5 ms·

An open letter to Kevin Rose from Reddit cofounder Alexis Ohanian

139 points by dcurtis 16y ago

jmtame 16y ago
can it be confirmed that KR isn't making the calls anymore at digg?
- kn0thing 16y ago
  Let me only confirm that I'm entirely speculating.
  - silkodyssey 16y ago
    You don't like the direction Digg is going. If you were the one making the decisions what would you do?
    - kn0thing 16y ago
      Hmm... User-created diggs (like we have on reddit, but better articulated & designed - I say this as the closest thing reddit had to a designer, I'm no designer). I have no idea about headcount, so I won't speculate there, only to say that reddit's ratio of 1 non tech for every 5 technical worked well for us. And i'd make that digg mascot more prominent, maybe change it around for holidays, too.
      - silkodyssey 16y ago
        User-created sections like the subreddits on reddit would be cool. In fact I think the subreddits are what I prefer about reddit over digg. I mainly go to the programming subreddit and sometimes I am deceived into thinking that all of reddit is about programming because it in itself is a large community. But apart from the programming subreddit I go to the AMA section from time to time and that has allowed me to really grasp the beauty of the subreddit system. It allows each subreddit to develop it's own personality in that it's not just the topics that change as is the case with a category system but the feel and concept of the community changes as well and it offers a unique experience to learn and interact. You guys really did a great job with Reddit!
      - fleaflicker 16y ago
        Basically reddit with a different skin? Is digg a site you frequent? Why so interested in its fate? Wouldn't you rather see reddit leave it in the dust?
- mikeryan 16y ago
  My understanding is that KR is now back in charge, with more control then he's had in some time.
  - mikeyur 16y ago
    This is also my understanding from people in the know. Jay Adelson was removed from the company and most of the codebase for Digg v4, that was supposed to be launching sometime soon, was scrapped and Kevin took over the direction of the company again.
chaosmachine 16y ago
Digg's front page hasn't been controlled by the users in a long time. The new changes hand control over from an anonymous group of moderators to your friends and people you follow, which seems like an improvement.
seldo 16y ago
This is such obvious linkbait that it even admits "this title is linkbait" at the bottom. He means give the power back to Kevin Rose, which is exactly what appears to have happened recently. So... non-story.
- marcamillion 16y ago
  What? I don't understand what the big problem with some HN users and 'linkbait'. Who cares? It's called journalism. In order to catch attention, the headline has to be attention grabbing. This post was soo timely for HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1384994 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1384994 If the article was garbage, then yes I would agree with you. But who cares if he manipulates the headline to get attention. The next time you write a blog post, or anything, that doesn't have an attention grabbing headline and gets a ton of traffic...please let us know.
  - zach 16y ago
    Indulge me a Simpsons quote: Baby-Proofer: Your baby is dead! Homer and Marge: [horrified scream] Baby-Proofer: That's what you'd hear if your baby fell victim to one of the thousands of deathtraps lurking in the average American home! I would like to think that HN follows some of PG's taste for things, and none of his essays have "Your Baby Is Dead" style titles, even when the ideas inside are provocative. I think there's a line to draw, even though nobody is ever going to agree, but that's the way social norms are.
- kn0thing 16y ago
  He's indeed CEO now, but the message to the VCs is that this appears to be a deliberate desparation move to find a suitor (remember we're post series C now) by bolting on the hot new things of the last year -- as opposed to the innovation that got digg to their titan status of years ago.
ziadbc 16y ago
I do agree that these features are 'inspired' by other apps. Had they launched these in 2006 it'd be a copycat move. At this point, these are features that I think many users expect in something like digg. Facebook features have also been 'inspired' by other apps (i.e. twitter) and you can't argue with their growth. Digg has looked more like a forum and less like a startup for a long time, and this may be a catching up on lost ground, and a prelude to hopefully more innovative days.
staunch 16y ago
Digg has already shopped itself around to all the big buyers and they passed (explicitly or not). This move is an attempt by Digg to position themselves as a potential rival to Twitter and/or Facebook. Now all they need is one big dumb company that buys into that illusion.
- mikeyur 16y ago
  I wish them luck in getting bought out. Seems like Digg would be a good fit for Yahoo, considering their new content-only direction.
kierank 16y ago
I assume the April 1st 2011 reddit site redesign has been decided then.
mikeryan 16y ago
I don't have a dog in this race and I actually agree with Alexis (I don't like the new product direction - it does seem very derivative as opposed to innovative) But if you look at where Pownce was going it looks like Kevin has liked some of these ideas for some time now.
phatboyslim 16y ago
Digg still crushes reddit in traffic. I'm not saying traffic is an indicator of profitablity, but it's apparent they are either marketing it better, or more people prefer it. Either way, it's tough to argue "with the people" based on the author's indication of importance. http://siteanalytics.compete.com/reddit.com+digg.com/ http://siteanalytics.compete.com/reddit.com+digg.com/
- fletchowns 16y ago
  This may have to do with the fact that Kevin Rose was a mini-celebrity in the tech world when Digg was launched.
  - mdg 16y ago
    But what about PG ? (for the record, reddit is my #1 site)
- abrahamsen 16y ago
  Maybe in traffic, but the same number of people google for the two sites, and the trend line is not in diggs favor: http://www.google.com/trends?q=digg%2Creddit%2Cslashdot%2Chacker+news http://www.google.com/trends?q=digg%2Creddit%2Cslashdot%2Cha...
- livejake 16y ago
  I wonder how much of their lead in traffic has to do with better SEO on Digg submissions. I see Digg submissions come up all the time in Google searches. I hardly ever see Reddit submissions.
benologist 16y ago
"back when "social media gurus" were simply called "tools."" Did we stop calling them tools?
- mikeyur 16y ago
  ..back when we were able to game Digg (algorithms were very predictable) for fun and profit.
blhack 16y ago
Uhh...what? These are features that seem kindof obvious to me...I think they're awesome. In fact, this is really similar to something that I used to do on my website over a year ago (we stopped doing it because there weren't enough users to make it feasible at that time...some of the ideas still exist though). Alexis, one of the problems with reddit, at least right now, is that there are just too many freaking people. I don't care about the majority of the users on the site. If there was a way to see reddit as it was 5 years ago when it was you and 10 other people, that would be great, and I think that is what the move digg has made here is trying to accomplish. (Shameless plug for my site, which is embarrassing when compared to places like here, reddit, or digg, but still just as addictive to me: http://newslily.com http://newslily.com - the part I'm talking about [show me what my friends are doing] is here: http://newslily.com/lilypad http://newslily.com/lilypad ])
- Lewisham 16y ago
  My only issue with this is that it assumes my friends use Digg too, and they don't. Kevin speaks a little bit about "tastemakers" (how do I find them? Why do I trust them?) and "publishers" (which sounds a lot like RSS spam... right to you in Digg). I hope there is a setting for Top News to be the default, and maybe some way of matching people who you are compatible with Digging to set them as your Tastemakers, allowing a transition away from Top News to something more personalized.
  - Timothee 16y ago
    Your point about RSS spam made me realize that the new design could be interesting. Right now, I use Google Reader to get content from feeds I personally selected. (so not RSS Spam, just publishers I selected myself) If I want to find links that are popular right now, I come on Hacker News (like I would on Digg, but I haven't checked it out in a long time), because the discovery/social aspect of Google Reader does not work for me. I also get links from friends on Facebook. Finally, on Twitter, I follow mostly what Kevin Rose calls "tastemakers" and sometimes get some links from them, amongst the general "what are you doing?" updates. But if I just want to read some stuff, it's all separated. Friends, tastemakers and publishers in the same interface could be a really good mix. Basically, Digg can become the one-stop shop for links and articles: some from my friends, some from tastemakers, my RSS feeds, and I suppose also from the Digg users in general (friends or not). And I get the ability to share each of them in turn from that same interface.
marcamillion 16y ago
My response: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1388142 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1388142
nostromo 16y ago
Reddit's quality has gone down in flames; it's 6 months away from being Digg with a shitty (if lovable) interface. I still visit Reddit, but less than ever. So to talk down to Digg, which Reddit shamelessly copied, and while Digg is at least trying to innovate is odd. What has reddit done lately? Subreddits? Narwhals? I still have love for Reddit, but this post seems obnoxious.
- rubinelli 16y ago
  Two minutes tweaking your subreddits will give you a much better experience. I found that just removing main Reddit made my first page an order of magnitude better.
  - tibbon 16y ago
    I concur 100% with this. The 'main' reddit isn't all that great and more of a distraction than anything. The strong use of subreddits has increased my interest in Reddit strongly over the past few months. Otherwise yes, what is on the front page is just a precursor to what will be on Digg the next day. That being said, these things just funnel around in a hierarchy. HN, Slashdot, Reddit, Digg, etc all suffer a bit from this.
rodh257 16y ago
what does he care? if you think they are making a mistake, great, they are your competitor... why bother writing an open letter? I also don't get what he is ranting about..I think the new Digg looks great, just when I was starting to get sick of the top news stories not being relevant to me, now I will be able to follow people with similar interests, just like twitter, but I don't have to read through what they had for breakfast to get the links I want.
- steveklabnik 16y ago
  They're not his competitor, he left Reddit months ago.
  - kn0thing 16y ago
    Exactly the reason why I felt OK publishing it. I'm still a redditor of course, but breadpig is my only ... uhh.. horse in this race.
    - steveklabnik 16y ago
      By the way, thanks for Reddit. I still enjoy it immensely, even if it has gone downhill lately.
ojbyrne 16y ago
Has he spent any time with Kevin? Because frankly this version reeks of Kevin - it's just endless twiddling with design and a fear of doing anything to actually change the way the site works.
- kn0thing 16y ago
  You certainly know him better than me, Owen. I don't profess to know Kevin at all. In fact, I'd be interested to read your "open letter to alexis: stfu, here's the real explanation for digg4"
  - ojbyrne 16y ago
    Perhaps. But I've really moved beyond it, and anything I say is probably not going to be constructive (and I guess my comment fits that criticiscm). At least until I get a green card and get to be something other than an employee in this country. Because I'd really like to do rather than say. As someone who used to work at a newspaper and harangue the business editor about how corrupt the editorial process was, long before digg, I occasionally get angry. Probably for similar reasons to your post. Cmon green card...
- pclark 16y ago
  you always sound really bitter about Digg. I really hope you've let this go and done awesome stuff post Digg, rather than dwelling on the past. This isn't an insult, just concern.
vaksel 16y ago
an open letter to Alexis Ohanian fix search, it's been broken for a couple of weeks now.
- mahmud 16y ago
  Reddit search? Was there ever one?
  - vaksel 16y ago
    sort of, before you'd get "crap" results, now you get no results. All you get is: Our search machines are under too much load to handle your request right now. :( Sorry for the inconvenience. Try again in a little bit -- but please don't mash reload; that only makes the problem worse.
  - mlLK 16y ago
    http://www.searchreddit.com/ http://www.searchreddit.com/ Except I never use it, googling site:reddit.com along with my search terms and possibly inurl:subreddit-keyword gets the job done
- kn0thing 16y ago
  I retired from reddit 7months ago, but let me direct you to code.reddit.com where I encourage you to contribute :)
- Naga 16y ago
  A couple of weeks?
- trin_ 16y ago
  open letter to you: it's open source, submit a patch.
shortformblog 16y ago
As a blogger, the fact of the matter is, all I ever use Digg for is skimming to see if they have any cool videos to post. I don't even use Reddit for that anymore. I feel like their communities aren't super-welcoming like HN is, and have avoided them. I think that Kevin realizes that to reach a broader audience the site needs to have value for people who don't choose to be active members of the community (or want their own little niches). Facebook does some of this, but it's too closed-off (unless you're on a fan page). Twitter does some of this, but it's too broad in some ways. If anything, it kinda takes the best elements from each. Digg has a lot of problems with the way its audience has grown, and as a result, it's become overly-influenced by one core group of people: Young guys. Jezebel actually called them out on this recently: http://jezebel.com/5531991/boys-will-be-boys-the-problem-with-digg http://jezebel.com/5531991/boys-will-be-boys-the-problem-wit... If you want to win the influence game, you have to have more than just guys and more than just Justin Bieber fans. And the fact of the matter is, you can still have a huge audience on Twitter even without ever touching the trending topics. The current Digg, you have to roll the dice the right way. Reddit, you have to also keep your fingers crossed. And to win the publishers over, you have to a) not treat them as if they're jerks for wanting to build traffic b) not waste their time. This design does both. I'm going to use this once it goes up, because it doesn't feel like the deck is stacked against my little blog ( http://shortformblog.com/ http://shortformblog.com/ for the curious).
budu3 16y ago
I'm a Reddit fan but come on Alexis. Let Kevin be. Digg v4 hasn't even been released to the public yet. You left Reddit a long time ago. If you were still at Reddit then I'd chalk this down as a little trash talk from a competitor. You're no longer in the game. Give him time to prove himself.
- kn0thing 16y ago
  My intention was quite the opposite from trash talking. As a commenter articulated, this feels more like something forced on him by acquisition hungry VCs than of his own design. Digg was in a way one of the best external things that could've happened to reddit: it did all the work of educating people to the concept of "social news" and provided a Goliath to our community's David.
  - puredemo 16y ago
    The VC is a huge assumption for one thing, and it sort of comes off as concern trolling.
sixbit 16y ago
This link crashes the browser on iPad.
antirez 16y ago
Hi think Alexis is biased by the fact that in some way Reddit was lucky in not having the social dynamics leading to a monopolization of the whole site. This is instead what happened to Digg, and to many other social news sites, and the only fix is probably to switch to a hierarchical model. This also happened to OKNOtizie, that is the "Italian Digg", that I happen to run currently. So I'm looking forward to the Digg changes, and in general to the idea of binding users to real identities of other social network sites, like twitter or facebook. We implemented a great deal of filters, but this does not work when a great percentage of your users are not playing the game correctly.
- tibbon 16y ago
  Subreddits (by design) somewhat prevent this monopolization of the front.

139 points by dcurtis 16y ago

jmtame 16y ago

can it be confirmed that KR isn't making the calls anymore at digg?

kn0thing 16y ago
Let me only confirm that I'm entirely speculating.
- silkodyssey 16y ago
  You don't like the direction Digg is going. If you were the one making the decisions what would you do?
  - kn0thing 16y ago
    Hmm... User-created diggs (like we have on reddit, but better articulated & designed - I say this as the closest thing reddit had to a designer, I'm no designer). I have no idea about headcount, so I won't speculate there, only to say that reddit's ratio of 1 non tech for every 5 technical worked well for us. And i'd make that digg mascot more prominent, maybe change it around for holidays, too.
    - silkodyssey 16y ago
      User-created sections like the subreddits on reddit would be cool. In fact I think the subreddits are what I prefer about reddit over digg. I mainly go to the programming subreddit and sometimes I am deceived into thinking that all of reddit is about programming because it in itself is a large community. But apart from the programming subreddit I go to the AMA section from time to time and that has allowed me to really grasp the beauty of the subreddit system. It allows each subreddit to develop it's own personality in that it's not just the topics that change as is the case with a category system but the feel and concept of the community changes as well and it offers a unique experience to learn and interact. You guys really did a great job with Reddit!
    - fleaflicker 16y ago
      Basically reddit with a different skin? Is digg a site you frequent? Why so interested in its fate? Wouldn't you rather see reddit leave it in the dust?
mikeryan 16y ago
My understanding is that KR is now back in charge, with more control then he's had in some time.
- mikeyur 16y ago
  This is also my understanding from people in the know. Jay Adelson was removed from the company and most of the codebase for Digg v4, that was supposed to be launching sometime soon, was scrapped and Kevin took over the direction of the company again.

chaosmachine 16y ago

Digg's front page hasn't been controlled by the users in a long time. The new changes hand control over from an anonymous group of moderators to your friends and people you follow, which seems like an improvement.

seldo 16y ago

This is such obvious linkbait that it even admits "this title is linkbait" at the bottom. He means give the power back to Kevin Rose, which is exactly what appears to have happened recently. So... non-story.

marcamillion 16y ago
What? I don't understand what the big problem with some HN users and 'linkbait'. Who cares? It's called journalism. In order to catch attention, the headline has to be attention grabbing. This post was soo timely for HN: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1384994 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1384994 If the article was garbage, then yes I would agree with you. But who cares if he manipulates the headline to get attention. The next time you write a blog post, or anything, that doesn't have an attention grabbing headline and gets a ton of traffic...please let us know.
- zach 16y ago
  Indulge me a Simpsons quote: Baby-Proofer: Your baby is dead! Homer and Marge: [horrified scream] Baby-Proofer: That's what you'd hear if your baby fell victim to one of the thousands of deathtraps lurking in the average American home! I would like to think that HN follows some of PG's taste for things, and none of his essays have "Your Baby Is Dead" style titles, even when the ideas inside are provocative. I think there's a line to draw, even though nobody is ever going to agree, but that's the way social norms are.
kn0thing 16y ago
He's indeed CEO now, but the message to the VCs is that this appears to be a deliberate desparation move to find a suitor (remember we're post series C now) by bolting on the hot new things of the last year -- as opposed to the innovation that got digg to their titan status of years ago.

ziadbc 16y ago

I do agree that these features are 'inspired' by other apps. Had they launched these in 2006 it'd be a copycat move. At this point, these are features that I think many users expect in something like digg. Facebook features have also been 'inspired' by other apps (i.e. twitter) and you can't argue with their growth. Digg has looked more like a forum and less like a startup for a long time, and this may be a catching up on lost ground, and a prelude to hopefully more innovative days.

staunch 16y ago

Digg has already shopped itself around to all the big buyers and they passed (explicitly or not). This move is an attempt by Digg to position themselves as a potential rival to Twitter and/or Facebook. Now all they need is one big dumb company that buys into that illusion.

mikeyur 16y ago
I wish them luck in getting bought out. Seems like Digg would be a good fit for Yahoo, considering their new content-only direction.

kierank 16y ago

I assume the April 1st 2011 reddit site redesign has been decided then.

mikeryan 16y ago

I don't have a dog in this race and I actually agree with Alexis (I don't like the new product direction - it does seem very derivative as opposed to innovative) But if you look at where Pownce was going it looks like Kevin has liked some of these ideas for some time now.

phatboyslim 16y ago

Digg still crushes reddit in traffic. I'm not saying traffic is an indicator of profitablity, but it's apparent they are either marketing it better, or more people prefer it. Either way, it's tough to argue "with the people" based on the author's indication of importance. http://siteanalytics.compete.com/reddit.com+digg.com/ http://siteanalytics.compete.com/reddit.com+digg.com/

fletchowns 16y ago
This may have to do with the fact that Kevin Rose was a mini-celebrity in the tech world when Digg was launched.
- mdg 16y ago
  But what about PG ? (for the record, reddit is my #1 site)
abrahamsen 16y ago
Maybe in traffic, but the same number of people google for the two sites, and the trend line is not in diggs favor: http://www.google.com/trends?q=digg%2Creddit%2Cslashdot%2Chacker+news http://www.google.com/trends?q=digg%2Creddit%2Cslashdot%2Cha...
livejake 16y ago
I wonder how much of their lead in traffic has to do with better SEO on Digg submissions. I see Digg submissions come up all the time in Google searches. I hardly ever see Reddit submissions.

benologist 16y ago

"back when "social media gurus" were simply called "tools."" Did we stop calling them tools?

mikeyur 16y ago
..back when we were able to game Digg (algorithms were very predictable) for fun and profit.

blhack 16y ago

Uhh...what? These are features that seem kindof obvious to me...I think they're awesome. In fact, this is really similar to something that I used to do on my website over a year ago (we stopped doing it because there weren't enough users to make it feasible at that time...some of the ideas still exist though). Alexis, one of the problems with reddit, at least right now, is that there are just too many freaking people. I don't care about the majority of the users on the site. If there was a way to see reddit as it was 5 years ago when it was you and 10 other people, that would be great, and I think that is what the move digg has made here is trying to accomplish. (Shameless plug for my site, which is embarrassing when compared to places like here, reddit, or digg, but still just as addictive to me: http://newslily.com http://newslily.com - the part I'm talking about [show me what my friends are doing] is here: http://newslily.com/lilypad http://newslily.com/lilypad ])

Lewisham 16y ago
My only issue with this is that it assumes my friends use Digg too, and they don't. Kevin speaks a little bit about "tastemakers" (how do I find them? Why do I trust them?) and "publishers" (which sounds a lot like RSS spam... right to you in Digg). I hope there is a setting for Top News to be the default, and maybe some way of matching people who you are compatible with Digging to set them as your Tastemakers, allowing a transition away from Top News to something more personalized.
- Timothee 16y ago
  Your point about RSS spam made me realize that the new design could be interesting. Right now, I use Google Reader to get content from feeds I personally selected. (so not RSS Spam, just publishers I selected myself) If I want to find links that are popular right now, I come on Hacker News (like I would on Digg, but I haven't checked it out in a long time), because the discovery/social aspect of Google Reader does not work for me. I also get links from friends on Facebook. Finally, on Twitter, I follow mostly what Kevin Rose calls "tastemakers" and sometimes get some links from them, amongst the general "what are you doing?" updates. But if I just want to read some stuff, it's all separated. Friends, tastemakers and publishers in the same interface could be a really good mix. Basically, Digg can become the one-stop shop for links and articles: some from my friends, some from tastemakers, my RSS feeds, and I suppose also from the Digg users in general (friends or not). And I get the ability to share each of them in turn from that same interface.

marcamillion 16y ago

My response: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1388142 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1388142

nostromo 16y ago

Reddit's quality has gone down in flames; it's 6 months away from being Digg with a shitty (if lovable) interface. I still visit Reddit, but less than ever. So to talk down to Digg, which Reddit shamelessly copied, and while Digg is at least trying to innovate is odd. What has reddit done lately? Subreddits? Narwhals? I still have love for Reddit, but this post seems obnoxious.

rubinelli 16y ago
Two minutes tweaking your subreddits will give you a much better experience. I found that just removing main Reddit made my first page an order of magnitude better.
- tibbon 16y ago
  I concur 100% with this. The 'main' reddit isn't all that great and more of a distraction than anything. The strong use of subreddits has increased my interest in Reddit strongly over the past few months. Otherwise yes, what is on the front page is just a precursor to what will be on Digg the next day. That being said, these things just funnel around in a hierarchy. HN, Slashdot, Reddit, Digg, etc all suffer a bit from this.

rodh257 16y ago

what does he care? if you think they are making a mistake, great, they are your competitor... why bother writing an open letter? I also don't get what he is ranting about..I think the new Digg looks great, just when I was starting to get sick of the top news stories not being relevant to me, now I will be able to follow people with similar interests, just like twitter, but I don't have to read through what they had for breakfast to get the links I want.

steveklabnik 16y ago
They're not his competitor, he left Reddit months ago.
- kn0thing 16y ago
  Exactly the reason why I felt OK publishing it. I'm still a redditor of course, but breadpig is my only ... uhh.. horse in this race.
  - steveklabnik 16y ago
    By the way, thanks for Reddit. I still enjoy it immensely, even if it has gone downhill lately.

ojbyrne 16y ago

Has he spent any time with Kevin? Because frankly this version reeks of Kevin - it's just endless twiddling with design and a fear of doing anything to actually change the way the site works.

kn0thing 16y ago
You certainly know him better than me, Owen. I don't profess to know Kevin at all. In fact, I'd be interested to read your "open letter to alexis: stfu, here's the real explanation for digg4"
- ojbyrne 16y ago
  Perhaps. But I've really moved beyond it, and anything I say is probably not going to be constructive (and I guess my comment fits that criticiscm). At least until I get a green card and get to be something other than an employee in this country. Because I'd really like to do rather than say. As someone who used to work at a newspaper and harangue the business editor about how corrupt the editorial process was, long before digg, I occasionally get angry. Probably for similar reasons to your post. Cmon green card...
pclark 16y ago
you always sound really bitter about Digg. I really hope you've let this go and done awesome stuff post Digg, rather than dwelling on the past. This isn't an insult, just concern.

vaksel 16y ago

an open letter to Alexis Ohanian fix search, it's been broken for a couple of weeks now.

mahmud 16y ago
Reddit search? Was there ever one?
- vaksel 16y ago
  sort of, before you'd get "crap" results, now you get no results. All you get is: Our search machines are under too much load to handle your request right now. :( Sorry for the inconvenience. Try again in a little bit -- but please don't mash reload; that only makes the problem worse.
- mlLK 16y ago
  http://www.searchreddit.com/ http://www.searchreddit.com/ Except I never use it, googling site:reddit.com along with my search terms and possibly inurl:subreddit-keyword gets the job done
kn0thing 16y ago
I retired from reddit 7months ago, but let me direct you to code.reddit.com where I encourage you to contribute :)
Naga 16y ago
A couple of weeks?
trin_ 16y ago
open letter to you: it's open source, submit a patch.

shortformblog 16y ago

As a blogger, the fact of the matter is, all I ever use Digg for is skimming to see if they have any cool videos to post. I don't even use Reddit for that anymore. I feel like their communities aren't super-welcoming like HN is, and have avoided them. I think that Kevin realizes that to reach a broader audience the site needs to have value for people who don't choose to be active members of the community (or want their own little niches). Facebook does some of this, but it's too closed-off (unless you're on a fan page). Twitter does some of this, but it's too broad in some ways. If anything, it kinda takes the best elements from each. Digg has a lot of problems with the way its audience has grown, and as a result, it's become overly-influenced by one core group of people: Young guys. Jezebel actually called them out on this recently: http://jezebel.com/5531991/boys-will-be-boys-the-problem-with-digg http://jezebel.com/5531991/boys-will-be-boys-the-problem-wit... If you want to win the influence game, you have to have more than just guys and more than just Justin Bieber fans. And the fact of the matter is, you can still have a huge audience on Twitter even without ever touching the trending topics. The current Digg, you have to roll the dice the right way. Reddit, you have to also keep your fingers crossed. And to win the publishers over, you have to a) not treat them as if they're jerks for wanting to build traffic b) not waste their time. This design does both. I'm going to use this once it goes up, because it doesn't feel like the deck is stacked against my little blog ( http://shortformblog.com/ http://shortformblog.com/ for the curious).

budu3 16y ago

I'm a Reddit fan but come on Alexis. Let Kevin be. Digg v4 hasn't even been released to the public yet. You left Reddit a long time ago. If you were still at Reddit then I'd chalk this down as a little trash talk from a competitor. You're no longer in the game. Give him time to prove himself.

kn0thing 16y ago
My intention was quite the opposite from trash talking. As a commenter articulated, this feels more like something forced on him by acquisition hungry VCs than of his own design. Digg was in a way one of the best external things that could've happened to reddit: it did all the work of educating people to the concept of "social news" and provided a Goliath to our community's David.
- puredemo 16y ago
  The VC is a huge assumption for one thing, and it sort of comes off as concern trolling.

sixbit 16y ago

This link crashes the browser on iPad.

antirez 16y ago

Hi think Alexis is biased by the fact that in some way Reddit was lucky in not having the social dynamics leading to a monopolization of the whole site. This is instead what happened to Digg, and to many other social news sites, and the only fix is probably to switch to a hierarchical model. This also happened to OKNOtizie, that is the "Italian Digg", that I happen to run currently. So I'm looking forward to the Digg changes, and in general to the idea of binding users to real identities of other social network sites, like twitter or facebook. We implemented a great deal of filters, but this does not work when a great percentage of your users are not playing the game correctly.

tibbon 16y ago
Subreddits (by design) somewhat prevent this monopolization of the front.