Pay to Play

March 1, 2007 8:56 AM

Digg has been gamed.Wired writer Annalee Newitz used the User/Submitter service to buy votes on news site/social aggregatordigg. Hours after she hired the service, her fake blog site, now popular through treachery, was on digg's front page.
posted by four panels (57 comments total)

OH NO NOT DIGG THE INTERNET IS ABOUT TO CRASH SAVE YOUR WORK
posted by DU at 9:01 AM on March 1, 2007 [2 favorites]

Digg gamed? Quelle surprise .....
posted by blucevalo at 9:03 AM on March 1, 2007

I thought it was common knowledge that Digg was easy to game.
posted by Blazecock Pileon at 9:05 AM on March 1, 2007

She digged herself into a hole.
posted by fandango_matt at 9:06 AM on March 1, 2007 [2 favorites]

Anyone else notice that there are increasingly frequent LGF-style anti-Muslim posts that make it to the front page of DIGG? It seemed like at least one to three anti-Muslim posts made it to the front page a day.
posted by bhouston at 9:06 AM on March 1, 2007

Annalee is teh genious!
posted by phaedon at 9:07 AM on March 1, 2007

Internet popularity contests can be gamed? Who knew!!!
posted by ThePinkSuperhero at 9:08 AM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

(Wired News is owned by CondéNet, which also owns Digg competitor reddit.)
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 9:13 AM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

I love the price: $1 / digg. That's nothing.
posted by Nelson at 9:18 AM on March 1, 2007

From the article:

I can tell you exactly how a pointless blog full of poorly written, incoherent commentary made it to the front page on Digg.

This seems like business as usual for digg, ha-ha. It's a shame she didn't put in a section titled, "Why this is important". Because, fuck man, who cares?
posted by boo_radley at 9:20 AM on March 1, 2007

I love the price: $1 / digg. That's nothing.

I'm pretty sure its demographic sweatspot 13-18 or so and they are geek oriented. Thus if you are pushing a video game or movie, it makes a lot of sense to buy links. Most of the people buying votes were pushing really lame and relatively unprofitable topics.
posted by bhouston at 9:21 AM on March 1, 2007

Isn't Digg a game?
posted by srboisvert at 9:21 AM on March 1, 2007

Digg went round the bend some time back and this is just further proof. There are various ways people rig the system.
posted by GavinR at 9:22 AM on March 1, 2007

wow...not only did she get the blog linked on Digg, but now on Metafilter as well! Damn, bet she can sell that puppy for a lot of money!
posted by HuronBob at 9:23 AM on March 1, 2007

I'm pretty sure its demographic sweatspot 13-18 or so and they are geek oriented

Sounds about right for Digg.
posted by uncleozzy at 9:29 AM on March 1, 2007

hahaha, that blog rocks.
posted by delmoi at 9:42 AM on March 1, 2007

Poor four panels.
:(
posted by boo_radley at 9:44 AM on March 1, 2007

Wow - the voice of metafilter has spoken and has (hath?) said: "we don't care".

Annalee is a fine writer and thoughtful essayist on tech issues. Maybe this is old news to you - but I think this was a useful project for pointing out the specific problem with Digg and Digg style sites.

I actually thought her fake blog was pretty funny too.
posted by serazin at 9:47 AM on March 1, 2007

serazin: The problem being that people can pay others to vote a certain way in a largely irrelevant arena? This, sir, is an essay on the obvious.
posted by boo_radley at 9:51 AM on March 1, 2007

Well, you might think it's irrelevant, but, isn't it much more popular than say, metafilter?
posted by serazin at 9:56 AM on March 1, 2007

The question remains: So what? What do I take away from this that wasn't immediately obvious? Saying "The emperor has no clothes!" is one thing, but this is more a case of going to a nudist colony and shouting "the nudist has no clothes!".

...

Do nudists have little doilies for sitting on chairs and stuff? I mean, I guess they have to be remarkably vigilant about bathroom stuff, but I wouldn't want to deal with somebody else's ass sweat on my couch.
posted by boo_radley at 10:00 AM on March 1, 2007

there's a good David Sederis essay on this very topic! It's called, Naked.
posted by serazin at 10:05 AM on March 1, 2007

Warning: Objects on internet are not as popular as they appear.
posted by Citizen Premier at 10:08 AM on March 1, 2007 [5 favorites]

"Anyone else notice that there are increasingly frequent LGF-style anti-Muslim posts that make it to the front page of DIGG?"

Eh, reddit is the same. If it's about Apple, "Bush sucks," "Cheney is the devil," "OMG cops are dicks," or sex, it'll make it onto the front page lickety split.

Generally digg has turned into a total cesspool of rancid attention whores of the worst kind. It's like the "September that never ended" has come back.. for good.
posted by drstein at 10:09 AM on March 1, 2007

That fake blog made me realize I may have a bit of a crowd fetish. I found myself hoping for more crowd pictures.
posted by Citizen Premier at 10:11 AM on March 1, 2007

Generally digg has turned into a total cesspool of rancid attention whores of the worst kind.

amen, brother
posted by malaprohibita at 10:12 AM on March 1, 2007

IMO, the problem with Digg is the apparently extremely low participation rate. It's getting millions of hits, it's overwhelming sites with hundreds of thousands of hits, but it takes less than 100 members hitting the Digg button to make the front page. (And you don't have to go to Digg to Digg most of the stories thanks to imbedded Digg buttons). Yeah, the usual participant/lurker ratio is like 100-to-1, but there it seems closer to 1000-to-1 between clicking the link and hitting the Digg button, which is way easier than writing a comment. I'm also amused by the fact that you don't HAVE TO click the link to Digg a story, and apparently the investigator could show that the early "Paid Diggers" hadn't. The whole algorithm doesn't seem to be working for anything but driving traffic to... wherever.
posted by wendell at 10:13 AM on March 1, 2007

I should also add:

"Lookee, lookee! I made to the front page of digg! I am SOMEBODY!"
posted by malaprohibita at 10:14 AM on March 1, 2007

rancid attention whores of the worst kind

Because there are good kinds?

Oh, and could someone in the know illuminate me on the whole 'cortex' thing?
posted by eurasian at 10:22 AM on March 1, 2007

Wow, they're charging $23 for three diggs and only paying $0.50? I'm surprised no one is undercutting that huge profit margin.
posted by scottreynen at 10:22 AM on March 1, 2007

How much will you people pay me to favorite your MeFi posts?
posted by dr_dank at 10:26 AM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

Anyone else notice that there are increasingly frequent LGF-style anti-Muslim posts that make it to the front page of DIGG?

The libertarian sites mises.org and lewrockwell.com had previously gamed the system very well, and I've seen a lot of links from both SINCE the "Libertarian Diggers" group was exposed. Now, apparently the Muslim-haters at Fartballs have been trying to push the Digg buttons, but are getting some serious blowback from a "Bury Brigade" that may not even be as organized as they are (there are just more of them in the Digg ranks). Anyway, they're complaining that they're being unfairly buried (and doing so in articles they submit to Digg), yet there are one or two "OMG Bad Muslims!!!" items on the front page most of the times I visit. I can only guess what massive quantity of links they're TRYING to push through.
posted by wendell at 10:27 AM on March 1, 2007

eurasian: did cortex put you up to asking that?
posted by boo_radley at 10:29 AM on March 1, 2007

wendell: you should try digg's spy feature, set to new items only. There are some... odd things... in there.

Beginner's astroturfing spotting: find a michelle malkin post in digg, post comment disagreeing politely with it.
posted by boo_radley at 10:31 AM on March 1, 2007

Wait... people actually USE digg????? And admit to it?

Yikes.

Digg and reddit seem like the retarded mongoloid siblings born of a shameful night of drinking and intercourse between fark and slashdot.

I've been quite surprised at all the "digg this" or whatever icons showing up on rather mainstream sites.

Just like most things in this world, it's all about promotion. Quality and functionality are, at best, distant goals, if they exist at all.
posted by Ynoxas at 10:32 AM on March 1, 2007 [3 favorites]

I blame Jimbo Wales
posted by matteo at 10:34 AM on March 1, 2007

Great thread. Dugg.
posted by flashboy at 10:42 AM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

First link has 1975 diggs right now.
posted by pinespree at 10:55 AM on March 1, 2007

The libertarian sites mises.org … had previously gamed the system very well

To be fair to the Mises Institute, it's their fanboys who are gaming Digg, not Mises itself.
posted by Aloysius Bear at 10:56 AM on March 1, 2007

What's a fake blog?
posted by klue at 11:00 AM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

As I recently wrote somewhere, getting Dugg is like speed-dating 10,000 potential lovers who all turn out to be snoopy and non-committal bastards.

Also, I hope Ms. Newitz remembered to call before she dugg.
posted by Milkman Dan at 11:11 AM on March 1, 2007

When do we get a port of Digg on Live Arcade?
posted by Mikey-San at 11:17 AM on March 1, 2007

Well, she has a FPP here now, so technically hasn't she gamed Metafilter too?
posted by kid ichorous at 11:18 AM on March 1, 2007

This blog was very insightful. I learned what a crowd was.
posted by Peter H at 11:29 AM on March 1, 2007

I can get someone on the front page of metafilter for not even $100. You want in, Pepsico?
posted by ontic at 11:48 AM on March 1, 2007

"Digg and reddit seem like the retarded mongoloid siblings born of a shameful night of drinking and intercourse between fark and slashdot."

Wait until the offspring has its own photoshop contests.
posted by drstein at 11:53 AM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

Anyone else notice that there are increasingly frequent LGF-style anti-Muslim posts that make it to the front page of DIGG?

Anyone else notice that there are consistently frequent dKos-style OMG ZIONAZIS RETHUGLICANS posts that make it to the front page of DIGG?

Oh wait, that's nothing new.
posted by Krrrlson at 12:02 PM on March 1, 2007

Krrrlson: OMG ZIONAZIS RETHUGLICANS posts are signs that the general population isn't afraid to show a little political dissent now and then... what do blatant anti-muslim posts show, exactly?
posted by tehloki at 12:13 PM on March 1, 2007

Do nudists have little doilies for sitting on chairs and stuff? I mean, I guess they have to be remarkably vigilant about bathroom stuff, but I wouldn't want to deal with somebody else's ass sweat on my couch.

Yeah usually they'll carry towels.
posted by delmoi at 12:21 PM on March 1, 2007

Trying Something a Bit Different -- A Herd!

I thought it was kinda funny. Kudos.

Arrington says Digg should sue. HA!
posted by mrgrimm at 12:38 PM on March 1, 2007

I want to digg the crowd blog, but can't find it ... anybody got a link?
posted by mrgrimm at 12:40 PM on March 1, 2007

eurasian:Oh, and could someone in the know illuminate me on the whole 'cortex' thing?
See the MetaTalk thread.
posted by mach at 1:02 PM on March 1, 2007

Digg should sue Wired for proving their algorithm is crap? I didn't know you could sue for being publicly embarrassed.

Good Digg takedown here.
posted by chlorus at 1:15 PM on March 1, 2007

Ah, the usual tribal 'that other website where people spend too much of their time sucks' but 'this website where we spend too much of our time totally rocks' nonsense.

If you stay out of the comments, Digg is another good source among many for new linkage. The same could be said -- as shown in thud-dullard threads like this one -- of Metafilter. And their podcast-aggregation section is very cool. I visit the site daily for interesting links among my rounds, even if I almost never read click in to comment threads. Almost the opposite of my behaviour at MeFi.

The 'revelation' that Digg is being gamed isn't a surprise, although it's nice to able to quantify and point to these things. Users will always try to game site features where voting and ranking is used. It's been interesting to watch the ways in which Matt has been cautious and tried his best to minimize the effects such gaming of the Favorites system has had on Metafilter -- no negative voting (so nothing is hidden or buried) for example.

Digg has gotten a lot of attention, and rightly so. It'll be interesting to watch how shilling and agenda-mongering are battled, but no matter what they do in terms of design or moderation, it'll never stop as long as there are ever-more eyeballs rolling over the place.

I blame Google and adsense for once again making the first and most natural question for people who want to build something on the internet, post 2000 tech crash, not 'do I have something to say?' but 'how can I monetize?'. But that's a whole slightly-related other story, perhaps.
posted by stavrosthewonderchicken at 4:12 PM on March 1, 2007 [1 favorite]

This is Number one on reddit right now too!
posted by gergtreble at 4:45 PM on March 1, 2007

OMG ZIONAZIS RETHUGLICANS posts are signs that the general population isn't afraid to show a little political dissent now and then...

If you can't see how ridiculous that sentence looks, then I think we can stop right here. By the way, I think they're waiting for you in the echo chamber.

...what do blatant anti-muslim posts show, exactly?

First of all, the posts I've seen attack Muslim extremism, not Muslims, and second of all... well, they are signs that the general population isn't afraid to show a little political dissent in a skewed PC culture that loves to excoriate some groups while others are somehow taboo.
posted by Krrrlson at 11:32 PM on March 1, 2007

Is this something I'd need zits to understand/care about?

In all seriousness, I hear Digg mentioned here occasionally, usually in a negative light. Never been there.
posted by Goofyy at 6:24 AM on March 2, 2007