DygiScape

Digg Users Fight Back (and Win)!

Some of you may have heard about the recent drama that occurred on the popular social news website, Digg. Well, I’ll share my two cents about it, at least from my perspective with community management.

Essentially it started out when there was a story about decoding HD-DVD with a code (hex characters). The social news service was issued multiple cease-and-desist orders to remove those stories. In response, Digg momentarily shut the site down to remove the said stories that users posted. It didn’t stop there.

Once the site was re-opened, users grew infuriated. A mass of users was commenting on every story they could find in an effort to raise the awareness of Digg’s actions. Since the crowd spread the word virally, it was only a matter of minutes before the front page was sacked with anti-Digg and HD-DVD anti-piracy code related stories.

I thought the community reaction was amazing. For all this time, I figured people practically pledged allegiance to Digg considering there were numerous other pro-Digg stories in the past that garnered thousands of Diggs.

As you would expect, the crowd (or rather, mob) won. In a statement [blog posting] by Kevin Rose, he concedes his position in a unusual PR-style in his blog. He appeased the angry mob, while explaining why Digg removed such stories. This proved valuable since he communicated with his users.

The Consumerist has more details on this, in a live-blog style with before and after screenshots. As you can see, users were peeved.

So I thought, what if the users I manage did this to me — convince the crowd to fight back against the enforcement or removal of content? I firmly believe that it is about expectations that are set. The users don’t expect stories that are “grey-area” illegal to be removed. This conflict of interest between Digg’s legal/business needs and the users’ interest for technology has climaxed with this event.

Another thought comes the legality issue. Why would Digg be held responsible for their user’s content? Could they really be shut down? In a legal precedent in the past, AOL was found not legally responsible if users author offensive content. I’m no legal expert, but as long as reasonable action is taken, then the provider can not be held responsible. The users are.

I suggest that Digg re-evaluate their Terms of Service/Acceptable Use Policy, making clear some expectations regarding removal of stories. Then, to remind the users of the changes, make an informative blog posting on why the changes were made and send a message to users after they sign in about the changes in the TOS/AUP.

The fault in this matter was communication. If Digg appears as if they are arbitrarily removing articles without communicating it, it’s no question that users will be upset. The key to managing the response is to anticipate the response. When you anticipate the community response, you can effectively respond to it citing both sides of the matter instead of appearing on defensive.

What do you think about Digg removing stories? Share your feedback in the comments.

[tags]Digg, Community, Technology, People, Censorship, Management, OpEd[/tags]