Comments on: Story Killers: Digg’s Bury Brigade vs. Reddit’s Downmod Squad

By: Loko Pokon » Digg Bury Brigade vs. Reedit Downmod Squad

Loko Pokon » Digg Bury Brigade vs. Reedit Downmod Squad — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 11:53:24 +0000

[...] read more | digg story [...]

By: Mighty Linuxz » Digg Bury Brigade vs. Reedit Downmod Squad

Mighty Linuxz » Digg Bury Brigade vs. Reedit Downmod Squad — Wed, 11 Jun 2008 11:53:06 +0000

[...] read more | digg story [...]

By: Mark Hanses

Mark Hanses — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 07:41:05 +0000

Thank you for these insights. I joined Digg less than 24 hours ago and then submitted what I thought was serious content. It had gathered 35 diggs within about nine hours and was then buried. Apparently Digg’s algorithm is not good enough to detect users who specialize in burying articles excessively or for spurious reasons. I will probably not use this site as a result of my experience. I see this story itself was buried. Where’s freedom of expression? It’s reminiscent of Nazi book burning.

I am entering these comments here because I was unable to do so on Digg. I just noticed the post by franklin on Sept. 24. That could be the problem I had. My story was a statistical analysis of Ron Paul’s rising poll numbers and a prediction of how he would place in Iowa and New Hampshire.

By: franklin

franklin — Mon, 24 Sep 2007 20:32:51 +0000

The bury brigade is very active on posts relating to Ron Paul, see
http://www.zaphu.com/2007/09/24/internet-censorship-a-digg-bury-brigade-case-study/
I hope that digg.com fixes this bury abuse.

By: brett

brett — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 12:26:41 +0000

My take on people rigging the system and polluting the internet (see comments):
http://www.pronetadvertising.com/articles/subvert-and-profit-expands-to-stumbleupon.html

By: brett

brett — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 12:22:24 +0000

Stop it! That sounds an awful lot like “viral marketing” to me.

By: YourConscience

YourConscience — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 12:17:11 +0000

Nope, the moral of the story is that no matter how many times I try to imply the shoddy ethics of SEO and Viral marketing, you will try to skirt the issue. But at least the seed is planted in your brain, and will gnaw away as you continue to pollute the Internet.

By: brett

brett — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 11:58:26 +0000

Yup.. that Manhole cover story is now 127 points and #3. Moral of the story: just submit some pretty, mindless stuff and it will go over just fine at Reddit.

By: YourConscience

YourConscience — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 05:08:52 +0000

“I enjoy writing web content as a hobby”. Your Conscience knows better. Quote from your resume:

Skills:

SEO, copywriting, social media marketing, viral content
authoring, blogging, public relations, branding, web
development, …

Here’s the point that you just don’t get: SEO, social media marketing, and viral content authoring, are a major source of Internet pollution. These activities are antithetical to the nature of sites like Reddit and Digg. I know that you are an enlightened troll and are don’t function at the level of a Viagra spammer, but still viral marketing *IS* deception.

Your Reddit submissions, until the one you made/deleted today, have been relatively tame. More precisely, the submissions you have made under the handle BrettFromTibet have been tame. Who knows what you have submitted, promoted and virally marketed by other means?

Anyway, I think you deleted your I-can’t-game-Reddit/Digg-frustration -blog-post” today because you know you had mistakenly divulged your business and attracted the attention of people who will eventually get you booted. Stick with stories like the Manhole Cover Art and everything will just be fine.

Food for thought - Bill Hicks on Marketing:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gDW_Hj2K0wo

By: Brett

Brett — Wed, 05 Sep 2007 04:20:11 +0000

YourConscience,

I was active on Usenet and BBSes since I was 14. So, we meet again!

For starters, there’s nothing unethical about doing SEO unless you spam or trick people. There’s nothing wrong with writing interesting content or creating valuable tools or resources and submitting them to relevant, on-topic sites. I write all kinds of stuff - some for a living, some for a hobby - but I would never submit anything to Reddit that I didn’t feel would be of genuine interest to the community there.

http://reddit.com/user/brettfromtibet/
Do you see any spam, ads, manipulation, commercial content, or “Un-reddit-ly” behavior on any of my comments or submissions?

I love social media and I enjoy writing web content as a hobby. People who write interesting and opinionated content are what make sites like Digg and Reddit possible.

I submitted a “story” tonight that is less thought-provoking and more palatable, perhaps:
http://reddit.com/info/2lv14/comments

I’m curious to read the kind of stuff you write / submit / comment on. What is your Reddit username?