The thing about the Internet is that it keeps getting more and more ambitious. Bigger and better and more and lots more. This is what we call “progress” in cliché moments of cynicism when we are using that word to denegrate that same word. I, however, am not using the word in this way in this context. I am using this word thoroughly in earnest when I say that Digg is bigger and better and more and lots more than anything else out there on the interwebs. It’s cool. It’s iProgress. It’s one-stop browsing. It’s the Mall of America for superdorks. It’s progress.
The site describes itself as being “all about user powered content” wherein “everything is submitted and voted on by the Digg community.” That “everything” can mean, well, everything from news articles (this being a popular one since the Digg community is typically a nerdy one) to YouTube videos to online games. The more people who vote on any particular item, the higher it gets on the list; luckily, the Digg community is large and thus, by virtue of many opinions, the cream, as they say, really does rise to the top.
For example, (I’m going to bypass the news stories at the top of the list because, when I was writing this, they were all the usual suspects—John Travolta blaming the Virginia Tech massacre on anti-depressants, Jon Stewart getting courted by NBC, Sicko getting pulled from YouTube) and admit that what sucked me in were the games. In particular, one that was a cross between Sudoku and a crossword puzzle. Or maybe more like “Wheel of Fortune.” Whatever.
But perhaps the most popular feature is that you can create your own profile that brings together all the stories, videos, games, what-have-you, that you “dig” for your friends to see. If you have friends, that is, and don’t spend all your time communing with the computer.