I have to say I am very anti-social bookmarking.  I don’t believe it provides the value that social networks do.  For instance, when you share something on a social network like Facebook, you can guarantee that people will view it.  Most of the times people will share it or comment on it as well.  However, with social bookmarking sites like Digg, I don’t see the value.

Yes, I do have evidence to back up my claim.  Let’s take Digg for example.  One, because it’s the most popular bookmarking site and two because it’s the only one I choose to use.  Digg had has interesting content on it before, like funny videos and interesting articles.  However,  what Digg has failed to address in my eyes is not giving everyone who submits content an equal chance to be noticed.  They said they have tried to do so, but it seems like the same issue repeats over and over. 

Look at from this angle.  If you share something on Twitter…you know you will get clicks on the link, no question about it.  Although, with Digg, you have a very slim chance of this happening.  One because almost anything you submit you receive the message “we think this story has already been submitted.”  (It’s something around those lines)  Secondly, you need to submit something almost immediately when it happens.  Unless, you don’t do anything with your life besides watch TV, your chances of submiting something become popular on Digg are slim.

You can submit something on Twitter that’s a day old and people will still click the links, retweet it, and have replies.  With Digg, your submission becomes burried in the archives and nowhere to be found.  My big question is what kind of social bookmarking is this?  It seems to be more like social storage!  You can’t even submit your own blog posts because unless you have discoverd the cure for all diseases, your post will be passed by.  My question to Digg is…all these articles submitted to your database, yet visibility for the majority of your users is slim.  This to me is poor management.  I can’t take away their success.  They have had a lot and I respect that.  Digg provides interesting material (at times), but fail to help all of their users get their submissions noticed.  Something needs to be done! 

Social bookmarking is another form of social networking, but you get more from your networking on Twitter or LinkedIn than you do from Digg or Delicious.  Social Networks allow you to meet new people, provide new connections, and bring together old friends.  Social bookmarking doesn’t provide this value.  It’s another form of the newspaper.  Today, all social networking sites provide news streams, but delivered from users.  Digg provides that, but there’s more interaction when someone posts a news bulletin on Twitter.  I just fail to see where social bookmarking provides me value. 

I will always prefer social networks over social bookmarking.  I have tried some of the bookmarking sites and they all are the same.  Knock offs of Digg!  Digg is the best, but still doesn’t give me a better experience than on Facebook.  Here’s a quick example to wrap your mind around.  You just wrote an article that raised money to build a playground in your community.  Now, if you post that on Digg, nobody will “digg it”  and the article will just sit there.  However, you put this link on any social networking site like Twitter, Facebook, or MySpace and you can watch the comments and replies flow in.  It doesn’t even matter if the people commenting are from the same town.  They want to add to the conversation and acknowledge your accomplishment.  Digg doesn’t acknowledge everyone.  Social networks do! 

In conclusion, I notice desperation from Digg when they add in Facebook connect to their site to log in.  They’re putting a social network right on their site.  Why?  They know that everyone uses social networks, so to entice people to use social bookmarking sites like Digg, they feel this will draw them in.  I don’t know about you, but for as successful as Digg is, they still are behind when it comes to user interaction.  Their biggest mistake was removing the share button when you submit something.  That was the only way to try and get your article noticed.  Now how does anything get noticed?

Eh, I digress.  So, you can either agree or disagree with me.  I feel though I backed up my opinion.  Social networks FTW!  Do you feel social bookmarking provides any value to the end user?  Are we gaining anything extra that we don’t already get from our social networks?

Further reading:

Is FriendFeed A Blossoming Social Network?

60 Minute Interview With Mark Zuckerberg

The Social Networks And Technology Impact

Top Ten Reasons To Follow People On Twitter