who came from Diggs seem to have stayed loyal (to some extent) to their roots and they still love Digg. Assuming that they are shackled by Netscape is.. well... presumptuous.
- jdawg, on 10/12/2007, -2/+5We allow folks to work on all sites.... we just need them to focus on growing Netscape! :-)
- Gregd, on 10/12/2007, -1/+5@tweeto
Who said I was leaving? I merely stated that it pissed me off, so I took a break. During my break, I happened to be brought on board with Netscape. If you read what I said, I indicated that the lack of communication about the changes on digg were what pissed me off. - TheAttacks, on 10/12/2007, -1/+4Hey man, I started off with Digg and will always wear my t-shirt with pride. I'm no where near the digg user I once was, but I'm still visiting daily to see what's going on.
- ryland2, on 10/12/2007, -1/+2@gregd
I did not mean to insult you in anyway, I just hope that digg does not lose another great submitter.
- mGee, on 10/12/2007, -10/+2Get a life dude. Who cares... there are plenty other users here to submit content.
- moet, on 10/12/2007, -7/+1These people dont get it, its not Aidenag, GregD, Geekforlif or who ever is a "heavy weight".
Digg is made up by every one who is part of this community and likes the digg.com website.
As long as there r people like Kevin, who generally understands what it makes to have a site people enjoy being part of or even just browsing.
All these bloggers or whoever are just trying to boost their page views by posting digg "killers".
Dont give em the attention or time- trex, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1In theory. But in reality, the trend so far appears to be the 1% rule:
http://technology.guardian.co.uk/weekly/story/0,,1823959,00.html
- trex, on 10/12/2007, -0/+1In theory. But in reality, the trend so far appears to be the 1% rule:
- marnaq, on 10/12/2007, -13/+1Netscape are terrorists.
- Geekforlife, on 10/12/2007, -6/+6This is why Digg, is going downhill
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