I was not familiar with the site Digg before reading Levinson’s book but found this chapter to be very informative. After visiting the site myself, I found many different stories that I was interested in and was surprised on how easily accessible they were. They are categorized into topics such as Entertainment, Science, and Sports, which made the site very easy to navigate.
In comparison to other social media sites, I would not consider this a great site to have “Friends.” The concept that one person can follow another like Twitter does not really make sense to me because I feel you should both agree to being “friends” together. While they are not true friends, I do like the idea that your “friends” have similar interests to you just as you would in real life. This keeps you connected and forces you to keep up with each other so you can find out more things going on in the world. You can keep each other updated on current events and this is a very positive part of this site. The site is always refreshing which keeps everyone informed at all times.
http://guyism.com/humor/types-of-facebook-birthday-wall-posts-real-meanings.html
I agree that Digg isn't the ideal site to have friends on. I still think its strange to have a list for "followers" and "following" on Digg. I think the original intention was to see links that other random people thought were cool and to then continue to "Digg it" to share them with more people. On the one hand, having followers takes the fun out of stumbling upon a story that you wouldn't normally have seen because you only focus on the stories that familiar people Digg. On the other hand, you're given the chance to follow people who's stories you regularly digg and appeal to your interests. Personally, I don't follow anyone on Digg, and prefer to look at Top News from all users as opposed to a select few.
ReplyDeleteisn't it comparable to following certain critics in the old media, say movie or music critics, because their tastes are comparable to your own?
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