The Return of Digg, a Star of an Earlier Internet Era
205 comments
·March 5, 2025Loughla
dartos
> that tech has gotten to a point where user hostile moves don't have as much of an impact anymore
It’s because the small dozens of us that care about the freedom that the small internet afforded vs algorithmic content discovery is now the minority and no big platform cares about us.
In the early days of the internet, they had to care. They had to convince people to leave their beloved forums and IRCs and move to Facebook or Reddit.
Internet users were fairly niche and fickle. Now everyone uses the internet and most people don’t care about their own freedoms wrt how they interact with technology.
phs318u
> Now everyone uses the internet and most people don’t care about their own freedoms ...
Honestly, you can leave it right there. No need to add " wrt how they interact with technology".
I'd add that most people aren't even aware of their own freedoms or the value of those freedoms. Civics education is probably at its lowest point (globally). A lot of people are only aware of the heavily "interpreted" version of those specific rights that they are constantly beaten over the head about by vested interests via old and new media.
juujian
Yeah, now everyone and their mom is on the internet. And their mom probably more then they are.
wdr1
time for us all to go back to gopher
dingnuts
[flagged]
jghn
> It’s because the small dozens of us that care about the freedom that the small internet afforded vs algorithmic content discovery is now the minority and no big platform cares about us.
This. I see people whine all the time about being subjugated to The Algorithm on these sites. On many sites there are easy workarounds to avoid The Algorithm altogether. But when this is pointed out they come up with some reason why they hate interacting with things that way.
In other words most people very much do want An Algorithm. They just might not want The Algorithm.
dartos
“The Alogrithm” is just another idea being propagated by an algorithm anyway.
DrillShopper
Every time someone complains about ThE aLgOrItHm as a YouTube viewer(*) I remind them that the Subscriptions feed exists and continues to work.
(*) YouTube creators, though, have to have a firm knowledge of it because at this point for many of them less than 10% of their views come through subscriptions.
null
phailhaus
That's because Digg's changes fundamentally changed how users interact with the site and receive content. From an article at the time:
> Protesting at the removal of the upcoming news page, the default setting of "My News", deleted favourites, the apparent front page domination of a handful of publishers, and the removal of the "bury" button (for voting down stories), Digg users flooded the front page with links to rival aggregators and pleaded with chief executive Kevin Rose to turn back the clock.
The quality of the content itself dropped off a cliff because of systemic changes. By contrast, Reddit's redesign was a reskin. Lots of people hate it, but Reddit is fundamentally still the same.
Source: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/pda/2010/aug/31/digg-...
ryandrake
On the other hand, I remember Fark pretty much dying after they forced an unwanted reskin on their users. The "You'll Get Over It"[1] hubris from their admin was probably the start of their downfall.
outer_web
Also the Gawker sites did the same, concurrent with their other mishaps.
nailer
Killing third party apps makes the site unusable. Some embedded videos don't have sound, you now have to click the link to the third party site to be able to hear a video.
Meanwhile, moderation has gone insane - I've had an account banned for saying 'Hamas must be destroyed' and another banned for merely explaining JK Rowlings position on transgender matters - not even offering my own. Reddit is very, very far left of the mainstream whose advertisers it is seeking to woo.
phailhaus
Reddit doesn't control subreddit mods, and some videos not having sound does not make the site "unusable". That's why it's still so successful.
AngryData
Reddit isn't suppressing you or your side specifically, they are assholes to everybody because it is moderated by tons of random people. You never got banned for posting leftist things because you don't post leftist enough things for anyone to be offended by it. Tons of people got banned for speaking a bit too frankly about their support for Luigi, which isn't a left/right issue at all, it is pure class divide.
lovich
The moderation is hyper partisan on all sides. Not just the left.
I’ve had accounts banned along the the entire ecosystem of libertarians solely for the audacity of asserting that there were people who described themselves as socialist libertarians, and not declaring that there were five lights and that the philosophy did not exist.
The admins don’t care unless it hurts advertising dollars. Reddits leadership has been very consistent on this practice ever since the early days like with u/violentacrez and the jailbait subreddit
eek2121
There are still 3rd party apps. One for iOS is called Hydra, which looks and works similarly to Apollo.
whateveracct
Reddit is perfectly usable in iOS Safari
roger_
Did Slashdot really kill itself or was it just never ambitious enough to seek a broader base or try to foster communities?
I don’t recall any user hostile practices, though I was just a passive user back in the day. I remember a few redesigns that people weren’t entirely pleased with, but nothing on the scale of the “new” Digg.
bombcar
I think Slashdot died when Cmdrtaco sold out, not for any real nefarious reason, but simply that it was no longer "a list of things Cmdrtaco was interested in" but had spread so wide that it was more of a mish-mash. Early on it was nice, because if you liked the things Cmdrtaco was interested in, you'd like almost every post (even if you got mad at it). Once it was wide, it was harder to follow.
Digg had a similar issue, but was more "active" for awhile. Reddit really "solved" the problem by having subreddits so you could curate what you were interested in.
Also, the people who were using /. grew up, and there wasn't really replacement people.
ta1243
> Also, the people who were using /. grew up, and there wasn't really replacement people.
This is a big thing. The internet users of the late 90s just don't exist any more. The internet isn't for nerds any more, it's as ubiquitous an infrastructure as electricity or roads, everyone uses it.
The generation before slashdot from the 80s upto Eternal September were another group
You can't recreate slashdot today, because the people don't exist.
_DeadFred_
Also how many times can we talk about the Enlightenment window manager?
emacsen
My read on Slashdot was that we need to separate out the folks who built the site from those who run it.
The original authors executed an exit strategy. They sold the site, got a bunch of money, and left to work on new things.
The various new owners (of which there have been a few) have never been ambitious about expanding Slashdot, either in technical or social scope.
hoistbypetard
I think it's more that second thing than the first one. I joined slashdot in the late 90s, and though some of the OSDN stuff briefly sniffed at enshittification, they didn't really ever take that plunge.
IMO, people who liked the user generated aspect of slashdot also liked the higher velocity of digg, reddit, and even HN better as those came along. People who liked the editorial curation angle that distinguished slashdot from these newer takes came to prefer more curation and professional editorial commentary, leaving slashdot in an odd in-between space.
jghn
This is an interesting point.
I was a heavy USENET user for several years before finding Slashdot. With /. I found myself rarely going to the source link and almost never reading the editorial commentary. I'd go straight to the comments and start reading what people had to say. All these decades later and what I love about sites like HN and Reddit is immediately wading in and embracing the zeitgeist. I *loved* Twitter for a long time for the same reason.
But you're right. There are others I knew who were the exact opposite. And those people today have very different internet habits than I do.
serviceberry
> Did Slashdot really kill itself or was it just never ambitious enough to seek a broader base or try to foster communities?
It's still around, but there's one simple DAU measure we can look at: it used to be that stories would get 100-500 comments, and now they usually get 5-30.
But I don't think it's a good example of what the parent is complaining about. Slashdot didn't change to be more hostile, it was fairly hostile from the get go. It had a snarky commenting culture, fairly brutal moderation, etc. You'd be downvoted into oblivion for the most minor transgressions - like not hating Microsoft enough.
It just happened to be the only game in town for geek news. But then, a number of alternatives popped up - tech-related subreddits, HN, etc. I stopped using Slashdot not because of any redesign or policy change, but simply because I could get the same news elsewhere, with a lower entry bar to participate.
chairmansteve
They sold to Conde Nast or something.
AnimalMuppet
I think Slashdot's problem was that the moderation there wasn't powerful enough. The percentage of trolls reached a certain point, and then some fraction of non-troll users got disgusted enough to leave, so the percentage of trolls was now higher, and more non-troll users got disgusted and left...
That vicious circle destroyed the community. IMHO.
SirMaster
I care to some extent. But both old.reddit.com still works just fine and 3rd party apps when using my personal API key still work. I am still using Apollo on iOS and it's still working just fine for me.
As long as these 2 things work I'll likely still continue using it.
So I care to the point that if I can get them to work then I will stick around, but when I can't then I'll leave.
liotier
old.reddit is nice but it feels like having a conversation while on death row - still a couple of appeals pending but the endgame is not really in doubt.
The end of RedditIsFun (https://www.reddit.com/r/redditisfun/) was the end of my Reddit era - I'm still on r/askHistorians, r/askScience and a couple of niche leftovers, but I stopped moderating - the interests of the platform and its users have obviously diverged.
pavel_lishin
Not to mention, moderation tools are spread over the old site, the new site, and the mobile site in completely incongruous ways.
I'm sure there are tools I'm not even aware of as a mod, because I'm not interested in digging into two additional interfaces, when most of what I need to do is "remove post", and "ban user from subreddit".
null
oneeyedpigeon
I wouldn't say old. is fine. It's all I use, but there are big flaws: some posts just aren't viewable and you'll end up on new. if you're not careful.
SirMaster
It seems to be OK for me, but I am using https://redditenhancementsuite.com/
So maybe that makes a difference. I think it forces the old interface. Like my URL isn't even old.reddit, but all I see is the old interface. Or maybe I don't use subs with newer posts types that are not compatible with old?
hasbot
Seems fine to me. Been a heavy user before and after the reskin and the only thing I've noticed missing is polls.
kevin_thibedeau
There are extensions to force you onto old and improve the UI.
Peanuts99
Funnily my Boost for Reddit app also using a personal API key has stopped working today. Hopefully I'll be able to fix it but it'll be pretty sad if not.
robotguy
Same here, but I'm still using (glances left, glances right) Alien Blue on iOS (Shhhh...). I have NEVER seen an ad on mobile Reddit. Someday they'll do something so that it stops working and I'll be off Reddit.
eek2121
Apollo was disabled by the developer. It now shows a thank you screen and stuff. There is no way you could be using it.
rudolftheone
You can still use it though, but it's not entirely straightforward: you need to sideload it, see https://www.reddit.com/r/apollosideloaded/
SirMaster
Yes you can still use modified versions that allow using your own personal api keys. The reddit api has not changed and a personal api key is free and has something like 1000 hits a day which is plenty even for a heavy user.
stronglikedan
At least reddit still maintains old.reddit. Digg never gave users the choice. If there is ever only new reddit, then there won't be reddit for me.
paradox460
Sort of. Reddit killed the old mobile site, which I built to run over 3G on a 533MHz CPU with 512Mb of RAM
The new mobile website is at least an order of magnitude heavier than the old one
There are some old screenshots of it, I've got one of them in my blog here: https://pdx.su/blog/2023-04-06-rip-reddit-compact/
vekatimest
I loved i.reddit, and really miss sites that were actually optimized for performance and low-end devices. It being removed kind of felt like a final nail in the coffin for that whole era. I think HTML Gmail was killed around that time too.
aaronbaugher
I had to find a browser plugin that automatically converts reddit links to old.reddit, for times when I'm researching something at work and land on a reddit link. The new system seems aggressively designed to keep you from reading the content.
gazook89
You’ve already got your solution but just wanted to mention that Kagi search gives this option, if that’s useful for someone.
adzm
Same, I've tried to get used to the 'new' format multiple times, but it's incredibly frustrating
ethagnawl
Please don't remind them that it still works.
oneeyedpigeon
I know you're joking, but I'd love to know their take on it. I assume they're viewing the logs and cursing all of us forcing them to keep maintaining old.
AlecSchueler
Reddit got big enough that the competition died off. When Digg took a nosedive there were plenty of other places with some community people could move to. Even BB forums were still a thing back then. Now pretty much everything that isn't extremely niche, and even many things that are, have been soaked up by Reddit.
dingnuts
lately Reddit has been feeling really like dead Internet though. every subreddit is talking about the same current event all the time.
there are smaller spaces that are thriving just like the old days.
hylaride
Agreed. Over the past 2 years so many subreddits have devolved into what can be best described as doom scrolling ragebait, which is what reddit wants because it keeps eyeballs going for advertisers.
My city's subreddit when from "here's what's cool, going on, or new" to constant political posts. I'm Canadian and it's all but been determined that political forces are using AI posting to complain and point all problems at the current government (it's not clear who is doing it, whether far-right, foreign, or the opposition itself) on all Canadian focused subreddits.
There's also some curious stories about how a lot of the very good moderators of some of the larger ones like r/Canada, their provincial/city/regional counterparts, etc were all pushed out via various means.
thih9
But where? What spaces?
I know about wikia/fandom, discords (both as user hostile as reddit), or some ancient topical forums (neither small not thriving).
foolfoolz
reddit is a really weird website these days. the main subs push misinformation / ai generated garbage. the same posts are on every sub. the self post subs are almost 100% ai written. the comments which historically have been sometimes useful just feel hollow
arkh
> lately Reddit has been feeling really like dead Internet though.
Saccharined killed. You used to be able to make some really vitriolic comments on most subs just for the lulz and only get downvoted to hell and back. But nowadays if you're not following the doxa you get perma-banned from some sub first then next day perma-banned from reddit itself. And if you comment on one of the main subs you go directly to reddit permaban.
halyconWays
The major subreddits are almost entirely bots as well. Try posting anything authentic and you'll be banned, regardless of how old your account is or how human you appear to be. It's entirely controlled, fake discussion pretending to be authentic due to the legacy of the site. The concept of moderators being volunteers from the community died off a long time ago, and there are zero safeguards to ensure they aren't captured entities from some organization or NGO; in fact, the architecture of the site itself doesn't even view this threat as a threat.
Remember, once considered a conspiracy theory, Ghlisane Maxwell was a powermod.
kacesensitive
I miss 2021-22 reddit. Seemed we finally went back to normal.
jghn
> But it seems like nobody really cares.
Speaking for myself it's because old.reddit is still available. I loathe the new reddit after all this time. If they nuke old reddit my usage would go down quite a bit.
Workaccount2
>But it seems like nobody really cares.
Reddit is referred to by most of it's users as an app.
That should tell you everything you need to know.
bityard
Back in the day, my top three websites I would visit were: 1) Slashdot 2) Digg 3) Reddit
At the time, Reddit was extremely small and looked a lot like Hacker News does now, except that the content was about 1/3 nerd-related, 1/3 mainstream news, and 1/3 was people's experiences and questions about recreational drugs. (Which I was not and am not into.) I'm not sure if there were even subreddits at that point.
DrillShopper
At the very beginning there weren't subreddits. When they introduced subreddits they put all previous posts under /r/reddit.com.
angry_moose
Oh damnit. I actually like current Digg. Doesn't nearly have the reach it used to, but its definitely in my "scan once a day list" for a couple interesting articles.
> Digg founder Kevin Rose has teamed up with former rival Alexis Ohanian to buy the once-popular content aggregator as they bet on an artificial intelligence-powered revival of the platform that once drew around 40 million monthly visitors.
Sounds way worse.
Edit: And, "Current Digg" is apparently down now.
rideontime
Like a lot of guys who haven't had a hit since the dotcom boom, he seems to have spent the past decade jumping on whatever bandwagon. He went big into crypto, too. https://www.coingecko.com/en/nft/moonbirds
qingcharles
The floor price for these things isn't awful ($1000) as NFT PFPs go, so they've retained some sort of value, perhaps because of Rose.
dehrmann
Another pattern I've seen is people recycling their old ideas, but with a twist that's the latest trend.
danso
Dang I thought this was going to be a throwback (2013) article about Digg's post-v4 relaunch [0] by Betaworks.
> The new Digg has little in common with the old site: it has big photos instead of tiny text, does not allow for comments, and most importantly, it depends on human editors in addition to an algorithm that weighs user voting. So far, people seem to like it. A new survey, this time with 2,600 users, showed that 81 percent would recommend the new Digg to a friend.
One thing I remember about this phase was how good the headlines were, they must have paid a decent sum for human editors.
[0] https://www.theverge.com/2013/2/4/3950596/diggs-traffic-rebo...
almosthere
I "liked" the new digg after it was purchased because someone took up the mantle, but I expected it to grow into the features it was missing, even perhaps have a new diggnation podcast behind it. But it basically just sat still, hoping to just ride the domain name. It also went extreme woke since I believe the human editors were hired that way.
peter422
It is very funny that the article highlights these two guys saving Digg, and they both care so deeply about it that they are going to... sit on the board and keep their day jobs.
They won't go all-in on the idea and expect that we'll all be super excited by it. Just shows how out of touch VCs can get.
righthand
Kevin Rose especially out of touch, but mostly because he spends his time hyping his own ideas and if they don’t work he steps out until the next idea comes around.
TomMasz
The Digg of (literally) yesterday was not the Digg that shot itself in the foot. It was just a site that posted links to various things you could find in other places. Not sure what they're planning but I can't help feeling the ol' ship has sailed on Digg as any kind of community site.
probably_wrong
Just for posterity sake I'd like to point out that the Digg of yesterday also shot themselves in the foot when they chose (allegedly) to copy all of their content from DamnInteresting [1].
Once they got themselves called out they stopped sharing that content and, consequently, the quality of the site went back down. Until yesterday they lived off Reddit polls, advice columns, and Twitter controversies.
Source: I check the website about once a week.
TomMasz
I noticed the content change, but missed the reason behind it.
flkiwi
Given Kevin Rose's web3 turn, I don't have high hopes.
criddell
I think he's pretty much done with cryptocurrency stuff and has moved on to health and AI (separately).
flkiwi
I was less focused on his NFT/crypto phase as on his faddishness. He just sort of grabs after whatever is in the headlines.
paradox460
I mean, he always has. Let's not forget that diggs grew the way it did because he talked about it on TechTV (rip)
jdlyga
the web3 bros moved on to ai agents
nailer
That's just the scammers. The people building financial products never left.
nailer
If I make a post that gets 100K likes, please give me some of the ad revenue.
RobotToaster
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
Anyone else remember?
qingcharles
The MPAA remembers.
Stevvo
I missed Diggnation, it was the first podcast I listed to. Happy to find it has already been revived; https://www.diggnation.show/
doix
Yeah, it was my first podcast too. I'm pretty sure it's part of the reason I went into tech, had a pretty big influence on my life. Kevin mentioned trying to buy back digg on the podcast, I couldn't tell if it was a serious comment or not. Looks like it was.
indigodaddy
Ahh the nostalgia: https://youtu.be/W1_YoG7lqI4
nntwozz
Ooof yeah that hits hard.
At the end of the video they mention del.icio.us, another blast from the past.
dehrmann
Remember the Businessweek cover?
ed
Kind of crazy Kevin wasn’t required to mention it was his project!
picafrost
As one platform chases profits and loses its soul, another resurrects to welcome the nostalgic refugees. The eternal cycle of digital migration continues.
permo-w
does it though? do you really expect this to be a success? people will just stay on reddit like they always do. twitter has been taken over by one of the most hated people in the world and they appear to be doing better than ever user-wise
basisword
I think current Reddit is very different from what Digg was. Reddit is too much user generated content (i.e. the exact same AskReddit questions asked on a weekly basis) and not enough cool links/videos anymore. At least on the non-logged in homepage. If Digg is exclusively links, it'll definitely have a place imo.
Digg killed itself and let reddit eat its lunch with user hostile practices. Just like slashdot before digg.
I find it fascinating that tech has gotten to a point where user hostile moves don't have as much of an impact anymore. Reddit pushing new Reddit layout and killing 3rd party apps is what did it for me. But it seems like nobody really cares.
I don't know what it means, but it means something.