The DiggBar is Not Evil
Over the last few weeks, Digg’s new “DiggBar” has been kicking up a fair amount of controversy. So far, I’ve seen a fairly even split between the people who like it and those that seem to think it’s worth blocking Digg traffic over.
The more vocal group is of course those that don’t like it. I won’t bother linking all the articles that are anti-Diggbar, however, the one that caused me to comment was one from John Gruber, of whom I am a huge fan and long-time reader. His recent post How to Block the DiggBar made me review and think about the bar in a more critical light.
His primary argument is that the DiggBar breaks an old “understanding” in the web world that framing someone else’s content is wrong.
All sorts of sites tried this sort of trickery back in the mid-’90s when Netscape Navigator 2.0 added support for the <frameset> tag. It did not take long for a broad consensus to develop that framing someone else’s site was wrong. URLs are the building block of the Web. They tell the user where they are. They give you something to bookmark to go back or to share with others.
The DiggBar breaks that, and I’ve seen no argument that makes it any more sense to support this than it does to support 1996-style <frameset> site embedding.
Daring FireBall, 04/09/2009 – How to Block the DiggBar
I remember the Netscape Navigator days and I remember this exact problem that Mr Gruber is talking about. The old method used a purely <frameset> setup and with the limited support for frames that this browser had, it was a horrible idea…. However, it’s 2009 and I think I have to respectfully disagree with Greg.
Why the DiggBar isn’t Evil
If the DiggBar was simply a bar that sends you back to Digg, and was 100% focused on retaining your traffic I would agree with Greg. However, as social media services like Digg and Twitter begin to shape the way we share information online, the DiggBar has proven to be a useful tool for me.
The DiggBar loads up all the features I need in order to share a link with other people within 1 click. More than likely, these friends have Facebook, Digg and Twitter accounts so when they recieve my super-short url it’s already setup for them to share, RT on Twitter or favorite in their Digg account.
It Helps my Digg Account Too!
Another reason I like the tool is that now I am able to use all the functionality that Digg offers but with much less effort. I can favorit, Digg or Bury articles without needing to digg through article comments and I can easily find related stories right from the bar.
This has improved the effectiveness of Digg for me because I am now using all the needed Digg features in order for them to serve up more links that I’m interested in.
Digg’s Official Comments
There were many additional complaints and concerns with the DiggBar, such as: SEO concerns, hogging traffic, messing up ad-revenue, etc, that website publishers were concnerned about.
John Quinn recently wrote a response regarding these concerns on the Digg Blog:
Prior to launching the DiggBar, we reached out to Google and SEO experts to ensure we adhered to the leading best practices, as we framed and linked directly to source content via the DiggBar. This process involved gathering feedback from publishers to ensure the execution was as content-provider-friendly as possible. We took several steps to ensure that search engines continue to count the original source, versus registering the DiggBar as new content. We include only links to the source URLs on Digg pages to allow spiders to see the unmodified links to source sites. These links are overwritten to short URLs in JavaScript for users who have this preference.
John Quinn 04/07/2009 – Source
It appears to me that they have made every effort possible to make the bar as unobtrusive as possible while offering some real value to people using both their website and who are dipping into social media to share information and connect with others.
What are your thoughts regarding the new DiggBar?
Update – 4/10/09
I’m never one to say I’m not wrong, especially after general concensus is that I am wrong!
After doing some reading, I’ve found a few resources that offer strong, well detailed reasoning as to why you should block the DiggBar.
- The Growth Of Framebars & Kevin Rose On The DiggBar
- 3 Reasons Why Breaking The DiggBar Can Actually Increase Traffic To Your Website
I’d be interested in seeing what the result of this is: Will Digg make the Diggbar an opt-in service instead of opt-out, will content publishers see a big enough increase of traffic that they stop blocking the bar?
Update – 4/11/09
Some questions:
- Could the fact that many extremely popular sites like Facebook and Digg are framing their content and people seeing a spike in traffic also mean that they are changing the way people browse the web? Should content publishers take a serious look at this instead of digging their heels in at the first sight of innovation?
- Would you turn away a 20% jump in traffic to your site form a highly popular site simply because it doesn’t fit your revenue and publishing model?
- Does this make anyone possibly think of classic newspapers and press that are dying because they have refused to adapt to the changes in technology?
- Social media sites like Facebook (200+ Million users) and Twitter (2 Million and growing users) might be signaling a change in how people use the web. Isn’t it dangerous for publishers to simply ignore this?
- What could be even worse for these publishers is if they adopt these social media sites in token only, put for tepid efforts to adapt, and then are crushed by newer more agile sites that are willing to adapt.
Just some thoughts… I’d love to hear yours!
Update: 4/15/09
Digg’s John Quinn gives us an update on the DiggBar based on feedback from users.
According to John, all of Digg’s shortened URLS will be properly setup as 301 redirects so that Google’s Search Engines will properly index the original posts. >
Additionally, the only people who will see the DiggBar are people who are Digg users that have chosen to view them!
Read the full post from John Quincy here.
This should address people’s concerns and hopefully we can get people to stop blocking Digg traffic!
This article was shared via Digg to Twitter and Facebook using the DiggBar. I will track results / links via Google Analytics and see how their URL structure effects it.
Sam-
Thanks for this post. My concern is this, isn’t this content scraping? Who is Google crediting for the link juice? My address bar shows Digg.com not your URL. Unless I’m missing something this will bump Digg’s rankings not the content provider. This is a slippery slope, and may also be illegal.
Interested in your findings.
Apparently, and this is just from my limited understanding… Google counts the resulting link as the final URL. However, this is just based on what John Quinn and Digg are saying. I have yet to literally see the results myself.
I will be making an update to this post with more information when I have it.
I would be interested in hearing from people who know if this is actually a detrimental tool… or not… from a professional who can present some facts.
All I know is that the more more I use the DiggBar, the more I like Digg.
In-fact, I’d like to see an open API access so that any twitter app can use Diggs short URL!
UPDATE:
I’ve found a few very interesting conversations regarding the DiggBar. Many SEO experts either hate it or are unsure of it.
http://www.3dogmedia.com/truth-about-diggs-diggbar/
This article has also prompted me to begin planning an article regarding “old school bloggers” and their seemingly reticent POV when it comes to new Social Mediums like Twitter and Facebook.
I’m sorry, I tend to use my comments as a note feature or something :)
[...] … ones I have used) 2) Automated submission of spun articles (With SEO in mind) to Relevant The Digg Bar is Not Evil – samhowat.com 04/10/2009 Other the last few weeks, Digg’s new “DiggBar” has been kicking up [...]
Hey Sam :)
You said: “If the DiggBar was simply a bar that sends you back to Digg, and was 100% focused on retaining your traffic I would agree with Greg. However, as social media services like Digg and Twitter begin to shape the way we share information online, the DiggBar has proven to be a useful tool for me.”
In the first sentence you seem to say “if this was x, I’d agree… but”, followed by something non-sequitur (about how social media services play a role in sharing, and how the tool may be useful to you personally.) While that’s interesting, I don’t see you actually address the point which you started the paragraph with. Sure, it may be useful to digg users… but isn’t that beside the point Greg and others have made (and you were responding to?)
So to recap, “if the DiggBar was simply a bar that sends you back to Digg, and was 100% focused on retaining your traffic I would agree with Greg.” In what way do you see that it’s *not* about retaining traffic and keeping you on — and coming back to when you bookmark the short url — Digg? I see it as something that makes sure I never leave Digg when I want to read a story, and if I want to bookmark a link the default action in a browser will bookmark Digg’s URL, not the real page in question.
Keep in mind, I’m not saying here that I think the Digg bar is necessarily bad… I just don’t see how your post really addresses what it seems to say it’s addressing re: Daring Fireball.
@Ryanpc
I get your point, and really it just comes down to, I need 2-3 more pages to really make my point complete and I need a whole lot more practice at writing blog articles. :P
Let me try to summarize.
1. Greg seems to equate the DiggBar to that of the old framesets that use to truly lock you into the originating site and that this bar is SIMPLY that.
2. I disagree in that the DiggBar beyond providing just useful features to Digg users also allows anybody involve with Facebook, Twitter or blogging to easily share or push the linked article to those resources using a previously shortened url, and via quick shortcuts that are useful to most anyone.
3. Another point that I would have liked to make is that the web is so much more than just blog links and getting traffic into your blogs via Google. It’s about sharing information through social media tools like Facebook and Twitter, and if Digg can generate a 20% increase in traffic to websites with this tool, over old linking / RSS methods, then I see it as a plus.
4. The one thing that does concern me is how the links are structured. I’ve been reading a lot of different articles since I wrote this post — should have read them earlier — that seem to indicate that either Google and Digg have a secret deal to allow the OP source to get the Google “juice” (which Google has never done before — to my knowledge), OR Digg is lying about their link shortening service.
—
Hope this clarifies a few things. I didn’t want the article to necessarily focus on Greg and Daring Fireball, however, I did want to use him as an example of those who dislike the bar :P
Thanks for the feedback! :)
Sam & Ryan:
Perhaps the most important reason as to why the DiggBar and other frames should be blocked is the fact that if one is allowed to do it, others will follow thereby reducing content on the Web to nothing but frames within frames within frames (see image below).
http://tomuse.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/multiple-iframes-digg-facebook-hootsuite-krumlr-hijack-web-users-large.png
This, in addition to a flurry of lawsuits claiming copyright infringement and content theft, was exactly why in the late 1990’s this form of spamming/hijacking was stopped.
I would even take it a step further and say that if a publisher is NOT blocking the DiggBar on his/her own website, and/or using the DiggBar links to distribute content, he/she is by association a frame spammer who is directly contributing to the problem. Nowadays there are plenty of browser based Digg toolbars and bookmarks as well as URL shortening services that do not apply frames to one’s website.
In response to your new questions:
You asked: “Could the fact that many extremely popular sites like Facebook and Digg are framing their content and people seeing a spike in traffic also mean that they are changing the way people browse the web?”
Yes, but perhaps not in a good way. It’s a little conspiracy-theory-ish… but by having the bookmark-ability and reach-ability of your content determined by a middleman service (URL shorteners fit in here too, but I can see much less issue, as they generally do 301 redirects.) Once your content-access experience becomes contingent on middle-man services, you introduce potential for several problems down the line.
Kevin above makes a great point, too…. it’s a slippery slope.
You asked: “Should content publishers take a serious look at this instead of digging their heels in at the first sight of innovation?”
You’re assuming they haven’t. I mean, we’re talking big names here. Endgadget for example — hardly someone entrenched in old print-based publishing models…
You asked: “Would you turn away a 20% jump in traffic to your site form a highly popular site simply because it doesn’t fit your revenue and publishing model?”
It depends largely on what my revenue model actually is, I’d say. I don’t think there’s an easy answer to that.
You asked: “Does this make anyone possibly think of classic newspapers and press that are dying because they have refused to adapt to the changes in technology?”
Not really. I don’t see this as refusing to adapt to new technology at all… as Gruber has pointed out, this is *exactly* what was done (and shunned) years ago. The only difference is they’re adding some fancier features and social experiences based around the Digg product. Again, I’m not saying this is inherently bad… but to call the Digg bar innovative is a big stretch. They’re trying to keep you at the Digg site as long as possible, which is what *any* smart business would do. (But that’s partially the point… they are a business, and this is/was a business decision.)
You asked: “Social media sites like Facebook (200+ Million users) and Twitter (2 Million and growing users) might be signaling a change in how people use the web. Isn’t it dangerous for publishers to simply ignore this?”
It depends on how you look at it. At the end of the day, the publishers still hold the keys to their content. If there is sufficient push-back online from website owners, it won’t last (because without sites to include / link to / frame, the feature becomes useless.)
You asked: “What could be even worse for these publishers is if they adopt these social media sites in token only, put for tepid efforts to adapt, and then are crushed by newer more agile sites that are willing to adapt.”
Perhaps you could elaborate on what exactly you mean here. In token only?
All that aside, I think opt-in (on both sides of the equation) would be the best move. Have publishers opt in to having their content framed, and have users opt-in to having outgoing links framed in it (because honestly, I’m not a fan.)
When I saw the diggbar, what I thought personally was “took them long enough”. It seemed to me a natural progression of interface, the traditional way of submitting sites on digg seemed so stupid to me, and felt the toolbar was an obviously needed improvement. So I was absolutely amazed at the amount of criticism it has gotten.
I just see it as a toolbar, just as a plugin would give you, except for all the millions of people who can’t be bothered to install a plugin, or who’re on many different types of browsers. A platform-independent toolbar.
So there are a few major complaints to the diggbar. One is the SEO stuff. And if the comments pointed out on this article, and others on the web, are true, then this should not be an issue. The source on digg pages should have links directly to the dugg pages, and not another digg link, while users with javascript enabled will see the digg links. So SEO shouldn’t be hurt at all. Some people have pointed out that some digg pages have in fact been indexed by google, as evidenced by some searching. My guess is that these urls gained page rank because users posted the digg url through twitter and whatnot, thus ending up giving the digg link prominence, rather than the original url, which digg frames.
There’s the idea that traffic goes to the shortened digg url, and not the original website. Well, that just seems kind of silly to me. The user still sees your pages, and if say you have ads, or require the user to sign up for a service by paying, or whatever, you still get what you want. The url says digg.com/93jrjioj or whatever, but your pages are still being viewed. I don’t see how webmasters are really hurt by this.
And I don’t know how anyone can seriously call this content stealing, unless digg starts putting ads in the bar itself (if opening up the bar to show comments etc showed an ad, I would that that’s fair play though). The content is free for anyone to see in the first place, and digg is obviously not acting like it created the content. It’s just a bar, and in terms of use, it is just like a browser plugin. Only the implementation is different. There’s even a big “X” that lets you get rid of the bar if you want.
ehsanul, you said: “There’s the idea that traffic goes to the shortened digg url, and not the original website. Well, that just seems kind of silly to me. The user still sees your pages, and if say you have ads, or require the user to sign up for a service by paying, or whatever, you still get what you want. The url says digg.com/93jrjioj or whatever, but your pages are still being viewed. I don’t see how webmasters are really hurt by this.”
For starters, it breaks the bookmark-ability of the site… the SE index hijack, if found to be true… it adds another man-in-the-middle (that you *hope* never abuses the trust that has now been placed in them)… and above all else, it begins to take us down a very slippery slope as outlined in my other comments, I think… and several of the blog posts that talk about this. While I’m not usually a fan of generic URL shortening services either, at least they do 301’s.
You also compare it to a browser plugin, which is substantially different in that it wouldn’t have any of these problems (and none of the arguments against the Digg Bar would apply to it.) A plugin couldn’t begin to alter SEO and/as it would let the browser preserve the *real* and bookmark-able URL. If I’m sending the link to a friend, they’ll know what site they’re going to before clicking, and so on. I’m ALL for a browser plugin.
And back to what Sam said above, I still don’t feel like my question about your (his :) take on Gruber’s comment was quite answered. He says: “the old method used a purely setup and with the limited support for frames that this browser had, it was a horrible idea” — I *still* don’t see how this is different at all. It IS purely a frameset setup, and IS designed to ensure you stay on Digg for as long as possible (for better or worse, I’m not necessarily judging). How *specifically* is this no longer the horrible idea you’re saying it once was? Because it includes a link to the source and has an “x” button? The sites that would frame links back in the day did this too.
“How *specifically* is this no longer the horrible idea you’re saying it once was? ”
Well, I wasn’t web-savvy when the frame-spamming went on during the 90s, so I wasn’t around to experience that. However, I do understand the danger. But I’ve gotten the impression that people really were acting as if the content was theirs when framing it, and simply putting ads above it, nothing else, nothing very useful. The Diggbar however is obviously useful for many people and is there to try to add some value in terms of user experience. That’s what I see as the fundamental difference.
Are you against Stumbleupon doing the same thing as well? I never saw any criticism of stumbleupon before, and they’ve had a similar bar for months. I’m pretty sure they use frames as well, for their software-free bar. They started with a plugin, but plugins are slow to spread. And they really did need some kind of bar for it to work well. The same could be said of digg, but people are so used to the clumsy interface now that they say “digg was working fine without it”, when it could be working so much better.
Anyways, I do think digg could have done things better. For example, they could check if you’re a digg user using cookies, and if not then redirect to the original page. That should be a reasonable compromise for webmasters concerned about SEO and all that, since only users of digg (who comes through digg anyways) see the bar. Don’t you think?