Web 2.0 Moving to the Mainstream
Last week, Time magazine named “you” — the average Joe who contributes to user-built Web sites that form the backbone of the Web 2.0 movement — as its Person of the Year. “You” beat out such newsmakers as George W. Bush and such troublemakers as Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Iran’s down-with-the-West president, and Jack Abramoff, former power partner to some of the nation’s top politicians.
But the world of Web 2.0, in which users build Web sites as a community, giving their time, content, and more-than-fleeting attention, is changing as quickly as the Web that gave birth to it.
One of the sites leading the charge is Digg.com, the popular news-ranking site that allows readers to submit and rank their favorite stories from around the Web. Earlier this week, Digg announced version 4.0, a substantial redesign that continues the site’s evolution.
Social Project
The Digg redesign includes new sections for podcasts and videos, and more clearly segments its news content, all of which is submitted by users. Although Digg’s roots can be traced to the world of technology news, the site recently expanded to include categories for World & Business, Sports, and Gaming.
For those who are not part of the “you” crowd that Time so vividly honored, it might take a little explaining to understand what Digg is all about. Essentially, Digg lets users submit their favorite news stories from around the Web. The more readers “digg” a story, the higher its ranking becomes.
As stories move to the top of the list, they get better visibility and are therefore likely to garner even more votes and move yet higher on the list. It’s kind of like a popularity poll of the Web’s daily news.
Like many popular Internet ventures, Digg began as a project created by several friends, all of whom maintain an active role in…
