Digg.com and the weaknesses of user generated content

A couple of negative articles about Digg.com point out two of the major weaknesses of user generated content: accuracy and quality of content.

First, Cyberjournalist refers to a post by Seve Rubel pointing to a fake Reuters news story - about a recall of the Sony Playstation 3- that fooled hundreds of Digg users and many more readers.

And Busines Week complains that the new posts on Digg look like junk or geek tabloid fare. Quoting Niall Kennedy , Business Week writes: "socially driven Web 2.0 sites are on the verge of becoming spam farms".

I agree with both of them and have reached my own level of disappointment with digg too. I no longer spend any time reading through new posts.

For anyone interested in a specific field, such as technology, searching for new and relevant articles in digg is just too unproductive (too many repetitive stories) and also a dangerous practice as articles can be several months - or even years old - and posted because someone who just discovered them, found them interesting.

For anyone knowledgeable in a specific field who submits a story, the voting process does not reflect it's true value. Great stories don't make it to the front page if they're not posted by the major contributors - who may not be knowledgeable in that field and don't recognize it's value- they carry no weight. So specialists stop submitting their stories, because there is just no point.

I really believe to be truly valuable, user generated content should be submitted by a mix of both popular contributors and recognized experts.

Update 28.11.06: Case in point. A story I submitted to digg yesterday, on a new facial spray which aims to protect skin from cell phone and computer radiation got all of 4 diggs. For anyone interested in the cellphone industry, this was a fun story and was picked up from my blog by many cell phone related and gadget blogs, including Gizmodo. But such a story today will never make it past go on digg, if it's not submitted by a contributor with voting power.

emily | 10:12 AM | Message from textually.org |
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