Neomeme

There’s recently been a lot of buzz about the true value of social news sites like Digg. Digg executives point to the hundreds of thousands of users, most of whom fit the affluent 18 to 45 male demographic advertisers would kill for, while critics point out the simple fact that the corner lemonade stand little Johhny runs is actually more profitable than Digg, Inc. It’s important to remember that profitability!=value. Even if they did not have any advertising, social sites like Digg and Facebook create enormous value for their core user base, who in turn artificially create value for the company. The sheer value of a front page link from Digg has been espoused by marketers all over. This value is expressed not only in the initial surge of traffic, but in the dozens of backlinks it generates.

Anyway, that’s not the point of this post. The point of this post is why social news sites like Digg suck.

In a word, this is the trouble with social news sites:

PEOPLE ARE STUPID.

Think about the average user of social Web 2.0 sites. Think about the posters of countless bulletins on MySpace and notes about nothing on Facebook. Think about the many commenters on Youtube saying “teh m00n landing is fake duh11111″ and the swarms of ignorant fanboys on Digg. Aren’t you smarter than these people? Aren’t you more intelligent than the unwashed masses? Half of the population is dumber than average. Half(+1, since you cast a ballot for yourself/digg your own story) is also what it takes to win an election in a democracy. Coincidence? I think not! Let’s face the facts- the idiots are overrunning social networks everywhere. In the long term, this decreases the value of social news to their users, which in turn decreases the value of the social network itself, as it is nothing without good content. Social networks rely on. Those who have more friends on Facebook get their feeds seen by more people just like those who have more diggs gain wider exposure for whatever story they choose to promote. And since idiots band together(mob mentality, etc), it is no wonder that critics of content on social news sites have been increasingly vocal, complaining about duplicate stories, fanboyism, and lack of truly creative, innovative content, the kind that democratic social networks are supposed to bring to the forefront.

This could also be titled “the problem with Democracy” and make as much sense. We don’t need a democracy, we need a republic of social news. More on that in my next post, where I singlehandedly solve the problem of human stupidity.