The Rise of Digg.com

An anonymous reader writes "Wired has a story about Digg, a community bookmarking site that creates its own version of the Slashdot effect. It's a provocatively titled piece - 'Digg Just Might Bury Slashdot' - but goes on to consider the obvious similarities between the two and the differences. Digg is more chaotic, immediate and user driven, whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions." Well, I hate navel-gazing news but I think the aggregation of blogs is a critical step in the future of on-line content, and Digg is doing good work here. The interesting thing will happen when their population grows a bit more. Scalability is hard... but I imagine the millions of dollars of VC funding will really help.

Comments

Naval Gazing?

[Liselle]

CmdrTaco, I like the Navy as much as anyone else, but I don't see how looking at sailors has anything to do with Slashdot or Digg. Oh, you meant "navel gazing". Well, some of us like to talk about the site, though, can we get a topic for it? Maybe? The icon could be a battleship. :D

So anyway, we finally have a story where Digg.com rants are not offtopic. Well, I'll fire the opening salvo: I've been to Digg, and their stories are much more current than Slashdot's (seemingly because of the way stories are posted), but the comment system is a steaming pile. There is no threading (seriously hard to follow conversations without threading). And, despite Slashdot's flawed moderation system, scanning article comments at +4 is usually a pleasant experience, and I can't find that kind of functionality on Digg as an anonymous reader.

I come to Slashdot for the comments. Not for the editor abuses, the typos, the political slant, the "last week" news, blah blah etc. I know I am not alone in this. It seems to me that Slashdot and Digg are both filling a different niche at the moment. I'd like to see Digg with a better commenting system and some form of user-moderation of posts: right now it resembles graffiti on the wall, not discussion.

Any Digg cheerleaders out there with some positive things to add about the comment system that I missed in my ignorance?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[gr8dude]

I come to slashdot for the comments.

I second that. The comments are fantabulous, and I really learned a LOT of new things as a slashdotter. I admit that some of the signatures are great too.

But the comments are the best. There's no place like slashdot!

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Otter]

Oh, you meant "navel gazing".

In Rob's defense, at least he can spell "dig" correctly. (Probably.)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[RobotRunAmok]

CmdrTaco, I like the Navy as much as anyone else, but I don't see how looking at sailors has anything to do with Slashdot or Digg. Oh, you meant "navel gazing".

Now even the typos, and the subsequent jokes they engender, are dupes!

I sit here slack-jawed and in awe.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

I learned that the word fantabulous is still used daily by some people.

What a strange world.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

I come to Slashdot for the comments. Not for the editor abuses, the typos, the political slant, the "last week" news, blah blah etc. I know I am not alone in this.

I come to slashdot for the trolls.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Mr. Underbridge]

Any Digg cheerleaders out there with some positive things to add about the comment system that I missed in my ignorance?

Not a cheerleader, but a user of both sites, so here goes:

I've been to Digg, and their stories are much more current than Slashdot's (seemingly because of the way stories are posted)

Right on both points. They don't have lazy editors to get in the way between a good story and the readers. A truly democratic method. I'm surprised, though, that a troll community hasn't been fostered that gets foul image sites permanantly at the top. Maybe they have a method of preventing that, I don't know that much about it.

but the comment system is a steaming pile. There is no threading (seriously hard to follow conversations without threading). And, despite Slashdot's flawed moderation system, scanning article comments at +4 is usually a pleasant experience, and I can't find that kind of functionality on Digg as an anonymous reader.

Comments aren't digg's focus. The stories are. You'll get some commentary on the story, but that's about it. And I think there's some simplistic beauty in that - the goal there isn't to get an off-topic discussion going, it's to provide a simple mechanism for commenting *on the story.* So threads aren't really needed. This doesn't mean they're better or worse than /., just different.

I come to Slashdot for the comments. Not for the editor abuses, the typos, the political slant, the "last week" news, blah blah etc. I know I am not alone in this. It seems to me that Slashdot and Digg are both filling a different niche at the moment.

Precisely.

I'd like to see Digg with a better commenting system and some form of user-moderation of posts: right now it resembles graffiti on the wall, not discussion.

But then it would be slashdot - what would be the point?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Kelson]

Who on /. hasn't spent hours staring at the C, contemplating its mysteries and trying to fathom its depths?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Flaming Babies]

I've been to Digg, and their stories are much more current than Slashdot's (seemingly because of the way stories are posted)

I, myself, have not been to Digg...
Just curious if you saw the http://diggvsdot.com/ link in the story?
I've heard many times here that Digg comes out with stories faster...this seems to disagree.
Is this bad data?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Kelson]

Comments aren't digg's focus. The stories are. You'll get some commentary on the story, but that's about it. And I think there's some simplistic beauty in that - the goal there isn't to get an off-topic discussion going, it's to provide a simple mechanism for commenting *on the story.* So threads aren't really needed. This doesn't mean they're better or worse than /., just different.

I know a lot of people here hate the word, but that makes Digg sound an awful lot like a blog...

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Khalid]

http://linuxfr.org/ is such a beast. Posted stories are voted for by readers, and it has a Slashdot like moderation system. I don't really think that the result is that much better than Slashdot, quite the contrary in my opinion, maybe because it has less readership than Slashdot, so some stories take way too long to make it to the main page, although this has improved recently.

Note that it's in french.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[ToxikFetus]

In a similar vein, one year "The Capital", Annapolis, MD's daily newspaper, ran a front page story on the "Navel Academy Graduation." Mind you, the US Naval Academy is located in Annapolis, and the artical pretty much summed up the competence of said newspaper.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

What about auto-posting top-rated digg stories on slashdot?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[cawpin]

"There is no threading (seriously hard to follow conversations without threading). And, despite Slashdot's flawed moderation system, scanning article comments at +4 is usually a pleasant experience, and I can't find that kind of functionality on Digg as an anonymous reader."

You obviously don't look too hard. The threshold for comments is right under the "Comments" title. As for threading, I prefer it not threaded. I can read all the comments on one page and easily see who is replying to whom. Threaded replies are just a pain. That's why it took so long to reply to you as a I had to go throught all the replies to make sure someone hadn't already said what I wanted to.

So there.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Liselle]

But then it would be slashdot - what would be the point?

It would be Slashdot without the editors. I think that would be interesting to see, if nothing else.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Riktov]

>>
So anyway, we finally have a story where Digg.com rants are not offtopic. Well, I'll fire the opening salvo: ...
>>

Over the bow, I presume. (And I'll gaze at the shell flying through the air.)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[thebosz]

I agree that on first glance, Slashdot seems to come out ahead. What the article means is over the entire time dig vs dot has been tracking it. If you were to change the "View By" setting to "All Results" you'll see that Digg.com is slightly ahead of Slashdot. Personally, I don't think that it means too much with the results that close (as of this moment 252 for Digg and 223 for Slashdot).

As far as Digg.com taking over goes, I'm in total aggrement with the Grandparent. You don't get any sort of intellectual discussion there like you do here (of course, using the comment threshold to its full advantage ;) ), but I don't think that's the point of Digg.com.

There is a way to report duplicates, spam, lame, or broken links on Digg.com but I haven't noticed any difference when I use that because I like to see the latest instead of waiting a week until a story hits the front page. I suppose the editors wait until a certain amount of complaints come in until they do something. It seems to work over all because few duplicate stories make it to the front page.

Personally, I keep an eye on both sites.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[nutshell42]

I've been to Digg, and their stories are much more current than Slashdot's [...] And, despite Slashdot's flawed moderation system, scanning article comments at +4 is usually a pleasant experience, and I can't find that kind of functionality on Digg as an anonymous reader.

I think those points are two sides of the same coin. We don't come to /. for the news, we come here to talk about yesterday's news and an important part of every productive discussion is that all sides are familiar with the topic and have an informed (*cough* but we *are* talking about +4 here) opinion about it.

/. - Watercooler discussions for nerds. Stuff that mattered a few days ago.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[GFunk83]

I'd like to see Digg with a better commenting system and some form of user-moderation of posts...

There is actually a user-driven commenting system:
-3 SPAM
-2 Flame
-1 Off Topic
0
+1 Useful
+2 Insightful
+3 Excellent

This isn't as specific (or targeted, if you prefer) as the Slashdot moderation system, but that's probably okay because, as some other posters have mentioned, digg is more focused on the stories than the comments. However, it would be nice if the current system worked well. As it is, most users either don't know how to use the moderation feature or don't care to use it.

There is no threading (seriously hard to follow conversations without threading).

Threading is another thing I'd really like to see on digg. Many users currently reply to eachother by using "@[username]" before the content of their reply.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Victor022]

I've been reading Slashdot for years but I actually like Digg's comment format better, It's like a chat room where many conversations can happen at once. It would be better if it had moderation like Slashdot's though, ala thisdaily. The comment's are flat and -everything- can be moderated by users, meaning no mods/admins needed! I would actually like to see Slashdot adopt this method for the front page, it would turn complaining about dupes into doing something about it.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[fyngyrz]

To be blunt, I think that the reason that taco hates nav(e|a)l gazing is because there is so much that needs improvement.

I too come for the comments. There are some real gems. Quite often, they've been modded into oblivion by some idiot who ( inexplicably) has mod points. That's why I don't read slashdot at +4; slashdot's moderation, to be blunt, doesn't work. Because it is so often punitive and/or ideologically driven, it makes no sense to trust it to limit what you read; and because it is anonymous, there is no ability for the community to rein in such abuses. Add to this the fact that meta-moderation simply doesn't work, as evidenced by the fact that slashdot's primary moderation is just as broken today as it was years back.

Step it up a level: It'd sure be nice if everyone who "edits" the stories had decent English skills. For instance, yesterday, in a story entitled "Smart hotels in New York City", the following nugget creeps, steaming and raw, into the reader's eye: "People will use computing as natural as they use writing instruments." Errors like that appear almost every day, putting the lie to the very idea that there are "editors" at work. People are approving stories, certainly, but at least one of them is not "editing" them. I find it a little sad that a site which claims to serve a technically inclined audience can't be bothered with the technical details of writing, even to the point of the truly minor and/or obvious. Naval, indeed.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Khalid]

Amen to that; although it often seems here that Everybody here loves to hate Slashdot comments :) I have been an avid Slashdot reader for at least 6 ou 7 yes :) and I have spent (lost :) ?) an awful amount of my life reading this thing, but I have to admit that I have learned an incredible amount of things here, and it has contributed to broaden my technology horizon.

Things I have discovered here :

Linux and Open source
MP3 (yes the first I heard about it was here)
p2p
Google (that was really the begining of the begining)
Wikipedia

and much more

I have then been an evangelist for these among my friends and relatives.

Slashdot is incredibly useful to spot emerging trends, and I am pretty sure that it has been fundamental in the launch of the sites and technologies mentioned above; Google has really learned that, that's why you have now at least one Google story per day.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[laughingcoyote]

I'm not a spelling nazi...but c'mon, when you're complaining about a misspelling in a newspaper article, you got to run the spellchecker yoursellf.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[ParadoxDruid]

I come to Slashdot for the comments.

I agree wholeheartedly. I tried Digg, and still get useful links from their sometimes, but it's lacking a soul. There's no community beyond framers and a brazen competition for frontpage stories. There's no interesting discussion of links.

That said, Slashdot could learn a lesson or two from Digg:

• Better integration with other websites.
  Digg's "Blog this" and other tools really allow people with a web presence to link seemlessly with Digg, making it easy on them and reinforcing the popularity of Digg by easily spreading it.
• The "didn't make it" stories
  Often, I find more interesting links in Digg when digging through new links, and ignoring the front-page entirely. Slashdot could have a "stories that didn't make the cut" section, and I'd be very interested.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you like it really fresh, try the new http://www.digg.com/q feature. It displays stories not yet posted to the homepage sorted by most recent vote time so that you can get an idea of what are soon-to-be popular posts.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Bogtha]

I'm surprised, though, that a troll community hasn't been fostered that gets foul image sites permanantly at the top. Maybe they have a method of preventing that, I don't know that much about it.

My guess would be that Slashdot are vulnerable to trolls and Digg are not because Slashdot has Broken Windows.

Slashdot exhibits a lot of broken behaviour - dupes, typos, bad grammar, entire words missing from sentences, obvious astroturfing/paid-for stories, front-page stories linking to Goatse pages, etc. Most of this can be explained by editors who can't or won't do a good job. This both attracts people who take advantage of that, drives away people who care about that, and frustrates the people who end up staying for the comments.

Digg doesn't exhibit the same systematic, long-term failures of Slashdot, so it's less likely to attract vandals and malcontents.

I'd like to see Digg with a better commenting system and some form of user-moderation of posts: right now it resembles graffiti on the wall, not discussion.

But then it would be slashdot - what would be the point?

It wouldn't be Slashdot until it added all the problems listed above. Digg with better comments would be like Slashdot with those problems fixed. And since the Slashdot editors obviously don't want to fix Slashdot, it's up to somebody else like Digg to take over.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Eric Giguere]

That's a good analogy, actually, a blog that is ordered by popularity instead of chronologically. Although you could argue that popularity of a blog posting can already be measured by the number of comments it generates, and some blog software lets you order entries that way.

Eric
Read my Invisible Fence Guide

Re:Naval Gazing?

[op12]

One other feature that Digg has over Slashdot: You can report dupes/old news/stupid posts and enough people reporting these things can trigger it to not get posted.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[glassjaw rocks]

I second that, you COCKSMOKING FUCKER!

Don't use so many caps. It's like YELLING.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[anonymo]

I did not compared the time-stamps on digg and on slashdot to see which was first, but I prefere Slashot. I do not agree with the moderation system on Slashdot but there's an easy way to improve it for your taste: pick those members who adds good comment in your opinion and add to your friend list.
Add +2 point to them and +1 to their friends.
Voila' you have a personalised moderation :)
It works for me just fine!

A reform of moderating on Slashdot would be good, but imho the personalised moderation by frien modifier is almost better :)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[PeteyG]

You are getting away from the FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM with Digg. Namely that the display of the 'stories' or articles is not linear in nature. This is good if you are viewing digg infrequently, but when you are going back regularly, new stories will not necesarilly be at the top. The mechanism that determines this is not at all clear.

Therefore, Digg is completely inferior to Slashdot.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Their trolls will have a field day with this once they get a sizable troll "community".

Re:Naval Gazing?

[usernotfound]

I almost always go take a gander and DIGG after spending my regular 2 hours here. Sure, digg has articles sometimes a few days before slashdot, but, like everyone else i'm sure notices, we have intelligent discussion here (and of course flames and flamebait, but hey, it's entertaining). Also, on digg, there'are waaaaaay too many stories saying "OMG we can compete with slashdot!!". I'd say atleast once a day there's something to that effect, yet we rarely post articles about it. We're not worried, but they clearly feel inferior, for good reason.
Just 8 hours ago this story was on the digg front page: http://digg.com/technology/Digg_Just_Might_Bury_Sl ashdot
Also we already have a digg article about the slashdot article. And these are only the ones that make their front page.
I just think DIGG users are too self absorbed in trying to be cooler than us, when their comment system utterly lets down any intelligent discussion.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[AKAImBatman]

Good points. One you didn't mention, however, is the point that really annoyed me while using it: The quality of the stories was consistently dropping. The digg users were continually finding stories about fart jokes or stupid flash animations far more interesting than any real info on science and technology. Thus the automatic filtering has been breaking down due to the opinion of its users. The end result is that you still have to do a massive amount of manual filtering to find anything of interest.

Oh, and their search engine sucks just as badly as Slashdot's. It works better technologically, but you still can never find the old stories you're looking for.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

"artical" Thanks for this illuminating post.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[BushCheney08]

Slashdot could have a "stories that didn't make the cut" section, and I'd be very interested.

That's exactly what I was thinking. This would be a nice feature to offer to subscribers.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[chris_mahan]

I would add to that that /. is a great place to get straight answers about products and technologies that are hyped or denigrated by corporate marketing departments. I would say that when a product gets low slashdot id thumbs up or thumbs down, this significantly inpacts its adoption or rejection as far as I am concerned.

(yes, I tried to merge everything into one sentence... j/k, gosh!)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[spludge]

Many people have suggested this to the slashdot editors and there is even an FAQ entry:

http://slashdot.org/faq/suggestions.shtml#su400

I've emailed them myself because I disagree with the FAQ entry. Slashdot could open up their submission queue (just like Digg) and it would be a very interesting read. The reply to my email was that this is not what slashdot wants to be, however I think that slashdot can do both. Have accepted stories with indepth commentary and a posting queue without many comments. Perhaps with paid access, although now with Digg I'm not sure I'd pay for access to Slashdot's posting queue.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[nigelo]

"you got to run the spellchecker yoursellf"

Er, I can't get no grammar/spellchecker satisfaction.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Karzz1]

I said across his nose, not up it!!! -- Dark Helmet

Re:Naval Gazing?

[houseofzeus]

Slashdot exhibits a lot of broken behaviour - dupes, typos, bad grammar, entire words missing from sentences, obvious astroturfing/paid-for stories, front-page stories linking to Goatse pages, etc.

Anyone claiming Digg doesn't have these problems isn't looking hard enough. Many articles do get duplicated (and dugg up to the top), have ridiculously poor grammar in the blurb and/or link directly to some tards blog, which in turn links directly to the ACTUAL article anyway.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[ToasterofDOOM]

For another interesting comparison, check netcraft for digg and compare it with slashdot Slashdot way outclasses them, natably in ranking as the 47th most visited site. (I swear, half of the top ten are google)

Also, for uptime people, /. last rebooted 102 days ago while for digg it is only 40 days ago.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[smitke]

I like http://diggvsdot.com./
Using their scoring system Slashdot doesn't look that bad.
However, if they had a -1 for delays longer than 24 hours Digg would score much better.

Slashdot may post earlier sometimes but Digg rarely is more than 24 hours behind.
Slashdot was 30+ hours behind on a number of stories.

I read Slashdot for the great comments.
Digg looks like a good alternative if /.ers are annoying.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[D3]

Hah! I've got you beat by 8 user IDs! ;0

Re:Naval Gazing?

[d_lesage]

That's not a problem at all if you're using RSS to "read" Digg.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Things I have discovered here :

Linux and Open source
MP3 (yes the first I heard about it was here)
p2p
Google (that was really the begining of the begining)
Wikipedia

Yeah, Slashdot is like a Digg of ideas in that way. Certain ideas resonate and take hold in the hive-mind through a democratic process mostly independent of any story selection the editors do.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

"got to" should be "have to" or "should"

and "yousellf" is spelled "yourself".

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

"scanning article comments at +4 is usually a pleasant experience, and I can't find that kind of functionality on Digg as an anonymous reader"

I'm AC because I don't want to take the time to log in

Actually, there is comment modding on digg. It's not that useful though. When you mod a comment (range from +3 to -3), it disappears from your screen (because the default threshold is 0), but I don't know how many people have to mod it down for it to actually be modded down for everyone who views the page. Most people don't use it, except to remove ads, so it's practically worthless.

Also, you must not have viewed any comments pages on digg because right at the top of the comments of an article post, there is a label that says, "Comment View Threshold" with a little combo box next to it. Please check before you bash. I will say that this feature is rendered virtually useless because no one bothers to mod comments.

I agree that the commenting system is horrendous. But that's not news. Anyone who visits the site knows that.

I've had enough of slash-digg wars. Both are good, for different reasons, so use both.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

The quality of the stories was consistently dropping.

That will only get worse once it goes more mainstream because a democratic system means it's a popularity contest, and we all know popularity doesn't mean quality.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[olorinpc]

Ended up writing quite a bit about this topic here http://www.sgbtech.com/?p=125 . but basically there are different reasons behind the sites.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[briancurtin]

Threaded replies are just a pain. That's why it took so long to reply to you as a I had to go throught all the replies to make sure someone hadn't already said what I wanted to.

more people should follow your lead. it gets old reading the exact same comments over and over and over, and all of them are moderated up the same even though the first post of that same idea was made hours and hours ago.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[daviddennis]

I think you mean nested mode here. In flat mode I don't think it would be feasible to read all replies.

Threaded systems, where you have to click individual messages to read them, drive me nuts because of server lag. I'd rather just see the whole thing.

Nested mode's great for that.

D

Re:Naval Gazing?

[PeteyG]

OMG what if I don't want to use RSS? What if I want to use... gasp... a web browser to access (wait for it...) a web site?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[focitrixilous P]

Yeah, I've been a reader for about 3 years. I had heard of google, but I really picked up a lot of useful and useless computer tricks. I probably wouldn't have discovered Nethack without /., I would have been years late on Bittorrent, I saw digg linked on /. in one of the pointless comments that makes me like /.

Just like playboy, no one reads slashdot for the articles.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

I think way too much is made of who "gets the scoop". Does it really matter if you learn that decaf will kill you a couple days late? Besides, most of the news stories that circulate on blogs aren't all that new anyway, so a couple days more or less doesn't really matter. There are a few stories that are important to get out fast, like the Greasemonkey vulnerability in Firefox, but, again, that was weeks old when it started to be reported on blogs, including /..

I think what's much more important is well selected stories; accurate, descriptive titles; and good summaries that don't assume you are an expert in a specific area. Digg seems to have /. beat on all those points.

IMO, the biggest shortcomings of /. are misleading titles, bad, often plagiarized summaries, frequent typos and dupes, and apparent undisclosed advertisements disguised as stories. It's only strength is the discussion that follows each story.

In short, I'll definately be spending a lot more time at digg in the future. Thanks for the tip, Taco. Don't worry, I was blocking your adds anyway. ;)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[RetroGeek]

Yes, except the pagination system is serious screwed up.

Let's say that the system allows x posts per page. If the first comment has more than x replies, then you will NEVER see x+1, x+2, and so on replies.

Clicking on Page 2 simply retrieves Page 1. If there are enough replies, the Page 2, 3, etc also only retrieve Page 1.

Eventually you CAN see the next root comment, but all those first comment replies are lost to viewing.

Unless there is some option I have not found.....

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Khalid]

Well you deserve all my respect, you are my elder here :)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[RetroGeek]

Sigh.

Serious should be seriously
the Page should be then Page

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Khalid]

Slashdot archives are also great, I particularly appreciate ask slashdot

Re:Naval Gazing?

[RetroGeek]

because a democratic system means it's a popularity contest, and we all know popularity doesn't mean quality

But wait, this is how we elect politicians!

LOL

Re:Naval Gazing?

[tsa]

Exactly. The moderation system works quite well. Browsing at +1 keeps most of the Beavis and Butthead speak away, and makes for nice reading. Keep up the good work, Taco et al.!

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Mr. Underbridge]

You are getting away from the FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM with Digg. Namely that the display of the 'stories' or articles is not linear in nature. This is good if you are viewing digg infrequently, but when you are going back regularly, new stories will not necesarilly be at the top. The mechanism that determines this is not at all clear.

Stories stay at the top if they are consistently "dug." Stories that are consitently "dug" are new to the majority of active "diggers." Therefore, a digger that is as active as the average digger consistently sees new stories.

You're right in that new stories don't go straight to the top. *Popular* stories stay at the top. But that's good - less popular stories fade faster. This is a much superior system in that important news is persistent. If you've seen the lead story, ignore it and scroll down, but other people will probably want to see it.

In any event, the problem you cite is only an issue for people hit digg tons of times per day. If that describes you, I'd suggest getting a life. Either that or do your part by sifting through other stories not on the front page and voting them up.

Therefore, Digg is completely inferior to Slashdot.

Hard to buy that considering that digg lacks the blatant editorializing, dupes, and other crap that plagues slashdot.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[lowrydr310]

Slashdot turned me into a bitch. Seriously...

Before I started reading Slashdot I was aware of techy stuff through friends of mine. Now that I'm a regular reader I feel compelled to complain about everything, especially stories from the YRO section (which are usually things that wouldn't otherwise bother me, but so many people whine and complain and it makes me do the same).

Look at me now - I'm bitching about becoming a bitch.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[SamSim]

I don't believe that site examines all the data. It goes back seven days but only lists a fraction of the stories which both sites have in common. Also, Digg lists a whole bundle of stories which never even show up on /., and vice-versa.

Frankly I think it's ridiculous to judge the sites on what they do the same, instead of what they do differently.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[advb89]

/. - Watercooler discussions for nerds. Stuff that mattered a few days ago. Hey, you would make a good sig... oh well, i already got one

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Capt James McCarthy]

Not a cheerleader, but a user of both sites, so here goes:

Holy crap! You really don't have a job....or...how does one aquire a job like yours?

I have a hard time keeping up with /.'s stuff. I mean with all that pr0n getting in the way...

Re:Naval Gazing?

[mrjackson2000]

digg has also been having growing pains, they have been doing alot of server stuff to overcome that. and really, is uptime that much of a factor?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[maelstrom]

Big deal.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Dude, slashdot is a blog. So what?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[ToasterofDOOM]

I personally don't think uptime is of utmost importance, but some do. However, really long uptimes indicate stability, and under /.s much heavier load it has still surpassed digg. I understand it's not a fair comparison, but I was just pointing out an interesting fact.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[cagle_.25]

Let me know if you find the solution. I've just resigned myself to reading only the first and last comments on a multi-page discussion.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Archangel_Azazel]

OMG!?! What if he was just offering a suggestion to help you out you ignorant prick?

*sighs* there goes my karma...just sick of seeing people get sarcasm in response to helping. /me shrugs...karma is made to burn I suppose.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Writer]

And just for the things you may have missed, you can look up the extensive information about Slashdot subculture on Wikipedia.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[WrongDecision]

I come here for the comments. "." 100%

I also read Digg and reddit; but for the links ONLY.

No worries, /.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Mars Ultor]

Ducks are birds. Birds have beaks. Therefore, ducks are completely inferior to pot scrubbers.

Wow. That is an astounding argument. I can't combat that. The way you drew me through your main points, in such an easy, flowing manner...then slammed my head into a wall with an abrubt nonsensical conclusion. You had me at hello!

You must have had a hand in analyzying all that Iraqi weapons intelligence before the war huh? :P

Re:Naval Gazing?

[MilenCent]

I too come for the comments. There are some real gems. Quite often, they've been modded into oblivion by some idiot who ( inexplicably) has mod points. That's why I don't read slashdot at +4; slashdot's moderation, to be blunt, doesn't work. Because it is so often punitive and/or ideologically driven, it makes no sense to trust it to limit what you read; and because it is anonymous, there is no ability for the community to rein in such abuses.

The solution to that, of course, has always been metamoderation, but that itself has been revealed to be broken in recent months by users who use the Overrated and Underrated mods, which are used to mark comments up or down without risking a reduction in mod points from negative metamods. Meaning over time, disproportionately many mod points may be put in the hands of these people.

Of course, some of this is speculation. But it'd explain some strangenesses I've noticed lately in moderations I've seen towards my own comments, and those I've seen of other people.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[MegaFur]

That said, Slashdot could learn a lesson or two from Digg:

You're right it could, but it probably won't because it's old and dumb. OTOH, digg could learn a lot from this article. Let's hope someone over there in charge at digg reads the thing and implements a slashdot-style mod system. Ok, ok so the slashdot mod system ain't exactly what we'd call, uh, good, but it's better than nothing.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[slimey_limey]

Stuff that mattered a few days ago.

And yet /. still seems to get the news out days before the Seattle Times.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[masterzora]

You are getting away from the FUNDAMENTAL PROBLEM with Digg. Namely that the display of the 'stories' or articles is not linear in nature. This is good if you are viewing digg infrequently, but when you are going back regularly, new stories will not necesarilly be at the top. The mechanism that determines this is not at all clear.

Stories stay at the top if they are consistently "dug." Stories that are consitently "dug" are new to the majority of active "diggers." Therefore, a digger that is as active as the average digger consistently sees new stories.

That's true /in theory/. But I'e seen a ton of people say "Wow, I remember when I saw this back in 1996. Dugg!" or something stupid like that. Certainly you aren't trying to tell us that those are new for those people?

You're right in that new stories don't go straight to the top. *Popular* stories stay at the top. But that's good - less popular stories fade faster. This is a much superior system in that important news is persistent. If you've seen the lead story, ignore it and scroll down, but other people will probably want to see it.

Once more, this is true /in theory/. However, people Digg random crap that doesn't belong. The site says in multiple places that Digg is for technology news, but people still Digg stupid things that certainly can't be considered important news. In fact, these things usually get the most Diggs (especially ones that say "DIGG IS GONNA BEAT SLASHDOT LOLZ0R!!!!!).

Therefore, Digg is completely inferior to Slashdot.

Hard to buy that considering that digg lacks the blatant editorializing, dupes, and other crap that plagues slashdot.

Wow. What Digg do you read? I look at Digg and I find more editorializing by more people, tons more dupes (and then people yell at me when I point out the fact), and plenty more crap including and beyond that which plagues Slashdot.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[macshit]

I know a lot of people here hate the word, but that makes Digg sound an awful lot like a blog...

Yup; from what I've seen, Digg reads pretty much like a typical web-forum/blogg/whatever; stories can be rated so that people know what's most popular (most web forums just show the most recently posted story first, which actually does tend to keep them in "popularity order", but less explicitly).

The comments I read were mostly the completely random pointless crap you tend to get on most web forums. They allow you to "rate" comments too (I guess like kuro5hin's "anybody can moderate" system), but there's little evidence that anybody actually takes advantage of this, and as you might expect, the few ratings that do get done don't seem to have much meaning (i.e., high-rated comments typically don't seem to be very good ones). As others have mentioned. there's also no apparent threading of comments, which makes it hard to follow them as a series of conversations, and reinforces the "random" nature of the result.

Another problem with digg is one shared by most "slashdot-like" sites (included many that use slashcode): most stories have very few comments, which means that few achieve the "critical mass" necessary to get a really good discussion going.

Finally, the digg user-community seems far more average than Slashdot's -- despite all the trolls, Slashdot has an unusually high degree of smart and knowledgeable users, and the moderation system tends to make their comments visible (and hide those of the trolls). Fundamentally it's the boring users (posting banal pointless comments) that make most web-forums so awful, and Digg has this problem in spades. Slashdot's elaborate mechanisms may seem unfair to some, but they do a pretty good job of keeping conversations focused and interesting, which is exactly what Digg comments aren't.

The end result is that Digg is actually quite lame; I don't know why people are getting so excited about it. It you want more anarchy (but more crap) than Slashdot, Kuro5hin appears to offer roughly the same functionality implemented more competently, with a somewhat more clueful user community.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[unitron]

All these naval gazing posts and not one "hello, sailor" joke? :-)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[lasermike026]

I'm sorry but i'm not happy with my slashdot experience. The karma thing hasn't work for me and I don't know why my karma is so low. Low karma reduces unpopular speech which makes this a more repressive system. The "Karma haves" speech gets louder while the Karma "have nots" userbase die away. This system directs speech. Why would someone with "bad" karma want to stay with slashdot? Also, authors have to much control on what is presented on slashdot. They act as barrier to what we see. Digg authors put stuff out there but the value of the story is determined by the users. That's better. People see what they want to see. Slashdot, stop trying to make something and start letting things emerge. PS. why is my karma so slow anyway?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Dollyknot]

If I were a moderator you would be moderated up

Re:Naval Gazing?

[cli_rules!]

I'm a relative newcomer, and was wondering if the mod system lets pals mod up each other's posts? (watch me get modded down for asking :)

Re:Naval Gazing?

[macshit]

As far as Digg.com taking over goes, I'm in total aggrement with the Grandparent. You don't get any sort of intellectual discussion there like you do here (of course, using the comment threshold to its full advantage ;) ), but I don't think that's the point of Digg.com.

Er, but what exactly is the point of Digg? If you want tons of random and pointless comments on the same stories every other site is reporting, there are approximately 535,239,887 web-forums out there to keep you happy.

Slashdot, on the other hand, is (in my experience) rather unique, in that it offers generally high-quality discussion from a very wide range of viewpoints (i.e., without being a closed community). Sure the editors are often kinda lame, but the system works quite well on average; even the dumbest stories duped for the 5th time often end up generating interesting conversations.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[jungleboy.ca]

...an informed (*cough* but we *are* talking about +4 here) opinion about it.

We are talking about Slashdot, right? This is the home of the "5, insightful" uninformed opinion. I do agree that higher thresholds reduce the amount of crap. However, plenty of informed, well-written posts are missed by moderators and get culled just the same.

I guess the point I'm trying to make is that readers should be just as skeptical of the comments at +5 as they are of those at -1. To do otherwise promotes groupthink in favour of individual skepticism and thought.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[jonom]

Digg does have user moderation of posts. Nobody seems to use it much though.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[apoc.famine]

To some extent I agree, but I left Digg after a few weeks of trying it out. Why? Because there was a lot of useless crap posted that made the main page. In fact, there was more useless crap there than I found on Slashdot. Yes, we have substantially more astroturfing and adverarticles, but at least here people point them out. And those people get moderated up when they do. On digg, if a person or two point out that everyone is sending clicks to a paid-per-view website disguised as an article, they get lost in the shuffle.

Another issue I saw was that when users can vote-in articles, one runs into the problem that most users are fucking morons. I saw the same article hit the frontpage 3x in one day, actually being on it in two locations at once. Different submitters, apparently different people voting it in. Not worse than slashdot, but when I come here, at least people realize that it's a dupe. The other issue is that someone can submit a story into the "submission pool" as often as they want. I saw one shitty-ass self-promotion show up, after a bunch of morons "Dugg" it. Checking the submitters history, they had submitted the same article SEVEN TIMES in the last two days, with slightly different writeups.

While Digg could be better, it won't be until they learn how to moderate (and thread) comments. When intelligent and insightful people can speak up on the topic at hand, everyone wins. When they get drowned out by trolls and omg-me-too-fanboys, the article has to stand on its own merits. While I see the power of a democratic system of story submissions, I'll take useful editors over it any day. Currently, Digg's voting system isn't much worse than the editors here.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[L7_]

Me too, reading at anything other than -1 is just too boring. :x

Re:Naval Gazing?

[geofferensis]

Right. Slashdot is just like Playboy. They are identical. I can't tell the difference sometimes.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[L7_]

Yeah and its not long that the 'Edit' nature of blogs will see the same linked to Goatse pictures from digg (when it gets popular enough). In fact, I can see 400 troll accounts set up just to 'digg' thier stories up to the top, to which they will later change the blog link to some goatse/tubgirl pic (since they control the blog).

Re:Naval Gazing?

[JAppi]

How is slashdot useful to spot emerging trends if all the news is weeks old?

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

Threaded replies are just a pain. That's why it took so long to reply to you as a I had to go throught all the replies to make sure someone hadn't already said what I wanted to. more people should follow your lead. it gets old reading the exact same comments over and over and over, and all of them are moderated up the same even though the first post of that same idea was made hours and hours ago.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[L7_]

I'm pretty sure you can add someone to your friends list and then associate a plus bonus to all your friends in said list. Which seems to be exaclty what you're looking for. Check your user page up top.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[ggvaidya]

Watercooler discussions for nerds.

Actually, I think of Slashdot more like an online geek pub. Everybody gathers 'round and has a drink, listening in on complicated discussions on the economy and the latest sports and the president (or, in our case, software and Bill Gates), joining in when we feel like. And every once in a while some grizzled old veteran in the corner will loudly yell "Bollocks!", and everybody goes silent as he tells of the war, and how it was back in the day with mainframes as big as dinosaurs and OS's slower than anything we could possibly imagine. Then somebody makes a stupid joke, the pub explodes into laughter, and we get back to our drinks until something else interesting turns up.

Not that I'm complaining, you guys are fun to have a drink with, even if it is virtual :).

Re:Naval Gazing?

[wbren]

Speaking as a fan of Digg:

We hate the comments system too.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Mr. Underbridge]

That's true /in theory/. But I'e seen a ton of people say "Wow, I remember when I saw this back in 1996. Dugg!" or something stupid like that. Certainly you aren't trying to tell us that those are new for those people?

Once more, this is true /in theory/. However, people Digg random crap that doesn't belong. The site says in multiple places that Digg is for technology news, but people still Digg stupid things that certainly can't be considered important news. In fact, these things usually get the most Diggs (especially ones that say "DIGG IS GONNA BEAT SLASHDOT LOLZ0R!!!!!).

Two things: You're right, digg isn't purely a news site. It is somewhat more prone to "nostalgia" stories than slashdot. But by definition, if they get to the top, then enough people thought it was worth seeing to vote it up. Basically, this means that you share different tastes than the average digger. That's OK - it doesn't mean the site is inferior somehow, it just isn't for you. Different strokes, ya know?

Wow. What Digg do you read? I look at Digg and I find more editorializing by more people, tons more dupes (and then people yell at me when I point out the fact), and plenty more crap including and beyond that which plagues Slashdot.

Not to be pedantic, but it's hard for digg to have any editorializing when it has no editors. It has commentary - some of it by annoying clowns - but that's missing the point because commentary really isn't the point of digg. I don't even read it, most times.

More things you won't find on digg: slashvertisements, propaganda stories, flamewars (for the most part), trolls (for the most part), punitive modding from editors (timothy and michael were fantastic for that), and more.

I'm not saying digg is better than slashdot (I'm still here, evidently), but it can often be refreshing in a lot of ways. But as far as you're concerned, you're looking for a pure news site with a fully-featured message board system. Well, that's not digg. That's slashdot. So you have what you need right? No probelms.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[masterzora]

Two things: You're right, digg isn't purely a news site. It is somewhat more prone to "nostalgia" stories than slashdot. But by definition, if they get to the top, then enough people thought it was worth seeing to vote it up. Basically, this means that you share different tastes than the average digger. That's OK - it doesn't mean the site is inferior somehow, it just isn't for you. Different strokes, ya know?

The thing isn't so much that my tastes are different (I quite enjoy many of those such stories, in fact). The thing is that the Digg site actually says that Digg is a technology news website, but it isn't living up to that. Well, that, and the number of "stories" that are on Digg several dozen times get REALLY REALLY annoying.

Not to be pedantic, but it's hard for digg to have any editorializing when it has no editors.

No, please, be pedantic. This is Slashdot, after all. ;)
However, dictionary.com has a different take on this issue:
editorialize: "To present an opinion in the guise of an objective report."
Real example from Digg: There was a posting of a link that was a list of media players. Ignoring for the moment the issue of whether or not it belongs on Digg, the summary ended with the phrase "and get away from that windows media player!" If that's not editorializing, I don't know what is.

More things you won't find on digg: slashvertisements, propaganda stories, flamewars (for the most part), trolls (for the most part), punitive modding from editors (timothy and michael were fantastic for that), and more.

Slashvertisements: More or less absent on Digg (unless it's from Apple)
propaganda stories: More or less absent on Digg (unless it's about Apple)
flamewars: More or less absent on Digg (unless it's about Apple, evolution, or whether or not Digg should be just technology news and related issues)
trolls: Absent on Digg (but you just wait until Digg has a notable audience and comments get notable use, and you'll see the trolls roll in)
punitive modding from editors: Of course, because there are no real editors, and nobody bothers to mod comments.

I'm not saying digg is better than slashdot (I'm still here, evidently), but it can often be refreshing in a lot of ways. But as far as you're concerned, you're looking for a pure news site with a fully-featured message board system. Well, that's not digg. That's slashdot. So you have what you need right? No probelms.

I'm not saying one is inherently better than the other (I still go to both more than daily), I'm just saying that Digg's problems are greater than most people know. If Digg fixed their problems, I'm sad to say that I would likely jump off of Slashdot in an instant. I'm not looking for a pure news site (not even Slashdot really provides that). I'm looking for a site that does what it says it does (in Digg's case, provide technology news in a user-driven manner). If Digg continues like it does, it should compare itself constantly to del.icio.us, not Slashdot.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[garymcg]

Anyone that doesn't give trolls +5 is missing out on the rare but exceptionally humorous troll, such as The Troll Polka . Funniest thing ever on Slashdot, it you don't mind the rude subject matter.

I come to Slashdot for the comments. The stories are timely on Digg, but the comments over there are just plain tiresome.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

If you don't like an article for a legit reason, you can report it on Digg. This system, for the most part, works... Is there a dupe? Report it as a dupe and it will likely not be on the front page much longer. I am a regular of Digg and I never see dupes on the front page at the same time.

And as other people have pointed out, Digg isn't being held back by its crappy comment system - that is what sets it apart. You go to Digg to see very recent news (often a day or two before slashdot) and RTFAs, something slashdot readers could learn a lesson about. Instead of spending time reading comments (like I do on slashdot) I spend time on digg reading articles and editorials on blogs. I still use both because they are still different enough to make it worth it.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[ErixTr]

I was thinking that was just me. Please post a solution if there is one.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[rjenkins1]

Slashdot just gave them free publicity.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[Anonymous Coward]

CmdrTaco, I like the Navy as much as anyone else, but I don't see how looking at sailors has anything to do with Slashdot or Digg. Oh, you meant "navel gazing". Well, some of us like to talk about the site, though, can we get a topic for it? Maybe? The icon could be a battleship. :D

^^ This would be a prime example of why I don't visit Slashdot.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[mdecarle]

I may be wrong, but that huge button on the right "digg for stories" goes to a page with all the stories, "sort by: newest".

Re:Naval Gazing?

[MullerMn]

The solution to that, of course, has always been metamoderation, but that itself has been revealed to be broken in recent months by users who use the Overrated and Underrated mods, which are used to mark comments up or down without risking a reduction in mod points from negative metamods.

As someone who sometimes does this, I'd like to point out that the reason is that the metamoderation system is equally broken from the moderator's perspective. You can quite often apply a moderation which is correct in the context of the surrounding posts, but which gets you slapped in M2.

Re:Naval Gazing?

[MilenCent]

You can quite often apply a moderation which is correct in the context of the surrounding posts, but which gets you slapped in M2.

That's why, when I metamod, if there's a question of context, I always make sure to get the parent of the original message....

I agree it should be easier to do this, though. I also think there should be an option you can enable that, when you get mod points, will temporarily set your threshold to -1....

My comparison

[DeadSea]

I have been reading slashdot for years and digg for months. I don't ever see one replacing the other. Some people will like one, some will like the other, but many will like both. Here is my comparison:

Editorial:
Slashdot: Targeted by very technical editors, I generally want to hear about 40% of the stories.
Digg: Targeted by users, I generally want to hear about 5% of the stories.

Comments:
Slashdot: Best comment system I've seen with a large number of commenters (threshold 4 for me)
Digg: Comments are worthless.

Timeliness:
Slashdot: Stories are often days old (and duplicates abound).
Digg: Generally havn't seen it before.

RSS:
Slashdot: As a subscriber, I get a full customized rss feed with some unexpected plums (see my latest journal entry)
Digg: The RSS feed doesn't contain the link to the story, forcing you to go to their useless comments page.

Re:My comparison

[P3NIS_CLEAVER]

Slashdot: Stories are often days old (and duplicates abound).

They are not duplicates. They are a Beowulf Cluster of Stories.

Re:My comparison

[rovingeyes]

Editorial: Slashdot: Targeted by very technical editors, I generally want to hear about 40% of the stories. Digg: Targeted by users, I generally want to hear about 5% of the stories.

I think you are missing an important distinction. Stories in Digg do not get rejected. If it is of great interest to lot of people, it makes to the front page. In /. if the editor doesn't want to hear about it, it adios...Pick your coolaid.

Re:My comparison

[TooMuchEspressoGuy]

"I think you are missing an important distinction. Stories in Digg do not get rejected. If it is of great interest to lot of people, it makes to the front page."

Just wait until it gets even more popular, and half the stories are Goatse redirects.

Rejection does involve personal opinion, yes, but it's also an excellent way of filtering the wheat from the chaff, so to speak. And it shows. Just looking at Digg's front page, it looks like a chaotic mish-mash of stories compared to Slashdot's.

Re:My comparison

[Liselle]

Maybe I read it wrong, but it sounds like the grandparent poster was talking about the overall interest-factor of the stories. On Slashdot, he finds two out of every five stories interesting to him, on Digg he finds one out of every twenty interesting to him.

So I assume that you are suggesting that since the stories the editors pick can be rejected, one of the rejected stories might be of interest to the GP and he'd miss it? Well, wouldn't the same thing happen on Digg if not enoguh people thought it was interesting in the first place? Seems to me he's noticed a great difference in the signal/noise ratio in respect to interesting visible stories, and it doesn't have much if anything to do with the way that the stories are chosen, but YMMV I suppose.

Re:My comparison

[Exocrist]

Digg stories dont necessarily get rejected, but only the popular ones make it to the front page. The bad stories kinda reject themselves by not getting enough votes to get to the front page.

Re:My comparison

[ivan256]

That's both the strength and the major weekness of Digg. It shows you what the majority wants to see. For now that means it's only slightly obnoxious. As it becomes popular with more mainstream "tech" guys it will become less and less useful for people with niche interests. We already have media that caters to the mainstream, and they know exactly how to draw readers. Just because it's user driven doesn't mean the front page won't look more and more like a cross between a variety of trade rags, just a few weeks early.

I don't know about you, but I could care less about what the majority of people want to read. I want to read what *I* want to read, and the best way to do that is to find a site that is moderated in a way that matches your interests.

Hopefully the people who like Digg better will go there instead, and stop bitching about how their stories got rejected in off topic slashdot comments.

Re:My comparison

[rovingeyes]

First of all digg and slashdot do not have the same niche. Idea is similar - have a story and have people comment on it and argue. But slashdot tends to be more technical in nature - even YRO to the most part. Digg on the other hand does not restrict you to a particular set of categories. You can even post a goatse link if you want to. But will it get to the front page, most probably not unless we have too many wackos in this fading republic. But on the other hand I see it this way - it is good to know about something else other than just technology; although I lose interest very quickly. Even though the stories can be any topic, if you notice the front page stories on digg, they are more or less technical. Now I don't know if that is gonna stay that way forever.

Re:My comparison

[generic-man]

I didn't like that system the first time, when it was called Kuro5hin. Just because a story is popular doesn't mean it is of interest to absolutely everyone.

I actually like Slashdot's subsections; I can specify that I want to see all Games stories but no YRO stories, and the home page changes accordingly. I have seen no news site that handles such filters as smoothly -- certainly not Google News or Yahoo News, where everything's split up into blocks that change at different rates.

Re:My comparison

[DeadSea]

kuro5hin.org is the other site that I used to read where the stories for the front page are chosen by the users. Kuro5hin eventually pissed me off enough because so many people insisted that nothing get to the front page without perfect grammar and spelling. Almost all the good stories are rejected IMO.

I would personally rather read a badly written write-up of something that is interesting rather than a well written fluff piece. I guess that is why I put up with CmdrTaco.

Re:My comparison

[sedyn]

I don't know if digg already has this, but from what you said it sounds like digg needs is an amazon-like "people who liked this story also liked..." function.

Re:My comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

"I don't ever see one replacing the other. Some people will like one, some will like the other, but many will like both"

Just like Coke and Pepsi

Re:My comparison

[ConnorDDD]

There will always be a slashdot, it's an institution. The democratic, bottom-up model isn't bad when it's done the right way (reddit has filtering), which means filtering out all the 15yr olds posting the shameless digg/kevinrose-related promotion. I've used slashdot for years, largely for the entertainment here in the comments (this is actually the first time I've had the stones to post non-anon), something digg can't reproduce.

Re:My comparison

[courtarro]

I don't know about you, but I could care less about what the majority of people want to read. I want to read what *I* want to read, and the best way to do that is to find a site that is moderated in a way that matches your interests.

(I think you mean you "couldn't" care less...)

This, though, is what Slashdot could be with some simple training of the editors: a collection of well-chosen articles that is consistently based on a particular range of topics, with well-written summaries. I genuinely don't understand why the editing at /. hasn't improved in the many years of complaints about dupes and bad grammar. Slashdot has gotten into the bad habit of posting "italicized quotations" for the summaries, which specifically prevents the editors from modifying those summaries and doing exactly what the job description entails: editing. Instead of posting rote copy, the editors should be converting the summaries to paraphrased copy with proper grammar, as well as checking for basic errors in facts and interpretations.

Personally, I like the current list that is supplied by the Del.icio.us Popular page. If you're not into things like web design, CSS style, and Web 2.0, it's probably not for you. However, I probably end up visiting 50% of the links that appear on that page simply because the types of people who currently interact with Delicious are just like me. Also, that page doesn't really reward users who contribute to it passively (by saving links on Delicious) since there's no summary to be proud of, or comments to attract attention. It's simply a list of links that are attracting the most attention right now. Eventually even this site will probably succumb to popular interests and become a list of links to ebaum's world, but for now, it's exactly what I want.

Re:My comparison

[freeweed]

Hopefully the people who like Digg better will go there instead, and stop bitching about how their stories got rejected in off topic slashdot comments.

Hear, hear!

Can I make a request that anyone who uses the phrases "groupthink" or "Slashdot bias" when bitching about the moderation system also move on over to Digg?

Re:My comparison

[Cro Magnon]

IMO, K5 used to be good. Slashdot was better for tech stuff, but K5 had some good political stuff. But the last year or two, K5 has gone downhill. The trolls have conquered it, and all the sane people have left. Except me.

Re:My comparison

[fatcatman]

As an aside, if somebody just wants to store bookmarks online & off, I've got a better alternative. There are several Digg-type "social bookmarking" sites, but none concentrate purely on the storage of bookmarks in a personal way as well as memFrag.

Of course, having developed the site, I'm heavily biased. But I wanted to share, anyway.

Re:My comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

With digg the one thing about it is that stories aren't censored. They just might not make the frontpage. If you register and use the 'friends' system, then you can find the gems in the bunch. With the friends system you can add a digg user to your friends list and be able to see all of the digg stories that he/she has dugg (voted for). If you find users that are your friends or that just have similar tastes in the type of stories that they like, then you can rely on 'newly posted stories' list or their list of stories they dugg. You don't have to rely on the frontpage for everything. It's just convient to see what the top stories are through the community.

Slashdot doesn't have something like this. The editors are a filter between the users and the stories. So if something is niche enough that the editors deem it to be useless, then it doesn't hit the slashdot at all. On the other hand with digg, it gets onto digg. It might not get to the frontpage, but it gets onto digg. But to achieve something like this you have to be part of the community and at least contribute to it by digg'ing stories. If you do this, people will be able to see your tastes and add you as a friend. Then they can digg stories that you have dugg, and others can see them and add them as friends, and so on... This allows for the possibility of sub-communities of like-minded people that may not be in the mainstream of the overall digg community. Just because a story doesn't get 1000+ diggs doesn't mean that no one found it useful.

Re:My comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

You are asking me to register, cheeky monkey, you are asking me to give you my --> personal -- details?

Re:My comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

You are asking me to register, cheeky monkey, you are asking me to give you my --> personal -- details?

His site only requires you to choose a username and password. How is that asking for personal details?

Re:My comparison

[Anonymous Coward]

I am not sure that I want to join the bookmark harvesting brigade

Re:My comparison

[jrest]

Digg: The RSS feed doesn't contain the link to the story, forcing you to go to their useless comments page.

Digg user frankvanrest has published a better RSS feed at http://dlfwww.liacs.nl/frank/rss.php

Already read this?

[Kelson]

Every other story I've read on /. over the past few weeks has had at least one comment saying, "Hey, get your act together, this was on Digg 3 days ago!"

I wonder how long it'll take for someone to post one here?

Re:Already read this?

[rovingeyes]

Yup I read it on digg 3 days ago.

Re:Already read this?

[HardCase]

Every other story I've read on /. over the past few weeks has had at least one comment saying, "Hey, get your act together, this was on Digg 3 days ago!"

I wonder how long it'll take for someone to post one here?

Apparently, about 5 minutes:

Late again
(Score:4, Funny)
by jcorno (889560) Alter Relationship on 11:00 AM November 17th, 2005 (#14054249)
Digg.com had this article posted six hours ago.
--
got milk? then you're a human and must be killed

Re:Already read this?

[penguinoid]

Hey, get your act together, this was on Digg 3 days ago!

Re:Already read this?

[Arandir]

Everything was on Digg three days ago. But it will take you three more days to find it.

Re:Already read this?

[BokLM]

Hey, get your act together, this was on Digg 50 minutes ago!

Re:Already read this?

[DavidBartlett]

Well, at least we sorta beat them to this one:

http://www.digg.com/technology/Digg.com_makes_Slas hdot.

Re:Already read this?

[Kelson]

I don't know, I only see a story on Slashdot about Digg. I don't see a story on Slashdot about Slashdot posting a story about Digg. I think we missed this one, too!

Digg?

[BushCheney08]

Dugg

Re:Digg?

[BushCheney08]

Offtopic my ass! Whoever modded this has obviously never seen the comment section of digg.com (hint: this is what about half the comments consist of over there).

Re:Digg?

[Eric Giguere]

Yeah, but, like, it's so 80's...

Eric
See your HTTP headers

A Critical Difference

[Dotnaught]

A Slashdot post will get you traffic, if you have a site linked to your user id. That's not the case with Digg. Ergo, Slashdot wins. It gives you more for participating. For Web site owners, traffic has real value.

Re:A Critical Difference

[saskboy]

I agree, I often get Slashdotters visiting my webpages, which is pretty neat I think and some even look around so they must like what they see?

I got my Digg account last week, so at least I'll have a low number user ID on one major online community ;-)

Re:A Critical Difference

[mcho]

I disagree with the comment that traffic has real value.

As a web site owner, traffic from /. doesn't necessarily translate into new customers, increase ad revenue, etc. And, ironically, this has been discussed on digg.com.

(Of course this comment won't see the light of day because if you don't post early, you're comments aren't moderated any higher to 'Nothing to See Here, Move On'.)

Re:A Critical Difference

[external400kdiskette]

And if your domain contains the word sex you'll get 1000% more traffic :)

Re:A Critical Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

False.

Slashdot's user links just give spammers such as Roland Piquapelle and Beatles-Beatles an easy way to get their sites onto the first page on google, and an incentive to contribute to all the dupes. All they need to do is find an article, wrap the first paragraph in tags and walk away laughing. All the way to the bank.

Re:A Critical Difference

[rizole]

Can everybody please click on the link in the parents sig. Lets see if we can prove all his points wrong and maybe he'll stop bugging us and go to Digg instead.

Re:A Critical Difference

[freeweed]

Re:A Critical Difference (Score:5, Interesting)
by mcho (878145)

Of course this comment won't see the light of day

Always kills me to see a poster disproven by their own comment.

Or is this a new, subtle version of the "I know I'm going to be modded down for this, but..." type of karma-whoring?

Re:A Critical Difference

[Mr. Foogle]

As a web site owner, traffic from /. doesn't necessarily translate into new customers, increase ad revenue, etc.

I disagree - we see an increase in attention (one metric is people signing up to our maillist at http://www.liftport.com/lists.php) every time 'space elevators' are in an entry. Granted none of these folks are customers and we're not generating revenue so YMMV.

Re:A Critical Difference

[mcho]

Well, I've included that short statement because it's true: if you don't post early, chances are you're not going to be modded up. I've posted before because I thought I had something interesting to add to the conversation and it was buried because it wasn't one of the first posts...

...or maybe it wasn't that interesting at all.

Overall, the main point of my original post was that an increase of /. traffic doesn't necessarily translate to an increase of customers (if you have a commerce-based web site).

Re:A Critical Difference

[Dollyknot]

I thought I had something interesting to add to the conversation and it was buried because it wasn't one of the first posts...

That has happened to me too.

Re:A Critical Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

you dont get business from slashdot because your product is written with the .NET framework

Re:A Critical Difference

[Anonymous Coward]

Me too!

nothing to see here

[ChrisCampbell47]

Please go away. You are finding Digg very very boring, you want to stay with Slashdot. Nothing to see at all. Mmmmkay?

Re:nothing to see here

[Anonymous Coward]

Screw that. If digg can absorb more idiot commenters from this place, I'll give them money. It looks like they've found a way to distill the moron-PHP-webforum mentality into almost pure form.

rewriting Oscar Wilde

[rovingeyes]

The quote below the page is from oscar wilde

"There are two ways of disliking poetry; one way is to dislike it, the other is to read Pope." -- Oscar Wilde

Lets modify it...

"There are two ways of disliking slashdot; one way is to dislike it, the other is to read digg. -- rovingeyes

Oscar Wilde sue me for copyright infringment.

Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[senocular]

Slashdot x Digg = The DigDot Effect
...
*Internet explodes*

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[schon]

I'm wondering if that might have been one of Taco's thoughts when he was debating posting this with his distaste for "naval" gazing..

"Damn upstarts - let's see how they handle a good /.'ing." :o)

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[Anonymous Coward]

FTFA:

The comparisons are clear -- while the official term for adding a link to Digg is "digging," popular sites that receive a huge wave of traffic get a "Diggdotting," a nod to "Slashdotting."

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[ToasterofDOOM]

If we slashdot digg in a holy war, will it be a diggdotting? A slashdigging? Diggslashing? Will any server survive if we post stories at the same time? Will our heroes prevail?

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[bk4u]

/me wonders if posting story on slashdot is an attempt to overrun their servers with the slashdot effect

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, at the very least, it looks like Wired is down. But we can still look at the Goolge cache.

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[Darthmalt]

What the heck lets get fark.com in on the action. Slahdot/Digg/Fark the new Axis of evil bringing servers down on a whim. Administrators everywhere cower in fear.

Re:Digg Mentioned on Slashdot...

[theblackhawk007]

more like Slashdot + Digg = Diggdot- Nerds digging for stuff that matters.

Technical Dissusions here??!?!?!

[Anonymous Coward]

Here are the technical discussions here:
- What would a beowolf cluster of these do?
- What would mother russia do?
- What would you guys recommend for a programmer who has never programmed?
- What does a girl smell like?

Naval gazing

[mblase]

Well, I hate naval gazing news

Yeah, staring at Naval vessels gets kind of boring unless you're really into that kind of thing.

Gazing at navels, on the other hand, I could do for hours....

Re:Naval gazing

[WhiteLudaFan]

I would bet a large sum of money that you're not just looking at their navels. :)

Re:Naval gazing

[blametheduck]

Thank you, that bikini link was really "Informative".

As for the ships, well we all know what ship looks like, right?

Re:Naval gazing

[Woldry]

Of course, it could be that gazing at the naval personnel, not materiel, is what floats your boat: http://www.ruggedelegantliving.com/a/002567.html

Digg (revisited)

[BushCheney08]

I've been checking out digg for the past few weeks. The only real advantage I see to it over slashdot is that you can see all the submitted articles and vote them up to the front page. The downside of that is that there's a whole lotta crap to filter through. And there's nobody to blame for the dupes. And the comment system sucks. And the dupes. Oh, and many of the posters seem to be 15 (at least those tend to get modded down on /.).

Re:Digg (revisited)

[Lewisham]

You're right about the crap problem, and it will only get worse. As Digg continues to expand, so the number of users submitting stories is increasing. If we assume there's only so much interesting news a day, the crap ratio is going to increase as well. This seems to be happening already.

Digg will implode if the expansion continues, because no-one will be bothered to digg for anything that isn't on the front page. So in the end, those that have the time/inclination to wade through the stories will end up becoming pseudo-editors (you can promote a story on just 50 diggs if you submit at the right time), and then it'll either get dugg more by people who enjoyed it and can't be bothered to digg for stories, or it'll be reported out. Front page stories will only end up being the ones that the pseudo-editors like.

Losing the Digg we're-all-equal-community ethos seems inevitable. They should give up, and start weighting user votes. For example: users who post stories that are often promoted; those who digg stories that are often promoted; or those that comment well should have their submitted stories in one pool. Stories below this privledged status go into another one. The stories for all will still go to the front page, but the more esoteric stuff that a sizable majority enjoy reading about (which really made Digg; getting stories interesting to you that editors didn't think were worthy) will end up in the privaledged pool.

Like Taco said, scalability is going to be a big problem if you aren't ruling from the top-down.

Re:Digg (revisited)

[doormat]

Oh, and many of the posters seem to be 15 (at least those tend to get modded down on /.).

My #1 problem with Digg is that it seems to be the same crowd that followed The Screen Savers on ZDTV/TechTV/G4/whatever. Younger kids dumber than I (I am 24 and have a BS in Computer Engineering so I figure I have a higher standard when it comes to the kind of news and analysis I want). I use digg to browse the news and whats going on, like I do here at /. (now that I have excellent Karma, I dont feel the need to post as much), and there have been some real gems I've found at digg that I would have probably not found anywhere else - the Best Buy Xbox 360 allocations was a good one - I found that the store near my house had 54 Xboxes total - so if I wanted one I'd have to get their early, I'm still debating if I want one or can wait 'til after the new year.

I stopped listening to the digg podcast since its basically Kevin Rose and that other guy Alex being drunk and stupid and laughing all the time. Plus their sponsor is GoDaddy, who's owner made some very flawed political statements he heard off some douchebag talk-radio jockey, plus the tasteless superbowl ads last year.

So yea, the only place I go for real in-depth news is ArsTechnica. Everywhere else is just filler.

Re:Digg (revisited)

[doormat]

Losing the Digg we're-all-equal-community ethos seems inevitable

Didn't Kuro5hin try that? I thought it didnt turn out too good. Although I will volunteer to work for digg on the weekends as an editor if they give me some of that $2.7M in VC funds they have.

Re:Digg (revisited)

[Anonymous Coward]

Or, perhaps, stories can simply be displayed in order of submission, with thresholds on number-of-times-dugg acting as a filter, much in the same way most people filter their Slashdot comment reading. Just without the moderators who consider "The government expanding is BAD!" to be "+3, Insightful".

Re:Digg (revisited)

[Qubit]

It looks like Slashdot, Digg, and Wired were all doing shots, and Wired just fell under the table...

Re:Digg (revisited)

[jp10558]

Hmm, I haven't really figured out Ars Technica for news yet, beyond what shows up on other sites as links. Their forums are good, but rather heavy for entertainment purposes for me, though goldmines for help if you have a specific question.

But they are still kind of low on my radar, I tend to go to DSLR (which seems to have a good mix of n00bs and techies, not to mention several respected professionals who post a lot) first, followed by Astalavista.net, and then get to Ars. I just don't really like the way their forums work - I get an e-mail telling me there were 0 new posts today on a thread I subscribed to. All I want is a mail when there is a new post.

Re:Digg (revisited)

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't forget that Digg actually LOOKS like a professionally designed website, and doesn't have this putrid green or Times Roman font! (Who uses Times Roman on a website????)

Slashdot is stuck in the 80's.(sic)

Re:Digg (revisited)

[Xepo]

Had an idea after reading your comment. Lots of people commented about how the Digg front-page is just a result of what the majority vote on, and the majority isn't intelligent. So here's a way to make everyone happy:

When you digg a story, link your username to everyone else that has dugg the same story. After digging at least 30-40 stories, you've got a nice little cluster of users which you relate to pretty well. The front-page for each user could be different, giving more weight to the people who digg like you do, and less weight to those who don't.

Now hopefully the stupid majority will be in a different cluster of users than the more intelligent people.

Combine that with a comment system like slashdot's, and I think you've got a real improvement on the system as a whole.

So Who's Goin' Down First?

[dcw3]

Ok, so /. links a story to them, and they link one back. The question is, who's servers are gonna melt down first?

Re:So Who's Goin' Down First?

[Major_Small]

wow... it's recursive linking... I actually clicked the digg link here and then clicked their story's header thinking maybe I'd get to read more, but it linked right back to the story I just came from...

Re:So Who's Goin' Down First?

[Andrewkov]

And an endless, ad-displaying, revenue generating loop is created! The perfect business plan! :-)

Re:So Who's Goin' Down First?

[booch]

Well, the Wired site is the one that's not working now. Unfortunately, Coral Cache doesn't seem to have a copy.

Late again

[jcorno]

Digg.com had this article posted six hours ago.

Re:Late again

[ezeecheez]

This joke was on there 5 hours and 59 minutes ago.

Re:Late again

[LoganEkz]

Digg.com had this article posted six hours ago.

I'll bite at this.

When did the article make it the main page? It seems that when people refer to when an article was posted, they are talking about when the article was submitted to digg.com, not when it appeared on the digg front page. Even sites such as digg vs dot use the digg article submission time and compare this with when the article appeared on Slashdot.

This is comparing apples vs oranges.

What I would like to see is a comparison of when the digg articles appear on the digg front page vs when they appear on the Slashdot front page.

Re:Late again

[elcid73]

Me too. I agree with you and owuld like to buy you a pizza (ok- I'm kidding about the pizza part)

Re:Late again

[Otto]

For this *particular* story, the story on digg only appeared after it appeared on slashdot.

However, being a long time reader of both digg and Slashdot, I find that links to stories which appear on Slashdot nowadays invariably have appeared on Digg's front page up to 2 days earlier. More, sometimes. Slashdot is not the place to go for up-to-the-minute articles.

My alternative theory is that the majority of Slashdot submissions are now coming from people who found the articles they're submitting from seeing them on digg.

Re:Late again

[zxking]

This is comparing apples vs oranges.

Are you sure that you want to say this?

Comparing apples vs oranges is no longer considered valid :)

Re:Late again

[WhatAmIDoingHere]

Want to see fresh new stories on digg.com? Try The Q.

Design

[jeremedia]

For me, Digg's primary advantage more modern, more readable page design. However, as other have mentioned many time, Digg's story comments are never, ever interesting or informative,

Re:Design

[jlp2097]

Digg's story comments are never, ever interesting or informative.

But that implies.... Ah, never mind :-)

Re:Design

[Anonymous Coward]

Digg.com looks like a shitty blog.

Re:Design

[jp10558]

What's odd is I find slashdot far more readable than Digg. Especially the threading, but mostly, the comments aren't all broken up in an odd ?diaglog bubble? I keep looking for the cartoon character speaking.

Plus, slashdot's format is far less distracting to me, just the comments, not trying to be "cool".

Maybe I'm elitest, but I've always found that if you are trying to be "cool", you aren't and won't be as long as you try.

Saw this last week on digg

[Anonymous Coward]

Actually I have only been to digg a few times. And I guess I don't get it.
Perhaps it is, as others have pointed out, the unstructured comment system.
For me /. is all about the comments, no matter the moderation level.

I see no reason for any major changes at Slashdot.org. If you don't like it go elsewhere.

The comparison is interesting

[Anonymous Coward]

I started looking at digg last week when I saw it mentioned in a slashdot comment. The mix of articles is usually interesting, but the comments are abysmal. Seriously, something about digg.com encourages comments which are almost indistinguishable from crapflooding. Who the fuck cares if you "dugg" the article? And when people aren't posting retarded "dugg/no dugg" comments, they are spewing stupidity that makes slashdot look like a MENSA meeting.

My recommendation: Put digg.com in your RSS feed, and never read the comments. Anything else is asking for a lower view of humanity.

Re:The comparison is interesting

[jp10558]

True. Digg is where /. should go when they want to feel intellectual. I mean, most posters I see with a default mod of 1 at least can use capitalization. I don't think digg actually ever moves gibberish off of the comments. Either that, or most diggers (is that what they call themselves?) don't know what the moderation widget means.

/. killer

[LittleGuernica]

So Digg is the latest Slashdot killer from Sony?

Less in depth than /.?!?!

[vondo]

I think I'll just skip it.

Its own version of the slashdot effect?

[jlp2097]

Let's show them who's the boss! :-)

Re:Its own version of the slashdot effect?

[Anonymous Coward]

It's official... diggdown...

just waiting

[Exstatica]

I'm just waiting for when slashdot drops digg to it's knees with the slashdot effect, Then we'll show it who's boss.

Digg is...

[John Napkintosh]

A Google, Apple, Firefox and Kevin Rose wankfest. Nothing against any of those individually, but put them all together with a fanatical userbase and it can be pretty painful sometimes.

Heaven help you if you try to become engaged in commenting.

Re:Digg is...

[Anonymous Coward]

You are joking right ? Excuse me but then whats the difference then with slashdot?

The only difference is the comments childish versus the zealots with their fud. Insightfull technical information my ass.

Re:Digg is...

[Anonymous Coward]

add in adam curry and you wil have a giant circle jerk of the wannabe's of the internet.

Ok google is not a wannabe, but they are slumming in the group for kicks.

kevin is a kissup that really has little technical abilities but huge networking and step on others skills. all of them fro mthe Screensavers crew are that way.

add in a out of work VJ that has no talent and you have the perfect circle jerk.

Re:Digg is...

[maddskillz]

Whereas Slashdot is a Google, Apple, Firefox and Kevin Rose wankfest and Microsoft hatefest.
At least Slashdot has threaded comments though

Re:Digg is...

[krakelohm]

I am gonna get creamed for this... but is that any better then here where it is a personal ego wankfest?

Re:Digg is...

[jp10558]

So, totally off topic, but is your sig a typo, or more likely some sort of psychological point - maybe that we read what we expect to see?

Re:Digg is...

[krakelohm]

It is actually something that my uncle says on occasion. The way he delivers it is just classic.

Let's Look at the Comments...

[TooMuchEspressoGuy]

On the Slashdot front page, at the time of this posting, the most recent five articles have 17, 124, 101, 178, and 232 comments.

On the Digg front page, the most recent five have 1, 6, 5, 15, and 13 comments.

Yep, Slashdot is REALLY in danger.

Re:Let's Look at the Comments...

[rm69990]

Lol, and considering most posts on digg are a sentence fragment, Slashdot really has nothing to worry about.

Re:Let's Look at the Comments...

[Elwood P Dowd]

Most of /.'s readership doesn't read comments. I'm sure Digg users are even less interested in comments, because their comments are a steaming pile.

So comparing their comment statistics doesn't mean anything. /. could descend into bankruptcy without losing any ground in # of comments, and that would probably be how things went if /. ever did fade. Because the people who comment here and like it aren't leaving for a site that doesn't have a similar moderation system that mostly works.

Re:Let's Look at the Comments...

[iteachgeeks]

On the Slashdot front page, at the time of this posting, the most recent five articles have 17, 124, 101, 178, and 232 comments. On the Digg front page, the most recent five have 1, 6, 5, 15, and 13 comments. Yep, Slashdot is REALLY in danger.

On digg it's not the number of comments it's the number of diggs that matters.

Re:Let's Look at the Comments...

[lexbaby]

However, those most recent 5 "diggs" can be replaced with new "diggs" a few times over before the next story on Slashdot is posted.

Re:Let's Look at the Comments...

[Mancat]

As soon as school starts getting out, the comments go through the roof. That also shows you the average age of Digg posters.

Re:Let's Look at the Comments...

[tawker]

Well, I don't know about exact timing but there are 24 time zoes around the world. I strongly doubt that most diggers are school kids, digg is just another great link source. You also seem to imply that many school age kids are posting junk, what is there to stop anyone else from posting junk. It's not just kids you know. At least as I see it, I keep both digg's and shashdot's RSS feeds on my google homepage, and it seems to get me most of the news just fine.

I really hate this...

[ColdCoffee]

Why can't both co-exist peacefully without constant 'Slash-Digging' at each other? I like both sites. I check them both quite frequently throughout the day? Can't we all just play nice? There's enough room for both Slashdot AND Digg!!

Re:I really hate this...

[Brazilian Invasion]

I make your words mine too.

Re:I really hate this...

[Anonymous Coward]

There's little profit in peace.

In other news...

[TheSpoom]

Steve Ballmer has recently sent a cease and desist letter to the operators of Digg.com, and has threatened legal action for violating his patented business methods.

In depth and technical

[Anonymous Coward]

I have always loved the indepth and technical goatse post of the past. Slashdotters keep up the good work!!

Digg.com diggnation!

[bearigus77]

Digg.com also has this amazing video podcast they offer. It is hilarious and well run. The two guys that are on it (alex albrecht and kevin rose) are really funny. Plus in addition to reading us the weekly news, they sample some beers while they are at it :)

Can't resist

[Billosaur]

"Digg is quite different from (older) sites," said founder Kevin Rose. "Slashdot is put together by an editorial board. Digg uses the collective wisdom of the masses and, consequently, news breaks faster."

Oh yes, and we all know about the collective wisdom of the masses! We see it every day in an ineffectual, partisan, out-of-touch Congress and a squirrely, short-sighted, and bumbling President. [sigh]

If Wired wants to annoint Digg as the new Slashdot, fine. Let the "diggies" have their fun in chaos-land. I'm sure the articles are newer, I'm sure more people are reading it every day, and of course their teeth are whiter and they have better lives. I'll stick with what I know. Here, there seems to be a better brand of intellectual discourse. I'm not a geek just to be a geek and I appreciate how Slashdot makes an effort to be informative without the need to pander to everyone.

Re:Can't resist

[east coast]

a squirrely, short-sighted, and bumbling President.

No sir, you're wrong. Bill Clinton left office a few years ago.

Hmm

[Anonymous Coward]

Well I've never used Digg, but if their average comment quality is lower than Slashdot's, that's not really saying much. Most of the comments on Slashdot are pretty bad, and unfortunately the moderation system does little to harvest quality.

Re:Hmm

[ZachPruckowski]

You think so? I think the only major flaw in the comment system is that it usually misses when it has modded something Informative/Interesting/Insightful that turns out to be false. I personally think the downmodding is more important than the upmodding. I mean, as long as they keep goatse and troll monologues out for the average user, they're doing a good job. but then again, I browse at -1.

Dupes

[Frankie70]

Slashdot: Targeted by very technical editors, I generally want to hear about 40% of the stories.


I want to hear about 20% of the stories, twice each.

Re:Dupes

[deltalimasierralima]

I want to hear about 20% of the stories, twice each.
You can HEAR stories on slashdot?! Tell me how please!!

Oy, this fight already has its own website

[Anonymous Coward]

Digg vs Dot, guess who's winning? Anyway I'll know that Digg has overtaken /. Wwhen it has more troll posts.

Slashdot vs Digg

[pureseth]

I like slashdot more basically because, like a previous comment said, the comments and the userbase. People get more in depth and debate the topics more vividly. Just better information overall..

Re:Slashdot vs Digg

[John Napkintosh]

lol omg i no wat u mean. slashdot rules!!1

\. em

[blindbat]

Let's slashdot digg.

Re:\. em

[Anonymous Coward]

Pssh, with 2.8 million, I'd hope Digg could afford to handle the load of a ./ing

Re:\. em

[Anonymous Coward]

That's a backslash.

Re:\. em

[ToasterofDOOM]

Wooo! He made a windows slash. I think that qualifies as blaspheme. We've got a mole boys!

Left Out

[mrisaacs]

In South Korea only old people Digg....

WTF?

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions

Ha! that's a laugh. Every discussion on slashdot is [Linux/MS/Apple/Google][rocks/sucks]because[bill gates is evil/i'm a fanboy/linus sucks/linus rocks/they're teh gehy].

Most of the truely technically driven posts rarely see above a 3, and then only if the orginal poster had a karma bonus. Most people waste their mod points on; redundent(WTF?), supporting whomever it is they support blindly or marking anything with the slightest chance of being offensive as "troll" or "flamebait".

Slashdot is teh gehy.

OLD news

[0110011001110101]

PFFFTTTT!! This story was on Digg this morning...

I know this because I submitted it to /. and was immediately rejected...

Score one more for Digg, as at least there the user community would have accepted or rejected my story...

Re:OLD news

[ebrandsberg]

You do realize that slashdot probably has a nice queue of stories, they don't post them as soon as they get accepted, and they probably get the same stories posted all the time. They space the release of stories so as to give each time for comments, as well as to drive continuous traffic to the website for advertising. As such, you probably wern't rejected exactly, but flagged as a dupe pending being posted. I always find it irritating when people complain about their story being rejected only to show up a few days later, but in reality, it was probably sitting in the queue until there was nothing else better to post per the editors.

Re:OLD news

[0110011001110101]

You do realize that nowhere in my post did I "complain" that it was rejected.. quite the opposite I assumed, as you did, that the /. crowd was all over this story the moment it came out and it had probably been submitted 100 times before me. I submitted it myself as a way to lodge my "vote" that the original submitter should be approved, as it was a topic of interest among the /. community.

I know this because I submitted it to /. and was immediately rejected...

I had 2 motives when I typed that line, neither of which was to complain, or grouse about my rejection.

1. To backup my statement of the story being available earlier this morning.
2. To show that I favor a system in which the story is immediately presented to the site readers, and they then decide if the story should be published. More than likely, in the Digg environment, my story would never have been submitted in the first place, as I would have already read it in the queue, and added my digg to promote it up.

I always find it irritating when people complain about other peoples postings, just to hear themselves speak. Give yourself a cookie, pat on the head, and continue indulging your inflated self importance.

Re:OLD news

[Anonymous Coward]

You're an annoying fuck. The guy was trying to explain to you, and you get all up yourself. Go read digg, you've obviously missed the point so thoroughly that maybe it'd be better for you than slashdot.

Moderation..

[phase_9]

-5, 100% Overrated

Slashdot has twice as many stories as Digg

[Cro Magnon]

Of course, half those stories are dupes.

Not just a subject- some nouns & verbs too.

[psbrogna]

Did slashdot just un-slashdot itself? I can feel the ground trembling as the herd of technonews junkies sweep majestically over to the new site.

paradox a'comin'

[urdine]

So finally Slashdot has an article about Digg. Will Digg have an article linking to this article? How far can this go?!

Re:paradox a'comin'

[John Napkintosh]

They already do. Three of them.

Re:paradox a'comin'

[BokLM]

It's aldready there.

$2.8 million???

[DogDude]

I thought that whole dot-com bubble was over. $2.8 million just because it's a high traffic site? You gotta be kidding me... I run a real business with real assets and real profit, but these stupid investors don't care. I honestly don't think that the dot-com bubble is over yet if sites like this can get $2.8 million for simply existing. There's nothing really unique about the site to warrant that kind of capital investment.

Re:$2.8 million???

[psbrogna]

Cut 'em some slack- $2.8M's isn't exactly a King's Ransom or anything. Isn't that what VC's all about? Throwing some money at what everybody else thinks is a stupid idea? It wouldn't be much of a "venture" if it was obviously going to exceed.

Re:$2.8 million???

[Anonymous Coward]

You call that puppy shop a real business? Just be glad youre not on the streets with that business model.

Re:$2.8 million???

[Anonymous Coward]

According to alexa they are doing 40 million page views a day. If the ad click through rate is an abysmal 0.1% and they only make 10 cents a click, they would still have revenue of $4000/day (or 1.5 million a year). I don't know what there operating cost is, but I think 1.5 million will easily pay 4-5 employees a reasonable salary and cover hosting expenses.

Re:$2.8 million???

[BushCheney08]

Over the weekend digg had a "story" submitted showing that digg's pageviews had surpassed slashdots. The "story" was a link to Alexa's site comparing graphs of the two. Keep in mind that Alexa measures this information via people who have the Alexa toolbar for IE (which many consider to be spyware) installed on their machines. I think this says far more about the technical awareness of the visitors of the two sites than anything.

Re:$2.8 million???

[mizidymizark]

First off, 2.8 mil isn't that much considering the amount of VC money that was thrown around during the Dot-Com craze. Also, you arn't hearing about 30 companies getting 3 mil every day, this is the first VC money of this amount I have heard of in awhile. The people funding the VC money are the owner's of Amazon and a couple of other Internet companies. You know, people who survived the meltdown and are making money. I don't know where getting some money and becoming popular has become a bad thing, honestly, people who say that remind me of teenagers whining about the last band that "sold out".

Re:$2.8 million???

[isd_glory]

Actually, if you take a look at the "article" they were talking about, digg.com got more hits than slashdot.com (not slashdot.org).

I'm sure that digg.com gets more hits than slashdot.gov too, thus proving digg's ultimate superiority...

Re:$2.8 million???

[BushCheney08]

That's not what was on digg over the weekend. What was posted linked directly to alexa.com. I've tried searching for it and I can't find it. Which brings up another problem I have with digg -- there have been a few times where articles were removed entirely from either the front page or the diggall queue. I realize it happens here from time to time, and it's just as obnoxious...

Re:$2.8 million???

[isd_glory]

Ah, I must have missed that one.
It's hard to tell when there are so many articles on that site that basically try to say "Dig is teh better than slashdot!!1!"

Digg and /.

[FerretFrottage]

I have both open in a firefox tab as both offer something to me that I find useful. With digg, you get stories that are generally "fresher", by days or in some cases even hours--which is like forever in "web speed". However, there stories are also all over the board and many are jsut links to other peoples' blogs--(e.g. "I hate the cold heat soldering iron blog story"--big deal) and I only "digg" about 10% of them. Comments are for all practical purposes useless compared to /. [when viewed at the appropriate threshold]. /. if more like a tortise if digg is the hare. Stories on /. have already been on digg 1,2,3 or more times already, but in taking it's time..it's damn sweet time, in getting stories out, I find more of the stories to be more the "stuff that matters" than I find on digg. /. has its trolls and flame tossing ACs, but in general you can find good discussions here as long as you don't mentions religion, politics (ignore the sig please), GW, or MS. Digg's comments seem more like where ACs are born or where the /. trolls go to play once no one bites on them here.

If you haven't seen digg.com, check it out. There will be some interesting stuff there, but it's no replacement for /. IMHO

Re:Digg and /.

[belg4mit]

Everybody plays up the freshness of Digg, but they forget the staleness.
Looking at the first two pages yesterday (once the damn thing loads) there
were a) new unseen things b) things common to ./ and c) lots of ancient
cruft that's just now making its rounds of the unwashed masses :-P

I like a but not at the expense of c.

Re:Digg and /.

[StarvingSE]

Yes, I agree, it seems to be filled with people just now finding out about various "slashdotisms" and thinking they are still funny, fresh and new.

For example, I see a large number of posts welcoming overlords, asking if it runs linux, etc..... talk about a bunch of copycats.

Digg needs to come up with their own infamous trolling/offtopic yet mildly humorous comments!

wow

[Clover_Kicker]

> Digg is more chaotic, immediate and user driven, whereas
> Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions.

*shudders*

Digg can't really be that bad?

Slashdot Digging Digg Digging Slashdot

[Azathoth!EDC]

This article is so very meta!

Re:Slashdot Digging Digg Digging Slashdot

[Andrewkov]

It's a new paradigm!

Delicious

[mobilesteve]

There are alot of things I hate about slashdot that I don't seem to think will ever change and might even lead to its downfall, but I tried to get into digg and to me, it is basically del.icio.us with comments. If you look at the front page right now, one of the stories is "Manipulating XML at the command line with xmlstarlet" which is such a nice article that the few people who are intrested it that would find it through other means. On top of that, the discussion that is going to surround the article will be rather boring

I think a system where a bunch of people submit articles, they get voted on and the highest ones go through an editor who then cleans them up and whatnot would kill both slashdot and digg.

Different niches

[Chr0nik]

Nothing that Digg does will change the way /. operates, regardless of their level of success, mostly because they are a different type of geek news site. Although they got their original inspiration from here, they wen't a direction that I doubt anyone here really wants to go. If the stories here were a bit more community driven however, I do think we'd see a little less "that was on digg days ago" type of stuff. On a side note, people here probably dislike being moderated into oblivion for little or no reason given, and no meaningful recourse, that may drive some /.ers to digg IMHO.

Re:Different niches

[Risen888]

Although they got their original inspiration from here, they wen't

They whated?

/. isn't that slow.

[Anonymous Coward]

In fact, I could argue that /. is faster as this website attests. but note that Digg did bit /. to this particular story.

Please tell me what to think!

[uberjoe]

I can't read digg, the comments aren't moderated. How will I know what to think about a comment without someone telling me if I should laugh, skip it, be informed, or insighted by it?

Not really competing

[c4ffeine]

To be fair, Digg and Slashdot aren't really competing with each other; they have different attractions. Sure, digg has great news (hell, I read it regularly), but let's face it: Slashdot has crap news. It's late, articles are misleading, there's dupes, etc. That's not why I'm going here. I go here for the comments. Sure, there's trolls, but the mod system works pretty well, and it attracts a lot of qualified people with a tendency to know what they're talking about. No other site offers anything close. Digg doesn't even have a moderation system...

Slashdot has nothing to fear- no one can match its comments. To be fair, though, Digg will probably keep growing- it's a great news site.

Digg comments javascript slowed me down

[sonofagunn]

Their comments page made my computer nearly unusable until I was finally able to navigate away from the page. I assume it was some nasty Javascript.

But when will we aggregate the aggrigator of ag...

[Em Ellel]

...but I think the aggregation of blogs is a critical step in the future of on-line content...

Ok, maybe I am missing something here, but arent blogs (at least of the Slashdot type) are already aggrigation of other "news" sources? Whats next? Aggrigation of aggrigators of aggrigators? At some point SOMEONE has to create content, no?

-Em

Why slashdot is popular

[external400kdiskette]

Because it was the original and it has the community, people don't go here for the outdated site technology/design and the questionable editorial quality, they come here because of the huge base of users who will rant on about anything and everything. So it's hard to say without being tainted but Digg may be technically better but it'll come down to who has the best community and how many people are reached by that. Slashdot has the benefit of a simple front page with just stories posted and tons of people replying, not to much clutter and almost a decade of user buildup.

So it's a race around the world you want!

[TheOtherAgentM]

First one to make it around the world, crushing as many web servers in its path along the way, wins. Go! *Maniacal laughter*

I bet you didn't use the magic words:

[winkydink]

"Web 2.0" and "AJAX"

Instant VC hard-on

I think I will stick to Slashdot

[Kylere]

Digg appears to be aimed at the Xanga/Livejournal/Myspace/Yahoo/AOL types and I prefer signal to noise with my bandwidth. I realize that Slashdot could become irrelevant with the custom news sources and ease of their configuration but I am not willing to let a net gaggle like Digg decide my news for me yet.

Re:I think I will stick to Slashdot

[RandoX]

You'd prefer the editors and dupes of Slashdot?

Re:I think I will stick to Slashdot

[RandoX]

You'd prefer the editors and dupes of Slashdot??

Re:I think I will stick to Slashdot

[Kylere]

heh nice dup effect, but seriously I know which editors to ignore, and I would rather read something intelligent twice than read something AOL level twice.

Bury Slashdot

[jasongetsdown]

the only thing Digg will bury Slashdot with are OMG's and LOL's.

perhaps the depth of the comment pool will increase with time. It they introduced threaded comments it could be a serious competitor.

I come to slashdot for the comedy...

[mulcher]

Seriously. The comments and the comedy. Awesome. I like the evolution of running jokes personally, and the puns using old technology... Check out the digg... dug ... classic old skool comedy.
Many script kiddies are too young for that... Korean old people jokes,
, mother russia jokes, jokes about the jokes, google base, watching fads rise and fall (Apple OS X, Google), priceless every little bit of it.

  Sure we get trolls, and slash-vertisments from unscrupulous individuals. But it is the community... *shudder* did I just say that..? there are some excellent folks around here... even some bigwig techies read the slashdot and post occasionally. And generally, even the script kiddies get moderated out, that or they p*wn the postings... I can't post a damn article ever... maybe, we need a karma posting system or something. Something better Cmdr. Taco please, please fix the posting system it *is* broken.

Just to troll, digg is lame, lame UI, lame comment system.

It's bound to happen eventually

[squoozer]

I'm going to try very hard not to bash /. to hard for the content of the articles but you have got to admit that they have dropped in quality over the last few years and they didn't start of that high. I used to be able to lose a good few hours reading /. now I'm lucky if I can lose an hour. I am pretty sure that the number of regular readers of /. has dropped dramatically as well. When I started reading /. it pretty common to get 1000 posts per article before it left the front page. What do we get now, maybe 500 on a good stir-up-the-crowd article. Yes it might be that more people are choosing to lurk but I think a more likely reason is that people are drifting away some something that isn't staying fresh and alive. I for one would have liked to have seen, for instance, a move to a CSS driven site and multiple skins a long time ago. Then start building on more features. Yes most features would probably be duds but it would have given us something new to play with and complain about. Even the polls have become stale and boring when once they brought some humour to the site. I'll probably still keep reading /. for a long while yet but I find myself increasing looking for other news for nerd outlets.

My Linux Distro....

[iamlucky13]

Is it possible that someone has finally invented a Slashdot article with more flamebait potential than the classic "$distro Linux Latest Release Adds $feature?"

In-depth and technical discussions?

[chris_eineke]

whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions

Right next to the "Frist Prost!" and GNAA posts, Natalie Portman and hot grits jokes, Soviet Russia/Korea/Overlord memes, pop culture references, polls with "CowboyNeal" options, general trolls*, Nigerian spam rip-offs, and bad puns? Unpossible!*

*I'm aware of the irony. Don't mod me troll... please?

Re:In-depth and technical discussions?

[Anonymous Coward]

You, sir, are a troll! And I don't know about you, but I just dumped some hot grits down my pants as I was staring at Natalie's bodacious Portmans...

Re:In-depth and technical discussions?

[Dolly_Llama]

Some of us browse at -1 for those posts. Feature, not bug.

The puerile guys at dig started it.

[jotaeleemeese]

I went ther when it was starting and the amount of childish behaviour regarding /. was frankly too much to bear.

ANd the posts were putrid. That may have improved but frankly I see no reason why to revisit the site.

Kevin Rose?

[Anonymous Coward]

Was Digg.com brought to us by Kevin Rose? The same guy that was on The Screen Savers and Attack of the Show on G4tv? I thought his picture looked familiar. Can anyone confirm? If so, that's cool. It's nice to see him doing so well after his TV stints.

Re:Kevin Rose?

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, it is the same guy.

i dig /.

[digitaldc]

The 'collect wisdom of the masses' is totally overrated. Just look at the latest Billboard charts and people who really enjoyed 'the Macarena.'

Re:i dig /.

[RevMike]

The 'collect wisdom of the masses' is totally overrated. Just look at the latest Billboard charts and people who really enjoyed 'the Macarena.'

That argument would be more persuasive if the record companies and radio companies weren't in cahoots to manipulate the charts.

Would Moderation Help?

[mudbogger]

Almost every post on Digg is of the same quality and so they'd all have to mod'd (-1, "Worthless"). Filtering really wouldn't help too much in that situation unless you just filtered them all out...

Re:Would Moderation Help?

[zeroduck]

I disagree about the articles posted on Digg, because some of them are interesting.

But the comments. . . I think they detract from the site in general. Everyone sounds like a 14 year old kid, giving a "me too" response.

At least on Slashdot, its easy to find the meat in the comments, and on nearly every story you're almost gauranteed to find something very insightful and learn something from it. With Digg, that is almost never the case.

In addition, this discussion here is "wow, they have a pretty cool site." Everytime /. is mentioned on Digg, it's always a "we're better" and "slashdot is going down." The /. crowd seemingly is much more modest.

Really?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions"

When did this happen? I thought slashdot featured only fanatical linux love and various links to tubgirl, the goatse guy, and the gnaa.

East Coast VS West Coast Nerds

[DaedalusLogic]

Let the fun begin!

Just don't let it escalate to the level of East Coast VS West Coast Rappers. I'd hate to see stories about CowboyNeal overdosing, Kevin Rose getting gunned down, or Leo Laporte convicted of robbery and assault.

And for god's sake if CowboyNeal does croak... CmdrTaco better not release a cover of "Every Breath You Take" lamenting his long lost compadre and punchline...

Digg pwns slashdot

[Anonymous Coward]

yup.

What I hear form all my non /. friends

[Mr. Cancelled]

Is that Digg gets the articles faster (Well duh... It's completely user/score driven. On /. you have to wait for an editor to post the articles), but also that most of them don't like wading through all the diatribe and arguements in the comments.

Now obviously Digg doesn't have a great comment section, since you can basically only add new message, not keep a thread going, or easily quote/tie your response to a particular comment, but that's not it's thing. That's /.'s thing.

I did find it interesting about how many people have told me that they hate /. for it's users, and the amount of crap you have to dig through in order to get some real info out of the commentary. While I don't mind wading through some crap to find my info, it's been a real eye opener how many people don't care for /.'s nerdy insults and arguments. When i'd mention that with a /. account, you can tailor what types of responses you see when looking at a thread, everyone I mentioned this to came back with a "Why bother? I've got digg now".

So I guess this means that the trolls are doing their thing here on /. (driving people away), and that the common user simply wants to know what's going on in their world. Not to discuss it, or defend their viewpoint against a bunch of Linux hounds, or holyier-than-thou type responses.

Me... I (obviously) still come back to /. for the threads, but I'll be honest in that digg's my 1st stop these days, and when I come to /., it's usually with the thought of "Let's see what /.'s got to say about that digg story I read, if it's even been posted there yet".

To me, the threads are still the "meat and potato's" of /., but I have found myself moderating a lot less since everyone else seems to be wasting their mod points on modding down posts, rather then elevating the good ones above the bad. Maybe /. needs to clean house of some moderators, since they seem to be focusing on what they disagree with, rather than focusing on the strengths which an opposing viewpoint might bring to the table? Just a thought...

Re:What I hear form all my non /. friends

[olorinpc]

Well said. Digg is my first stop these days as well.. however I do still keep tabs on Slashdot. When there is a particularily interesting story on which I have something to say (whatever site it is on first) I come to slashdot to at least read the comments and discussions and possibly leave a comment of my own.

Re:What I hear form all my non /. friends

[davids-world.com]

Honestly... I actually like the comments. Reading Slashdot is not just entertainment - I see keeping up to date as part of my job. The original stories on Slashdot are often one-sided, and their summary posted here is often mediocre at best. But when there's a story about a new virus, you'll find an immunologist explain why it won't the human body hurt as much as the big headline suggests. The number of sources and the moderation system is what helps and turns Slashdot into a viable alternative to proper journalism (even though it usually doesn't beat it!). But then, I'm pretty good at digging through crap...

Re:What I hear form all my non /. friends

[Anonymous Coward]

Finally a reasonable comment in this whole thread! And you wonder why more and more people dislike /.

This whole bs about MS vs Linux is just tiring to read. Whenever I arrive here I come for the article not for these silly comments...sorry for adding one more to the thread! :)

Now I'll go ahead and check more articles around. ;)

AC

Re:What I hear form all my non /. friends

[freeweed]

So I guess this means that the trolls are doing their thing here on /. (driving people away), and that the common user simply wants to know what's going on in their world. Not to discuss it, or defend their viewpoint against a bunch of Linux hounds, or holyier-than-thou type responses.

You nailed it, in a sort of derogatory way. Allow me to reciprocate (maybe not directly targetted at yourself, but oh well :)

Slashdot, as long as I've known it (6, 7 years?), has always been targetted towards more technical types. More nerdy types (hey, it's in the tagline!). More obsessive types. We're the ones who get addicted to Evercrack. We're the ones who laugh at every obscure Simpsons joke, because we know damn near every line off the top of our heads. We're the ones who compusively try out every new Linux distro, spending hours of time playing with obscure computer minutiae (probably spelled that one wrong!) instead of doing things the rest of the world sees as normal.

It's always been this way. There has always been a very visible pro-Linux, anti-Microsoft slant here. Because overall, that's how the really geeky think. We also think we're smarter than everyone else, and that our viewpoint is the correct one.

THAT IS THE POINT OF SLASHDOT. I've never heard Rob whining that he doesn't get enough of the "common person" checking out his site. Most long-time readers aren't whining about the lack of MCSEs commenting on Linux stories. No one who actually spends any time here can seriously think of this as a general tech news site, aimed at anyone with a slight technical leaning.

I don't think it's so much a matter of trolls driving people away, it's just that most normal people look at Slashdot and realize it's not for them.

If you want to point out that Linux is hard for your Mom, that's one thing. If you're going to complain that you simply aren't interested in learning how your OS works, and that you shouldn't have to edit text files, and that Open Source is useless because not everyone is a coder, then guess what?

This site is not for you.

Apply those sorts of criteria to virtually any other discussion we have here. Hell, we just had a poll for "the most realistic nerd portrayal on TV". We're geeks. The majority of us like Linux. If you can accept that, you can have fun here, even if you're not as weird as the rest of us. If you can't, you're just going to find this site frustrating. There are plenty of other places to go for news. Even pro-Microsoft sites, and places where people almost never mention the Simpsons.

Personally, like the small marketshare of desktop Linux, I love it this way.

Re:What I hear form all my non /. friends

[Filthysock]

I just set my comments threshold to three, its quite pleasant up here. Of course, it has meant that not a single one of my comments have be eligible to be read with that filter :)

FUCK SLASHDOT

[Anonymous Coward]

YA DIGG??

Nooooo!

[Robotech_Master]

Digg's been Slashdotted...and now, when they see the mention of their site here, Slashdot will be Diggdotted...it'll create a feedback loop that will suck the entirety of Internet traffic into a swirling vortex! They had to go and cross the streams!

Re:Nooooo!

[somersault]

I had a similar thought. But not so in-depth. Maybe I should go to digg :(

It's officially OK to like Digg

[restive]

because, like Slashdot, their page doesn't validate either.

Re:But when will we aggregate the aggrigator of ag

[BluhDeBluh]

Aggrigation of aggrigators of aggrigators are surely search engines, and the recursiveness continues :)

Pretty Website Design

[prometheus250]

While they are definitely not the Slashdot killers they DO have a pretty website design. Slashdot could use a little cosmetic work itself I believe.

Matter of preference.

[unik]

Maybe already stated, I didnt have time to read. It's completely a matter of preference. With slashdot, you know you can show up and read oodles of interesting articles, and have intellectual discussions regarding them. That is why people come here. I haven't been to Digg.com, but it probably sucks. :/

rejection system VS spam

[dindi]

In the shadow of only user rejection :

I wonder how many paid persons from .oO INSERT FAVOURITE LOW_WAGE COUNTRY Oo. will it take to get your spam on the front page then.

I mean I see posts on the front page that have as low as 25 comments and the "who dug this" seems to be a bit bogus showing the same number all the time ...

I like their system, I just wonder how long until it is overflown with "how to use viagra and buy it cheap" or "new ways to eliminate your debt" dug by hundresd of "dig it for 5cents a piece LOW_WAGE & STUDENTS".....

I like slashdot because some of the comments actually have valuable information (I see more and more one-liners with a URL as sig though), and there is almost nothing I would consider spam.....

Nowadays I would eliminate Anonymous alltoghether from lots of place or would implement a "must moderate one AC post"....

I mean you can stay anon without an email address even, just have a handle, so you cold be filtered, messaged and so ...

It used to work fine in the BBS era, and eliminated lots of assholes just throwing in a line when drunk and alone on a friday night, that technically ruin most online medias ....

Redux?

[ketsugi]

Wasn't this on front-page some time ago? I specifically remember the "naval-gazing" typo.

Re:Let's Look at the Times...

[Guy.Gregory]

It's the speed at which the news is reported that is remarkable, not the comments.

Last 3 articles:

Office 2003 Beta 1 - Digg posted 17 hours before Slashdot

UN Summit - Digg posted 14 hours before Slashdot

WGA / Firefox - Digg posted 11 hours before Slashdot

Slashdot has a far superior comments system, but in terms of news, Digg is usually about half a day in front.

Digg(nation) has something /. does not offer

[papaia]

First - trying to get /. on my Treo650 to show correctly is impossible. I have to stop the loading to the HTML code level (before being processed), so that I could read some text. If not, the whole stuff shows as one single column. In an era of mobility, where I can get almost all my news on my phone, the design of the /. web site (I am no expert in web design, so I am not sure where the problem is) sucks.
Ok - now on to digg.com - they offer a useable web site for mobile users, and - more importantly (again - from a mobility perspective) - there is nothing on /. matching diggnation's podcasts. Before any long trip (nowadays before any trip, even to the grocery on the corner), with my car, I burn myself CDs with podcasts, in majority technical/geeky, and diggnation is always there ... any chance for the /. gurus to start something like that?!?

Re:Digg(nation) has something /. does not offer

[Lumpy]

I have no problem with it on my treo 600 or my now long gone Zaurus SL5500. I simply set the settings on a second account to be low bandwidth and simple UI, log in on the treo and have it remember me with a cookie.. poof it works great for mobile use and defaults to that mode for me.

granted I rarely do so on my treo anymore for two reasons. forat the cellphone datarates suck horribly to the point that dial up on a 28.8 modem feels fast, and the company blackberry gives me free unlimited internet at the same dismal Cellphone speeds the TREO has.

Re:Digg(nation) has something /. does not offer

[papaia]

Just for completeness reasons - I post and read from the same account, all the time, so double accounts won't cut it for me, even though I could appreciate the suggestion. Also - my Treo 650, with the its latest patched OS, released by Sprint (had to back out from the unoficial hack allowing bluetooth, not long ago, as Sprint just enabled it, themselves) and Sprint infrastructure, gives me, in the area where I hang out (probably not everywhere in the country, of course) better throughput than the WiFi access at Panera - and I compare the two simply because they're both free for me ;)

Re:Digg(nation) has something /. does not offer

[jp10558]

Have you tried (can you?) one of the "mini" browsers, like Opera mini or that mobile mozilla (what is it called?) thing?

SlashdotNation

[Anonymous Coward]

Perhaps CmdrTaco and CowboyNeal could start a weekly vidcast featuring the top commented stories on Slashdot. CmdrTaco could dress as a commander and CowboyNeal could be in his grody bare feet.

500,000 visitors per month?

[Slashdoc Beta]

That's only 16,000 per day or so. Which is a lot but really not that much. In the good old days of the dot-com bubble I used to run a small site that got 6,000 unique visits per day .. on Geocities no less.

Re:500,000 visitors per month?

[BokLM]

Thanks to their website beeing slashdoted, maybe this will increase ?

Once in a while, the blog is there first

[jfengel]

There is occasionally actual news in a blog. That's "occasionally" and "in some blog, somewhere, among the millions of them". Most famously it was the case of the Bush deferral letter, where the first ones to post that the letter looked suspicious were bloggers, which was later picked up by the blog-aggregators, and finally by the wire services.

But most blogs are just commentaries on the news. Read some if you find a commentator that makes sense to you, but treat it as your primary news source and you're going to be late, not early. News stories that start in blogs happen far, far less often than news gathered by wire services.

In a way the wire services are the ultimate blog aggregators. They take reports from a zillion stringers all over the planet, so they get to be there first. Once in a while some blog will beat them to the punch, but it's the exception, not the rule, and I expect it to remain that way.

Not to inflate the egos here...

[Craig Maloney]

Not to inflate the egos here, but this kind of article is the reason I come back to Slashdot. There's little ego in the editorializing, and no "We're better than (insert site here) that many other news aggregation sites may have. Sure, the news may be a bit slow, and sure I've had my fair share of articles dropped that later showed up as news. I don't mind. The discussions here are great, and the topics are interesting. Digg offers a little more in the programming arena, but I find that I enjoy the commentary here more than the actual article.

Kudos, Slashdot... You've built quite a community here.

Average Comments on Dig

[rm69990]

Comment 1:
LOL!

Comment 2:
DUPE!

Comment 3:
You suck

Comment 4:
This story is a dupe

Comment 5:
So, I found it interesting

Comment 6:
Still a dupe!

Comment 7:
Dupe! No Digg!

I found after reading Digg, I might get one comment that would be labeled as insightful, interesting, etc on Slashdot across multiple stories on Digg. It says the site is essentially run by its readers....I'm inclined to think 99% of the readers haven't reached the age of 13 yet. I just removed Digg from my RSS reader a few days ago, I'd never drop Slashdot for that chaotic mess Digg.

the real question

[tont0r]

is will /. be digged or will digg be ./'ed? loading up digg, it took alittle bit of time :P

Implement Digging on Slashdot

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

Basically, in order for Slashdot to compete, it needs to somehow rip off the Digg system. Story submissions could be placed in a pool where Slashdotters could select the best they feel that the editors are letting go to waste.

The Random Slashdot Story Submission System (RS^4) had to be updated at some point.

Digg now digdotting this page which is..

[Anonymous Coward]

slashdotting dig back and so forth. Oh god, its an infinite loop! Programmers are jumping out their windows as we speak. http://digg.com/technology/Digg.com_makes_Slashdot .

it will never work

[idlake]

Without the careful editorial control, proof reading, and story selection found on Slashdot, Digg will be swamped with duplicates, misspelling, and partisan postings.

[;-]

Yeah

[akaina]

Digg is cool, but /. has better karma :)

Apples and oranges?

[CousinLarry]

I don't know about other readers, but I see digg and slashdot as having two fundamentally different purposes.

Digg is essentially a broadly human moderated story aggregator that reads like a constantly updated portal page. Slashdot is a reverse-dated discussion forum where stories are selected by human editors. Other than the fact that they both seem to overlap in coverage (the case for many "competing" sites on the web, there's little new content under the sun), i see them as two totally different entities that rightly serve separate purposes.

Slashdot has a memory that's modeled on human understanding of events - event A happens, event B happens and in that order. Digg is a shifting pile of stories that does not retain a sense of timeline. It's like: I have a to-do list and I have a journal. My to-do list is not precious or useful to examine next year, but my journal is. The difference is the to-do list (digg) serves as a "snapshot" of a day that once removed from immediate context is not relevant. The journal (/.) can be reconstructed and examined as a continuing and related dialogue.

These fundamental differences do not make one more useful or relevant than another, but they do reflect a fundamental difference in purpose between the two.

agreed

[digitaldc]

you are told what to think, listen to and buy...I'm moving to a shack in the deep woods.

In Depth Slashdot Buggery

[GAMMAH_DJ]

"whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions"

Uhhh if you mean linux-zionist dogmatism, then yes.

on dash line?

[tehwebguy]

i think the use of "on-line" in the summary says a lot about who will come out on top

I like digg

[bogie]

In general I find that /. appears to be mostly posting adverts masquerading as stories these days. There is still some decent content but really the ads and press releases that slip through are tiring. Also by the time it gets to /. I've usually read the story elsewhere. Without the comment section of /. there might be zero reason to come here ever again.

I actually still do like reading comments on /. . This is one area where /. has digg beat cold. Since digg has become widely known the comment section has become overrun by 12yr olds. And yes I know that sounds awfully close to the standard, "Since everyone found out about it, it's no longer cool" comment. But in digg's case it's 100% accurate.

Anyway imho they don't really compete and I'll still continue to visit both.

Re:I like digg

[Widowwolf]

And who knows digg could have paid for this article as an advert..

Digg/Slashdot == SF Bay Area/L.A. Area???

[thrillbert]

I life in the SF Bay Area, but lived in L.A. before, and one thing I have found that is very true, this is something that was pointed out to me while I lived in L.A. by a friend of mine. In Southern California, they spend a lot of time hating Bay Area people, and they claim that the feeling is mutual. Having been raised here, I knew this was a false statement.

Well, now when I go to digg (which I have been doing for a few months), every chance someone gets to put down /. seems to be taken. They're always going on about how digg is just so much better.. and how /.ers hate digg.. umm.. grow up, no one hates you.. and yes, it is just you!!

Depends on your definition of trash

[kajoob]

As the saying goes, one man's trash is another man's treasure. The fact that you have to 'filter through a whole lotta crap' is precisely why I've been becoming a Digg user instead of a slashdot user of the past month or so.

You can view the Digg queue and see what gets submitted and I find awesome links that are useful/interesting to me that never make it to the main page. That may be 'crap' to you, but that's a whole hell of a lot cooler in my eyes than just consuming whatever biased/inaccurate/flamebait articles the slashdot 'editors' deem worthy enough to send down from the mountaintop.

I will say though that for in-depth technical comments, slashdot is the place to be. Digg comments leave much to be desired, but because stories hit the main page faster than slashdot can keep pace with and the fact that I can see what is going on behind the scenes has converted me to Digg.

Re:Depends on your definition of trash

[BushCheney08]

Don't get me wrong. I do visit digg a few times a day and I've definitely found some fairly esoteric stuff there that I wouldn't have found otherwise. However, I get the feeling it's gonna be like another fark to me -- a site that I visit a fair bit initially, but that I stop going to altogether after a few months...

Re:Depends on your definition of trash

[jp10558]

Yeah, I have an order of sites I try and see. Digg has made it onto that regular list, which is a feat, but it ends up kind of low.

In case anyone cares, /. is not on the top of the list either. But it still is higher than digg. Fark is also on that list, but it has fallen behind digg recently, so digg is moving up - though I get more out of Fark comments than I do digg comments. However, I am registered at Digg and not at Fark. Oh what the hell, I only post at /. anyway :P !

a critical step

[Anonymous Coward]

the aggregation of blogs is a critical step in the future of on-line content

yeah and In order to assure that solutions-oriented core competencies can hardly help but to raise a flag over the user interfaces, we must be certain that a win-win opportunity touches base on mindshare. Thanks to the recent reorganization, the scripting languages interactively touch base on the architecture.

This is why Tom Jermoluk recently announced that a collaborative challenge helps us in the concepting of the state of the art drop dead dates. Our third parties tell us that content creation steps up to the challenge of core competencies. It's so clear that user-friendly partnerships enable the multimedia plug-ins; we are convinced guesstimates impact protocols. Guesstimates enable the user interfaces. The multimedia deliverable impacts Silicon Graphics. This is why Tom Jermoluk recently announced that the next generation system takes the issue off-line. Truly we must. Truly we must. Surely, we can conclude that the feedback indicates that the time frame creates fiscal architectures. We are all impressed to see that the drop dead dates agree to disagree on superscalar benefit. As always, a state of the art committee is not a synergistic gating factor. Media authoring takes the issue off-line. I think that revolutionary challenges enable focus. We feel that the technological web site will enable the best systems in the world. We're going forward on IHVs. Customers need the zero bug count, and we fulfill that need with the growth year. We have been looking into culture changes. Leading indicators would seem to suggest that real-time leadership positions are a zero bug count. This is why Tom Jermoluk recently announced that user interfaces take the initiative. Now that the merger is complete, the enabling technology is going to grow the internet service providers. As always, the unix database server with all deliberate speed empowers the ongoing support for increased productivity. A major action item for this fiscal quarter is lightweight goals. Surely, we can conclude that the mips workgroups indicate that the team player works effectively. In order to assure that the killer apps make it happen, we must be certain that opportunities bravely agree to disagree on the compatible relationships. Why do you think the extensible major players continue to realize the benefits of excellence ? Because the staffing takes the issue off-line. Customers need the feature-rich feedback, and we fulfill that need with big deals. The win-win key players will follow through on the issue of productized time frames. In order to obtain the standards, we took a close look at the fiscal component to understand what it means. We have been looking into the binary-compatible dealer channel. Having the media-rich time frames that are SGI, it follows that the user-friendly guesstimate provides an indication of an action item. Having task-oriented headcount readjustments that are enabling, it follows that going forward is going to create teamwork-oriented synergy. We're making forward progress towards embedded user interfaces by implementing the best computer company in the world that is both collaborative and staffing. The digital ISV efficiently can ride the wave of the time frames, however UI red flags interface with interactive price points. Leading indicators would seem to suggest that environments continue to realize the benefits of all of you. Price-performance red flags take the initiative and in view of the fact that a marketing neophyte takes ownership of mips we clearly can conclude that the web browsing tool leverages multimastering. Can we indeed say that the collateral web browsing tool engenders the feature-rich strategies ? We must put database servers in place so that culture changes -- never before so advanced -- can ride the wave of communication. Having the technologies that are digital, it follows that the world-class customer focus can ride the wave of challenges.

Difference of Purpose

[ponds]

When I want to read up to the minute tech news, I read digg. When I want to read good discussions of tech news, I read /.

Re:Let's Look at the Times...

[TooMuchEspressoGuy]

Frankly, who cares how fast the good news is reported, if it's so buried in amateurish junk that it actually takes searching to find it? The news postings on Slashdot may be late, but they're edited, moderated, and quite professional.

Too late to stop it!

[ToasterofDOOM]

I would like to be known as firing the first shots in a new holy war that will blow away vi vs emacs or linux vs windows or any other holy war. Death to Digg!!! Eat flaming death you unwashed huns!

Thus the greatest holy war with "The Shot Heard 'Round The Web"TM(C)*
Patents Pending

slashdot every time

[daivdg]

I used Digg for a few months after Slashdot put restrictions on how frequently RSS feeds could be accessed. I stopped using it a few weeks ago. It seemed that a large chunk of the community voted for *anything* that referred to Google or Apple, regardless of content. Also, far too many duplicates made it to the front page.

And the lack of filtering greatly increased the level of trolling.

I suspect they serve two slightly different, but overlapping, communities. I find the Slashdot crowd more interesting to read, and I think that although Slashdot posts fewer stories, they are more likely to interest me.

And, of course, there is only so much 1337 I can read in a day...

Now here's the big difference twixt digg and /.

[ngr8]

From digg.com homepage:

Digg is a technology news website that employs non-hierarchical editorial control.

Pepper and fly sh*t, anyone?

Both digg and /. have (different) value

[RabidPuppetHunter]

I go to /. to read (and occasionally comment) on selected technical topics. The topic choice is predetermined, some I like, some I pass, many topics I'd like to see may never surface. Regardless, there is always a debate, some flaming and sometimes some laughs. Its all about the comments. I no longer look to /. for late breaking news, its invariably delayed or some news/topics never show up. Its all about the discussion...

I go to digg to get late breaking news, book mark my areas of interest (I invariably want to find an article again later) and "dig" for new information via users with related links. Digg's comments are mostly worthless dribble but I do not look for comment value on Digg.

Digg seems to be evolving (and hopefully improving their scalability). I hope to see some innovation on the proven /. concept (I am patient, I expect I will have to wait a while...).

The Obbligatory

[rookworm]

Netcraft confirms: Slasdot is dying.

News Bookmarking

[wunch]

I know there are other sites that allow you to do this, but the real benefit of digg for me is that I can 'bookmark' stories and links by digging them, and then access that list from anywhere. So, when I try to remember the link to something that I vaguely recall having read a couple days ago, I can just go to my dugg stories list and pull it up very quickly.

I haven't really used the features of Slashdot that much; I'm mostly a reader. Digg does make news bookmarking very easy, however.

Quick

[TubeSteak]

Quick! Join Digg now to get a low UID!!

Wait... they don't have UIDs?
Will NEVER be like Slashdot

Without uber-low UIDs, nobody can say "I'm right because my number is 1,234" (and the followup comments saying "yea I wouldn't argue with him, his low-ID buddies will beat you up"

Anyways, I noticed three things
1. Their comment rating system goes from +3 Excellent to -3 SPAM (kinda like the wild old days of slashdot's moderation system)
2. someone already registered CmdrTaco
3. They have spelcheking

Re:Quick

[anethema]

Hey, slashdot looked deep into my soul, and assigned me a number based upon the order in which i joined.

Re:Quick

[TubeSteak]

Then how do you explain CmdrTaco getting #1?

Obvious Solution

[The Real Nem]

I guess we'll just have to slashdot them before the diggdot us then wont we?

Like we already didn't know this.

[Anonymous Coward]

I believe the article was extremely redudant. Anyone who had spent half an surfing the two sites could have realized every bit of the article. That is why I disdain the mainstream media. Viva la revolucion!

Slashdot without the editors

[wiredog]

Check out K5.

Re:Slashdot without the editors

[pebs]

K5 - the place where people write such long and boring entries you won't want to come back. Honestly, I almost forgot K5 still existed.

Both are good

[BlueFiberOptics]

I come to Slashdot to read the comments posted by other users. There are actually some highly intelligent people that know what they are talking about, which I enjoy reading. (They are not always there, though)

Digg.com's comments are terrible, I don't know what it is. Maybe digg.com users are less mature or something. (Look at the Diggnation podcast and see how offtopic they get when reading NEWS)

Anyway, Slashdot is great for reading comments from the community, Digg is a great place to perhaps find stories that are very recent or too abnormal for Slashdot. I think both sites have their audiences. I don't see Slashdot going away anytime soon.

Only a Few Changes Necessary

[duerra]

I don't particularly care which of these sites changes, but they both do some things that the other should, and neither do one thing that both of them should.

1. Slashdot should better enable the users to decide what content is posted, as Digg does.

2. Digg needs some serious help with its comment section

3. Digg needs to be open sourced to really attract the Slashdot nerds ;)

4. Neither sites do this well.... but there should be a section, or some sort of system, where popular articles that are continuing to get a lot of comments/discussion/replies are still readily visible, *regardless* of how old it is.

No Zonk on Digg!

[Anonymous Coward]

That is enough to be considered heaven!

AlbertPacino?

[RedCard]

...They should give up, and start weighting user votes. For example: users who post stories that are often promoted

So in other words, they should just turn the whole operation over to AlbertPacino? (Judging from the podcast)

Re:AlbertPacino?

[Lewisham]

Well yes, this is a case in point. He is on the front page usually once a day. Albeit this is often by a scattergun approach, a lot of people like what he does, have them on their friends list and wait and see if he posts stuff, and digg it. He is already almost what I described as a pseudo-editor.

digg on slashdot on digg on slashdot

[SebNukem]

digg takes on slashdot so slashdot posts about digg that takes on slashdot so digg posts about slashdot posting about digg taking on slashdot. You just read this on slashdot.

What's the big deal?

[eno2001]

Sites like digg.com and del.icio.us are just a passing fad. In fact I would argue that similar stuff has already been seen in the form of about.com. The only difference is that you're letting "the rabble" define portal catgories which guarantees a crappy experience. I'd be very surprised if these types of sites are even more than a blip on the radar in five years. about.com hasn't made much of an impact and they have been around for a lot longer.

The main problem with giving the masses control is that nobody does things the same way. This means that you lack any uniformity in the categorization process which pretty much kills the point of categorization: uniformity. Personally, I still don't get why people are so fired up for prepackaged "cool link" sites. Do you lack the intellect, imagination and interest to do some actual research yourself? It's not that hard. And actually, research is quite a fun hobby. The only thing that sites like these bring to the table is a travesty in the guise of a panacea for lame brains.

I get by with my trivial research needs (ie. research that doesn't need to be 100% authoritative or verified) very well with Google and Wikipedia thank you very much. And for the more important research there are texts at the public library and librarians who are willing to help you. The last place I'd go is something that aggregates popular content for lazy asses.

Can you digg it?

[aconkling]

I can't.

I first visited digg after a link to it in a Slashdot comment. I must say, I was taken by the democratic approach and the site design (aside from comments) is very nice IMO. I tried "switching" for a while; I found that most of the stories on Slashdot ended up on digg.com (and yeah, sometimes sooner). So I diligently updated my RSS feed page, submitted some stories, and dugg ones that I thought were interesting.

After a few days and much wasted time, I had seen a plethora of DUMB stories on the front page (e.g. how many things I can build with 4 bazillion legos and 3 years of my life, or this awesome 8-color JPEG image with ridiculous montage of images that somehow are supposed to resemble Episode IV), tons of duplicated stories, only a few I thought were worth reading, and no interesting feedback from other users. The comments were terrible, and it didn't seem that the +/- ratings were used at all. So now I'm back to Slashdot, where, as a nerd, I know I'll read stuff that MATTERS.

I, for one, welcome our filtering overlords.

translation

[Anonymous Coward]

"Digg is more chaotic, immediate and user driven, whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions."

Translation: Digg is crazy-go-nuts wheras slashdot features more MS bashing and Linux nerds mentally masturbating themselves.

I'll keep using both, thanks.

[gwjc]

I'd wager there are a large number of us who check both sites. Digg is fast and more varied; but more crap and dupes get through. Slashdot is picky and slow; but usually offers more depth and less garbage makes past the moderators. Kevin Rose himself said Digg was inspired after his interview for Tech TV with CmdrTaco; he thought there should be a slashdot where the users are the only moderators and submit whatever they want; which is a neat model. I find the bit about 'digg users don't click adds' a little dubious.. it's mostly the same crowd.. I find it hard to believe slashdot users are any different than digg users on average.

Re:I'll keep using both, thanks.

[clcobra]

That's exactly what I been doing - you get best of the two sites!

Shoutwire vs Digg

[Anonymous Coward]

Digg is nothing more than Shoutwire.
In fact the interfaces are almost identical.

Comment removed

[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Looks good - I'm switching

[vik]

After Slashdot banned my ISP - and hence me Slashdotting from home (advertisers take note) - I'm relieved to hear that there is an alternative site.

It has brought home to me that a single information repository is a bad idea, as it can too easily be compromised. Someone at my ISP has effectively mounted a DoS attack on Slashdot, banning all Maxnet users due to a single crap-poster.

By the way, I found this article at work through Digg...

Vik :v)

Slashdot is NOT "in-depth"

[Anonymous Coward]

"Digg is more chaotic, immediate and user driven, whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions."

Slashdot has never been in-depth. All you can see are lunatics, fundamentalists and nerds talking about their misconseptions and bad reasoning. And not even that for long time enough to reach any useful goal or point.

Slashdotted

[MiliusXP]

Slashdot's slashdotting the slashdot killer. If you wanna be a serious competitor to Slashdot, try to have at least the same kind of server/bandwitch.

Kevin and Alex and Digg.

[cabazorro]

Kevin Rose
and
Alex Albreicht (obviously I'm mispelling here)
are the 2 dudes
I've been following (as in reading and listening) for a few years now.

They launched a few years ago an ultra-cool site called thebroken where they posted the best ever videos on techie stuff, from a self-destructing laptop to how to break the password on an old Windows box.

Now the are digg.com

They are a new breed a media personalities. They are the Martha Stewart omnimedia of computer technology for the masses (aka not the scientific angle but the practical).

Kevin and Alex are not only trend setters but they have the finger on the pulse of the techie community. They launched digg and along with it, diggnation, a podcast where they comment on digg top stories.
It's a very funny podcast that is fast, and to the point.
Digg beats Slashdot in many ways.

Yet, Slashdot is a different beast. Slashdot has a truly academic and scientifc community ..law..engineering..medicine you name it..behind.

Through Digg I have found truly awsome sites. For example yesterday I found www.opensourcemac.org because the community highlighted the story. It has a pragmatic useful approach.

In Slashdot somewhat we are all steered at the whim (mispelled? digg has spell checker) of the editor. They even, in a funny way, explain to contributors why they go and reject stories..hey is their site..let them set the agenda..right?

Digg then says: "You don't like my story eh? Let the people decide!!" A valid approach too.

To recap. Digg loaded with buzz and coolness. Slashdot is is highly intellectual. They complement each other. IMHO

I just heard on twit (this week in tech) that Kevin Rose is now a millionaire.
Good for him!

Re:Kevin and Alex and Digg.

[Anonymous Coward]

Kevin Rose isn't a millionaire - that was a joke - the 2.8 million was an investment to his company, and if he hopes to keep growing digg, he's putting a lot of that into a) servers, and b) features (he's already pointed these two out on TWiT before).

And it was Kevin Rose and Dan Huard that did theBroken back in the day - and more recently Systm - not Albrecht.

Alex Albrecht was Rose's cohost for the Screen Savers for about a month or two - that's how they know each other, and that's why they're doing their podcast - a known onscreen chemistry of sorts.

Just wanted to clarify a bit.

Re:Kevin and Alex and Digg.

[cabazorro]

My mistake. Thanks for the correction.
Albrecht and Rose have a great chemistry (a-la Wayne's World) in their show but the shouldn't be drinking each other's beer..that's gay..
Not that there's anything wronng with that!

hillarious

[minus_273]

"Digg is more chaotic, immediate and user driven, whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions."

hahahahah. clearly someone has not really visited slashdot.

Meta Naval Gazing

[figa]

I posted a pretty solid defense of meta naval gazing the last time CmdrTaco brought it up. It was moderated down as a troll, so this is probably a meta troll. It's unfortunate. Had all the naval comments been modded up last time around, CmdrTaco might have figured out the homonym and remembered it.

I, for one...

[LoneGNUman]

It's really a matter of niches. They have more general topics while we deal with more important techie things....like getting first post of the day. I, for one, welcome our digg.com overlords...

StumbleUpon

[alexandre]

has anyone tried the StumbleUpon.com concept for news? It may work...

MOD PARENT JEDI

[Pollardito]

(Of course this comment won't see the light of day because if you don't post early, you're comments aren't moderated any higher to 'Nothing to See Here, Move On'.)

Digg Spy

[goochman]

One feature of digg that I never hear mention of is a little feature called Digg spy:

http://www.digg.com/spy

What sets digg apart from slashdot is the "no moderator" thing that has been said 264 times. This feature really puts that difference front and center. Digg Spy lets you have a realtime look into the heart of digg. Being able to see the stories as they are dugg lets the user watch as the site "self moderates," which really brings to light what people find interesting and how popular a topic is at any given moment.

Both Digg and Slashdot RSS feeds are my homepage... I guess I'm in the middle on this debate.

Dig = WAY overrated

[mabu]

Dig is like the web-equavelent of e-mail forwarding. Due to the way the system is designed, stories get high visility regardless of whether they are truthful or total FUD. In fact, Digg is fast becoming a web site that where articles are spammed into prominence by various ideological and political groups.

Digg has not even hit mainstream yet and it's already becoming painfully obvious that the site's ranking system is fatally flawed. Snopes is likely going to have to create a new category just to dispell the plethora of rumors and falsehoods that seem to commonly appear on the front page of Digg.

It's a nice concept, but there's a good reason why most sites don't let any anonymous user have the power to pick what should appear on the front page.

Wired apparently succumbed

[21mhz]

Holy shit, the Wired website has timed out on me.
And we thought being linked from Slashdot alone is bad...

YES - this is why dupes are a good thing!

[snowwrestler]

According to them, the editors are often aware they are posting dupes. They do it to try to get more comments on a particular story! Many of the most knowledgable folks on any topic are too busy to surf Slashdot multiple times during the day, or to post when the story is high on the page (or on the front page at all). Posting dupes is a way to keep popular stories on the front page to try to elicit more comments.

Taco and other editors have stated several times that they know when stories are dupes most of the time, but they post them anyway because they think the community still has interesting things to say about it. Personally I like the dupes because I'm a busy guy and I don't always catch the interesting stories (or best comments) the first time around. And when it's a dupe, people are always so helpful about modding up the links to the last time it was posted, so I can read those comments too. :-)

Re:YES - this is why dupes are a good thing!

[Cro Magnon]

I don't remember the story right now, but recently I saw cries of "Dupe" on a story when I never saw the original. Turned out, the original was posted Saturday evening. Plus, it gives us something to b!tch about.

In Soviet Russia

[bazorg]

digg slashdots you?

But Slashdot Subscribers...

[Anonymous Coward]

...can beat the rush and see it early!

So slashdot is almost the same as digg

[ruiner5000]

if slashdot had a page where you could see pending submissions? The the only difference is who decides what hits the front page. Do we really want to see all of the Slashdot submissions becomes the question.

User base size

[Dollyknot]

I'm waiting for the first slashdot ID number, to get over a million, I'm in the first quarter of a million so I'm still a newbe.

Tell your friends about slashdot :)

Re:User base size

[Woldry]

I don't think you have long to wait. Look at my ID.

Gee!

[spect3r]

Who'd ever thunk of people browsing BOTH sites! I read both Digg.com and Slashdot.org; and I'm not leaving one for the other... I'm glad to have both new sites; both have positive, informative and enjoyable content.

Anchor Brewing Co.

[Graymalkin]

What I find unfortunate about Digg is the stories that get moderated up to the front page tend towards rehashes of the same damn things: Ajax tutorials, running OSX-x86 on some random Dell junker, and lately how to rip videos onto a new iPod. Beyond the occasional link my RSS reader misses on the fifty some odd sites it trolls digg isn't terribly useful. I thought it might be for a while and had high hopes for it. When I started browsing it every day the cracks became apparent.

The comments are neigh worthless. People chime in to claim they "dugg" the story or in the case of Apple-related stories post to berate "Apple zealots" who have yet to actually post. Everyone reading digg hates iPods but owns them anyways and posts as such on every damn story. If I ever chance a click on the comments link I think to myself "why does it suddenly feel like September"? There's no moderation to speak of and no real way to reply to specific comments.

Digg's stories and links aren't nearly as good as digg fans would have you believe. Quite often people write a post on their blog and then link the digg story to the blog. The top stories tend to follow the same themes week to week. Every once in a while you'll find a really cool link in one of the sections or the main page but it happens about as often as such a cool link coming up on Del.icio.us. I've got an RSS reader that trawls the same sites as digg's readers so I end up seeing stuff about the same time as digg does, without links to someone's blog.

What I love about slashdot which simply does not exist on digg is the community. Rarely does the story interest me as much as the comments on it. There's a nice collection of really bright folks that read and post on slashdot which makes the site what it is. Sifting through troll posts is as hard as changing the moderation level to 3 or higher. Digg has a large number of people pointing at shit saying "that's cool".

wtf?

[dR.fuZZo]

whereas Slashdot features more in-depth and technical discussions

OMGWTFLOL!!!!!!!!

So...

[ewerx604]

Wired has a story about digg.com. Slashdot has a story about Wired's story about digg.com. Then digg.com has a headline pointing to the Slashdot story about Wired's story about digg.com. Then the Internet imploded.

I think . . .

[DrMrLordX]

This article should serve as a reminder that public discussion of Slashdot's present and future state is a GOOD THING. I'm sick of seeing people being moderated as Offtopic, Flamebait, or Troll just because they dare to question authority around here. I suspect that it isn't usually the moderators down-modding these posts, either!

In fact, the entire moderation system is constantly undermined by the editors. There's a total lack of trust around here with a bent towards mindless censorship of "offensive" material. Translation: people here have a lousy sense of humor. That whole "excessive bad posting from this IP" thing shouldn't even exist. Mod their comments down and move along! If it isn't spamming(which it frequently is not), let it go!

My IP was banned until recently because I had the gall to post comments in that goatse prank-article(you remember that one?) that were favorable to the pranksters. I thought it was funny, and I said so. It was! I like a good prank, especially when it's not at my expense, and all it was was a picture of distorted human anatomy. Everyone's got one of those . . . things, albeit not such a distended one, so what's the problem? How could anyone even be offended by that?

Someone - likely an editor whose ego was bruised by the prank - decided that all my comments needed to be down-modded, and that my IP should be banned for "excessive bad posting", even though my karma was still at Good despite several successive down-mods from the incident. I don't mind the ban so much, but what I do mind is that Slashdot's editors are obviously unimpressed with their own moderation system that they need to ban people who are willing to accept the consequences of getting modded down. I haven't been to Digg, nor do I feel any complusion to go there. However, if they are not saddled with this stifling moderation system and a pack of editors that want to police users for no good reason, then I'd say Digg has at least one advantage.

Allow me to be the fist to say...

[Cryptnotic]

I for one salute our new Digg overlords.

Pirates got me tongue

[AutopsyReport]

Overhead CmdrTaco comment: Argh, they be digging up me naval treasures before I cast me one eye on them buried RSS treasures. I ought to digg themselves their own graves!

Digg vs Slashdot vs Fark

[mabu]

Digg is neat because it allows you to submit a story and make it accessible, and you can manipulate the content to make it to the front page. This results sometimes in timely stories getting listed first, but it also results in a lot of FUD and partisian crap that starts flamewars.

Slashdot is neat because the comment moderation system has proven to be a very reliable way of filtering noise from user comments, and slashdot has the most sophisticated user base of any site I've seen on the web. Unlike Digg, you will almost always get more information in comments and you have a way of getting right to the meat of the issue with the rankings. Digg is more of a free-for-all.

Then there's Fark, which is another useful link service, that IMO, gets more traffic than Slashdot and Digg combined. For some unknown reason, Fark doesn't have as much noise in its comment section as one might expect given the amount of users they have. Then again, Fark is not a good source of additional info on a story as much as it is a good source of amusing one-liners. However, Fark does have one neat feature that explains why Digg is getting attention, and what could be done to improve Slashdot, and this is TotalFark. The ability to see all stories submitted by users (whether they're approved or not) is a tremendous value. If Slashdot added a totalfark-like feature, where premium users could see all submitted stories, then I think Slashdot would have the best of both worlds. I haven't donated in awhile so maybe this feature already exists, but last time I checked, it didn't.

It wouldn't be too difficult IMO, to alter Slashdot to apply the comment moderation and meta-moderation system to un-approved articles and spawn a totalSlashdot-esque site where users could bypass the editors' sometimes heavy-handed approval process.

Re:Digg vs Slashdot vs Fark

[Dollyknot]

Maybe the slashdot editors could send slashdots rejected submissions to digg, so we could read them there.

Re:Digg vs Slashdot vs Fark

[Profane Motherfucker]

And also read them in a more timely fashion. It's always nice to see a six to 12 hour delay on slashdot stories. It's now Old News for Nerds.

Strange, digg is down

[RickySan]

Now that's strange, this article shows up on /. and digg goes down. I wonder why..

No, no and yes.

[Some Random Username]

No its not new. No its not subtle. Yes its the same old "say you won't get modded up so people will mod you up" karma-whoring.

...Let's not

[cj79]

I have no interest in looking at digg's comments as long as it's not threaded and not moderated. I visit the digg page from my reader to follow the link to the article and nothing more.

So I use digg for the articles and not the comments. I use slashdot for the comments and not the articles (I usually don't RTFA). slashdot's strength is the moderation of a large number of comments (only the best ones get my eyeballs), and digg's strength is the moderation of a large number of articles (only the best ones get my eyeballs).

So comparing the number of comments on each isn't really going to matter (to me). I imagine you could easily count the number of articles on each and it could be lopsided the other way. I didn't RTFA here either, but if they're comparing the "digg effect" vs the "slashdot effect" on those hosting the articles, then that sounds like a more interesting comparison.

but the real question is..

[tigerd]

was digg.com slashdotted after this story?

I tried to but it seems to be /.ed

[crovira]

I think they have to increase their bandwidth. :-)

Missing word

[RAMMS EIN]

``Digg doesn't exhibit the same systematic, long-term failures of Slashdot'' ... yet.

How quickly we forget, slashdot is Rob's blog

[Anonymous Coward]

Slashdot is Rob's blog. We were discussing recently when he posted an opinion on cyber identity. Obviously slashdot is more than the typical blog, but it still reflects Rob's thinking. Digg does not seem to be blog. More like google news in some ways.....

Re:How quickly we forget, slashdot is Rob's blog

[Anonymous Coward]

C'mon Rob what have you got to say :)

Alexa comparison (was: Re:My comparison)

[otisg]

For those interested in visualizing this, here is how Slashdot and Digg compare, according to Alexa: http://www.alexa.com/data/details/traffic_details? &range=6m&size=medium&y=r&url=slashdot.org#top

Digg can't bury Slashdot...

[Macblaster]

because it's down right now. I'm guessing from the slashdot effect...

take that, Digg :P

Anyone have a cache copy?

[HeLLFiRe1151]

Seems it's been /.'ed, hehehe

slashdotted

[Anonymous Coward]

what the hell is wrong with slashdotters...??

Site Temporarily Unavailable
Digg is experiencing sudden massive user growth. We're adding servers right this moment to handle the increase of load. Please bear with us and we'll be back online shortly!

DIGG has been Slashdotted!!!

[finelinebob]

Site Temporarily Unavailable

Digg is experiencing sudden massive user growth. We're adding servers right this moment to handle the increase of load. Please bear with us and we'll be back online shortly!

Generated Thu, 17 Nov 2005 23:14:30 GMT by Prolexic.com (SI2MIA1/4.0)

OMGOMGOMG!!!11!!1!1!!! pwnt!

Digg got slashdotted

[MySchizoBuddy]

just visitted digg.com and its down here is the screenshot of it

Digg Doesn't Have Zonk the Fuck-tard

[Alan Livingston]

I agree with previous comments, Digg's comments suck. But the best thing about Digg... No Zonk the fuck-tard!

digg is small time

[Anonymous Coward]

Come on! Look at the numbers on the front page. 200 diggs. 3 comments. It's like reading fucking barrapunto - interesting, just lacking the critical mass of slashdot.

Look at the colormatch link, currently 2 links down. This is the sort of thing we don't get here. It's just a "hey, this is kinda cool", type thing, whereas slashdot is a news site.

I add myself to the list of people calling oranges vs apples.

Digg++

[MadJo]

digg++

digg.com sucks

[whiteSanjuro]

[getting on soapbox]

i've been a user on digg.com from early on and i have a very high "rank" (top 3% of registered users). the problem is, this rank means nothing because i have no idea where it came from...am i a good digg citizen because i digg lots of stories? because i report lots of stories? because i submit very few stories? is it my comments? i mostly troll because i hate the users of digg; they are obsessed with the poser kevin rose and podcasts and everything else that is trendy and horrible. also, you want to talk about duping, slashdot looks like the washington post compared to those guys...i've seen days where the same story will be on the homepage 2-3 times! for all that there is some kind of url checking in place, it appears to only prevent you from linking to digg.com, it doesn't check if that URL has already been submitted. plus you get lots of blog spam (people link to their blog which links to what they are talking about),lame ass internet jokes (omg teh funniest pic ev4r!!!1), and advertisements for conga lines, etc.

the only reason i still go there is that they do seem to be getting stories more quickly than slashdot and for all the shit they have, an occasional gem will slip through. i'd say about 50% of the stuff on /. is neat whereas its about 5% on digg, but since digg's turnover is so high it seems to be ok...so i still use both.

"Collective intelligence" will sink Digg

[bayvult]

A pretty good summary. Digg has more problems here, because it will be easier for Slashdot to get timely than it will be for Digg get a community. Without the community it's just a set of public bookmarks, like deli.cio.us.

Digg's comments are real trash. It's already astroturfed and the trolls haven't even come out to play yet. When you hear the word "collective intelligence" used to pimp a site, you know there's trouble ahead. Today's "collective intelligence" site is tomorrow's entropy graveyard

Slashdot more TECHNICAL? BAHAHAHAHAHA

[Anonymous Coward]

Ok, Ok .. Guys, stop it.

Everytime I've attempted to post a technical breakdown as to why something is or isn't, I get trampled upon by the "elite" of slashdot and my post gets downgraded to a stupid -1 "modifier" simply because I made a more witty comment then those who actually have an account here.

Either way, the posts that get the +5's are usually idiotic one liner jokes by members attempting to be clever and cute!

So to say that slashdot is more TECHNICAL, and that Digg is "more chaotic" translates to you guys running scared. I've never been to Digg and just checked it out. The first 3 stories there are:

"The Best Geek Novels"

"Firefox 1.5RC3 Released!"

and

"Popular Science honor's Tiger's Spotlight Search"

Three TECHNICAL stories that are relevant to the community it targets.

The top three stories here???

"It WORKERS Worst Dressed Employees" (???)

"Mad Scientist Invents Colored Bubbls" (???)

"Mega Bloks Wins Supreme Court Battle Against Lego" (???)

And you're trying to tell me that poorly dressed "nerds" is a more fruitful and technically challenging discussion than the best geek novels and release notes about firefox???

You guys are behind the ball. Slashdot has fallen victim to the holier than thou syndrome that effects most kids who grow up to be cooler than thier bigger brothers. Unfortunately, you also grew too big for your knickers, kiddies.

Digg seems to be the place to go for real news concerning technology and nerdy material. I think I've actually found a new home

-BROOKLYN-
_NEVER A SLASHDOT MEMBER_
_ALWAYS RIDICULED_

(Thanks in advance for the -1!)

PS

Calling Non-Members "Anonymous Coward" is askin to the fascists who consider non-citizens those residents who don't serve in the military. But, I digress. That's too technical for you guys. :)

Re:Let's Look at the Times...

[jp10558]

The news postings on Slashdot may be late, but they're edited, moderated, and quite professional.

Well ... *caugh* *caugh*CAUGH* BWAHHHHHHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA!!!

For certain values of late, edited, moderated, and professional I'm sure you're right. But those values are pretty low.

Harder to troll on digg?

[Anonymous Coward]

Another reason digg might not have a troll culture like /. is that it has a few more safeguards in place. You can register a /. account using a mailinator or dodgeit address, but digg doesn't allow these or even spamgourmet addresses. Thus, to register an account on digg, you have to go to the extra trouble of creating a new email address. Also, most of the bugmenot accounts on digg seem to be disabled because of abuse. It seems to be a lot harder to get banned from /.. Finally, most of the trolling on /. seems to be in the comments section these days. I've never seen an actual troll submissions get greenlighted on /., and to my knowledge, there have only been a handful in its history. Whereas on /. the comments are the main attraction, on digg they're secondary, thus being less attractive to trollers.

Slashwhat?

[dspisak]

Discussions at Slashdot are relevant? That's the first time I've ever heard that. Must be due to the Great Hot-Grits Famine of 2003-2005. The fact of the matter is, Slashdot's story submission system blows. On Digg it's much easier to find esoteric stories that the stuffy story submission soup-nazis here would have rejected because it wasn't the right shade of purple, or the content wasn't just pink enough.

Dugged???

[dugged]

What is this then? http://www.dugged.com/

4+ Interesting

[slashdotjunker]

Interesting to see other users commenting that they read Slashdot at 4+. I have always done so and I find Slashdot unbearable otherwise. (Currently reading 4+ with -2 to everything except Informative.)

If Slashdot wants to attract more users, perhaps consider making the default filter 4+?

As an avid AC on Slashdot, it is my duty to say...

[Anonymous Coward]

digg is teh suck there coments
likc balls slashdot
ROXX0R!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!111!!1

(the lameness filter didn't allow me to post in all caps, so bear with me)

Convenient

[Anonymous Coward]

Read the article after reading this: http://www.paulgraham.com/submarine.html
Isn't it very convenient that Digg needs techie posters and Wired picks it up ? Digg effect indeed - how come they didn't mention even a single site ?
I'm skeptical - with such an eye-catching headline, the motive seems to be to get slashdot crowd to defect.
Maybe I'm paranoid - but I suspect the motives of the article aren't totally altruistic either.

Re:slashdot without editor....

[leuk_he]

It would be Slashdot without the editors.

Like k5, that has been taken over by intelectual punks?

Didn't someone say this about...

[mortong]

*cough* Fark *cough*

We've been Diggdotted

[melvo]

I cant get through to this website anymore, and I've forgotten that awkward URL that you'all use!

mod +1 funny!!

[Anonymous Coward]

See sibling.

wiki might just too

[chocotofferts]

if you hate avatar culture, want story updates in closely next to eachother... you would end up with wiki. a wiki vs. slashdot vs. digg mix... who makes it happen or famous...

You curdsed yourself

[Tau Zero]

Would you like some cheese to go with that whine?