May 2nd, 2007
The Problem With Digg Is Anonymous Users
The Digg user revolt (see here if you haven’t heard the story) demonstrates the real problem with Digg — anonymous users are not accountable as individuals, so they have no qualms about breaking the law or forcing a company to break the law. This problem is above and beyond the inherent problem of Digg’s user base, i.e. largely adolescent boys (whether in age or temperament).
Here is an example of a profile of one of the many Digg user who posted the HD-DVD decryption code on Digg during the revolt:
This user’s website has no information about his/her identity. Here’s another profile of a user who submitted the code, even more telling:
This account was created on May 2, 2007, solely for the purpose of submitting the code under a veil of anonymity. Digg has no requirements that users verify their identity — many users are known to have multiple accounts.
The problem of bad behavior of anonymous internet users dates back to flame wars on pre-web bulletin boards. But never before has a media company given complete control over its content to a group of anonymous users. Behind the protection of anonymity, Digg users didn’t have to think twice about the potential legal jeopardy around submitting the HD-DVD decryption code. They can act however they want, and Digg the company has to bear all of the accountability.
A society or community without individual accountability cannot function.
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Totally agreed. However, what I thought was sadder was Kevin Rose’s response about going down fighting (legal fighting that is) because he agreed w/the users. While Digg’s management team said they would continue to prohibit porn or other illegal posts from showing up, I’d like to see whether this would indeed be the case if the user base took them to task as they did in this incident.
The old adage about a few bad apples is starting to ring true, and since now there are lots more bad apples (note the Kathy Sierra incident), it may indeed be time to force people to come out from behind the shield of anonymity and live up to their comments. Sad to have to see the greater good now slipping into what I once considered to be the greater evil, that of siding with anonymity as a means of protecting free speech. Those bad apples are ruining it for free speech
Digg’s problems stem from its liberal user base and the democratic nature of the technology on which it was founded.
No “internet society” will ever live up to the rule of accountability. Anonymity paired with adolescent behavior is nothing new in the digital world.
“never before has a media company given complete control over its content to a group of anonymous users”
Welcome to 2.0
The proposition is that it is anonymity that allowed Digg members to propagate the secret code.
There is utterly no evidence for this. While it is true that some, maybe even many, Digg members are anonymous, there does not appear to be any hesitation on the part of identified members to take part in the same action.
Google the string of numbers in question. You will find them posted in numerous non-Digg locations (as well as on Digg).
p.s. ‘forcing a company to break the law’ - there is a very substantial difference between defying a take-down notice, the validity of which is yet to be established in court, and “breaking the law”.
Stephen,
Anonymity is not what “allowed” Digg members to propogate the code but it removed a barrier to participation in the user revolt. In mob behavior individuals feel empowered by anonymity and act in ways that they never would by themselves where they would be individually accountable for their actions.
Whether defying a DMCA takedown notice turns out to be breaking the law is the not the issue — it has the potential to be illegal, and Digg users demonstrated a total disregard of this risk to the company.
The Problem With Digg Is Anonymous Users
The same users are violating the law every day - downloading and cracking software, copyrighted music, etc. Anonymity or the “mob-like” may have drawn a few users in, but the seeds were already in place.
Longterm users don’t care about Digg as a company - that’s what started this broohaha in the first place.
This is an excellent example of something I find difficult to summarize. How many Digg users are there? How many posts each month across the Digg network? And how many represent this type of “opportunistic” rule breaking?
Every day people get along fine in the “real” world. Some would say this is because we are held “accountable” for our actions, but in reality this is not true. The vast majority obey the rules because they believe in the rules. They accept them internally, and whether or not there were any third party accountability, they would still obey the rules.
I think that it is enlightening that given a more or less anonomous the ratio of acts within social norms to those outside of social norms parallels or pehaps improves on what is expressed by the human condition within a system where behavior is policed.
Legalize It
“never before has a media company given complete control over its content to a group of anonymous usersâ€
Digg didn’t give control over it’s content to anonymous users - it’s not as if Digg actually had any content to begin with, and then just gave control over it away.
Digg is made up of those users who submit content created in other places. The Digg content - their whole value as a media company, is a direct result of their users. Without those users there’s no Digg.
Apparently Digg management understands this, and this is why they caved eventually and were “forced to break the law” as you say.
As for the user base being largely composed of adolescent boys, the amazing thing is that grown men and women now depend on the fruits of adolescent boys’ labor for a lot of their media consumption and knowledge gathering. If you look at wikipedia user profiles you’ll find that many of it’s contributors are high school students…
Very interesting. Perhaps a potential solution is to give members of good standing i.e. “known quantities” of some sort more “rights” than the anonymous user. In other words, Digg might be willing to stand up for and protect a loyal and visible Digg member, but could more easily zap the submissions of an anonymous user.
anonymous individuals. It’s much bigger than we realize. And who has the upper hand? Finally, the delicious irony of it all. Tags: Digg revolt | social media | Digg surrenders
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