Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg • Hacker News Board

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#121

Post by citricsquid » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 3:59 AM UTC

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #118

citricsquid wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The replies you'll get are "you make your own reddit, just remove the popular subreddits!" but you're right. reddit is usable for hardcore users that want to invest real time into their experience, it's atrocious for casual users (that don't care for the meme spam). There is a large hole that (new) Digg could fill.

This is obnoxiously false. If no one liked reddit, no one would be there. The majority of current users came from digg. You can watch the decline in content and maturity since then (and before then as digg was shedding users before they flipped the switch on diggv4). The content APPEALS to them which is why reddit keeps gaining users. The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since when the co…

That's true, if nobody liked reddit nobody would be there. That does not mean that reddit isn't missing out of millions more users that are driven away from the site because they don't enjoy the "popular" content but don't understand how they can customise their own reddit, or they don't want to work to get reddit to be a site that they like.

> The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since when the content was good and relevant, are smart enough to find subreddits that appeal to them because they like the style and functionality of reddit.

That's a god awful assumption to make.

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#122

Post by joke-away » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 4:14 AM UTC

wildmXranat wrote: post #92

ot86 wrote: post #77

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's a great post by a redditor that explains how Reddit has become "anti-content": http://www.reddit.com/r/circlebroke/comments/vqy9y/dear_circ...

Very good analysis there. I wonder whether # of eyeballs is more important that accurate ranking algorithms. Viewers are washed, rinsed and asked to repeat.

It's pretty much just ripped from Paul Graham's essay "what I've learned from hackernews": http://paulgraham.com/hackernews.html

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#123

Post by yuhong » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 4:25 AM UTC

jgroome wrote: post #13

> The News.me team will take Digg back to its essence: the best place to find, read and share the stories the internet is talking about. Right now. With my cynicism hat on nice and tight, it seems a bit late for that. Digg WAS, in its heyday, the best place to find and share online content. But as the management undertook on iffy decision after another, and as imitators sprung up left right and centre, it lost its pl…

Yea, this reminds me of the MS/IBM DOS 4.0 fiasco, though in this case it is much worse.

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#124

Post by drivebyacct2 » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 4:29 AM UTC

citricsquid wrote: post #121

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is obnoxiously false. If no one liked reddit, no one would be there. The majority of current users came from digg. You can watch the decline in content and maturity since then (and before then as digg was shedding users before they flipped the switch on diggv4). The content APPEALS to them which is why reddit keeps gaining users. The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since when the co…

That's true, if nobody liked reddit nobody would be there. That does not mean that reddit isn't missing out of millions more users that are driven away from the site because they don't enjoy the "popular" content but don't understand how they can customise their own reddit, or they don't want to work to get reddit to be a site that they like. > The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since w…

Really? The people that were there in the beginning to see subreddits develop... aren't smart enough to "search for subreddits" and find ones that are interesting? Or aren't involved enough to find those subreddits organically?

Maybe it's a bad assumption, but I guess I don't give a shit. This whole "we have to cater to the lowest denominator is the whole thing we're trying to avoid, is it not? Digg was fine when they went after geeks. As they tried to make it social and opened it for massive appeal it went down the shitter. I have no problem with the more refined subreddits staying hidden. If people can't manage to find their way there, they probably shouldn't be there.

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#125

Post by aquateen » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 4:36 AM UTC

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #118

citricsquid wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The replies you'll get are "you make your own reddit, just remove the popular subreddits!" but you're right. reddit is usable for hardcore users that want to invest real time into their experience, it's atrocious for casual users (that don't care for the meme spam). There is a large hole that (new) Digg could fill.

This is obnoxiously false. If no one liked reddit, no one would be there. The majority of current users came from digg. You can watch the decline in content and maturity since then (and before then as digg was shedding users before they flipped the switch on diggv4). The content APPEALS to them which is why reddit keeps gaining users. The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since when the co…

I'd bet a majority of reddit users have never heard of digg.

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#126

Post by deveac » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 5:24 AM UTC

hello_asdf wrote: post #35

jgroome wrote: post #13

> The News.me team will take Digg back to its essence: the best place to find, read and share the stories the internet is talking about. Right now. With my cynicism hat on nice and tight, it seems a bit late for that. Digg WAS, in its heyday, the best place to find and share online content. But as the management undertook on iffy decision after another, and as imitators sprung up left right and centre, it lost its pl…

I liked Reddit back when it was less well known. Now, it just appears that the content appeals to the lowest common denominator. Some of the content is still great (i.e. r/dwarffortress), but a lot of the site has degraded into junk. If anyone has some good subreddits that are still decent, I'd love to know what they are.

Well, it's kind of specific, but r/TheoryofReddit is a very interstitial sub that often deals with the questions we're talking about here. I find it to be quality. Here is an interesting comment regarding the submission problem: http://www.reddit.com/r/ideasfortheadmins/comments/rbwn4/ran...

You could also check out Hubski. It's a much smaller new community with completely different social feed mechanisms. I like it quite a bit, though the volume of users is small (but growing). The owner coded it from the open source HN code. There have always been differences in the features and mechanics, but mk just completed a redesign that completely removed even stylistic similarities.

Time to hit 'reply' and see how badly I mangled this post typing on my phone...

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#127

Post by ricardobeat » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 6:02 AM UTC

thaumaturgy wrote: post #96

citricsquid wrote: post #69

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The replies you'll get are "you make your own reddit, just remove the popular subreddits!" but you're right. reddit is usable for hardcore users that want to invest real time into their experience, it's atrocious for casual users (that don't care for the meme spam). There is a large hole that (new) Digg could fill.

I agree, but I think that Reddit is only usable for a specific subset of hardcore users. Unfortunately, Reddit's admins chose to take a hands-off approach to policing bad behavior in the community. As a result, Reddit regulars have to guard themselves against providing enough information in their comments to attract the attention of a diligent troll. I had a 5-year-old account on Reddit, and had been active on there…

I doesn't matter that Reddit itself is only usable as a news source for hardcore users, if news stories show up there first and then are shared to a wider audience.

That's precisely why it is the source of stories: there is a myriad of communities with the wildest varying interests, and that's where things grow before going mainstream.

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#128

Post by ruhsler » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 7:17 AM UTC

news.me + digg could be good

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#129

Post by icebraining » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 8:07 AM UTC

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #124

citricsquid wrote: post #121

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's true, if nobody liked reddit nobody would be there. That does not mean that reddit isn't missing out of millions more users that are driven away from the site because they don't enjoy the "popular" content but don't understand how they can customise their own reddit, or they don't want to work to get reddit to be a site that they like. > The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since w…

Really? The people that were there in the beginning to see subreddits develop... aren't smart enough to "search for subreddits" and find ones that are interesting? Or aren't involved enough to find those subreddits organically? Maybe it's a bad assumption, but I guess I don't give a shit. This whole "we have to cater to the lowest denominator is the whole thing we're trying to avoid, is it not? Digg was fine when the…

I don't think the point is whether we care or not. The claim was that Reddit powers the news cycles and gets them before Gawker, HuffPo and all the other sites.

Re: Betaworks has acquired the core assets of Digg

#130

Post by capsule_toy » Fri, Jul 13, 2012, 8:43 AM UTC

citricsquid wrote: post #121

drivebyacct2 wrote: post #118

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is obnoxiously false. If no one liked reddit, no one would be there. The majority of current users came from digg. You can watch the decline in content and maturity since then (and before then as digg was shedding users before they flipped the switch on diggv4). The content APPEALS to them which is why reddit keeps gaining users. The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since when the co…

That's true, if nobody liked reddit nobody would be there. That does not mean that reddit isn't missing out of millions more users that are driven away from the site because they don't enjoy the "popular" content but don't understand how they can customise their own reddit, or they don't want to work to get reddit to be a site that they like. > The "real" or "hardcore" users, aka the ones that have been there since w…

I actually think Reddit is quite optimized and not missing out on too many users. The Reddit homepage can take on the following states:

1) As it currently is dominated by memes and linkbait articles 2) Links to actual news and good content 3) A combination of 1 and 2

Out of the 3, my guess is #1 drives the most traffic. If you're goal is to get the most traffic, then almost by definition you're trying to get popular content as the default state.