News and Commentary on Politics, Media and Culture

Update: Moved to the top for timely discussion.

Michelle Malkin has noticed that there seems to be a strong liberal representation at DIGG and other similar social networking sites. So, in an effort to help right the ship, so to speak, she is adding DIGG to her posts.

One of the interesting things about DIGG is that users can vote for stories to push them to the top as well as bury stories that they don’t like. Hence longevity is questionable. I don’t know for sure as I haven’t used DIGG although Webloggin is DIGG enabled (see the social networking icons at the bottom of this post in the comment section).

I used to prefer Newsvine and I am not sure if Michelle or Allah Pundit has made their way over there. Newsvine, like most other social conservative sites is disproportionately represented by liberals. However, it is easy to keep your articles front and center on the Vine. I have had articles last a whole day and they generated some spirited discussion. Newsvine also has a feature that lets you blog on their site as well as create a MySpace/Technorati like experience with buddy lists, tags and all that good stuff. Thus you can seed articles, write articles, comment on articles, etc..; kind of like a super blog extension to your site. Politics is very hot on Newsvine.

Unfortunately I had such a bad experience with the management of Newsvine that I left it altogether. It turned out that they have a system where they moderate comments on your articles. One of the bigger bloggers over there is a pro-Chavez socialist whose sole existence appears to hinge on launching Chomskyish Z Magazine bred tirades on conservative posts. He also appears to be in very tight with the CEO of the site. Hence moderated comments tend to favor those of the far left persuasion. Rather than stay and deal with these guys I chose the alternatives of Digg and Fark.

Digg really helps drive traffic to your site. Etiquette dictates that bloggers should not Digg their own articles. Readers of blogs can help bloggers out by promoting articles to Digg and Fark by clicking on the and buttons below. These buttons will redirect you to the respective social networking site and allow you to add a comment to the article as an intro to their users.

Once the articles are on the social networking site they can be promoted by the readers over there. The diggs will link back to your site and thus increase traffic.

Caution must be taken however, you must be prepared to represent and defend your work as you will surely get flamed by the left. If the effort is one that is designed to spur discussion or even convince some on the left that they are on the wrong side of the argument (which should be the ultimate goal) then it is best for your article if it does not get bogged down in name calling that detracts from its main focus.

However, if you go in all guns ablazin’ with ‘moonbat this’ and ‘crazy left that’, then you will get exactly what you came there for, a flame war that is tiring and non-productive.

These sites are great for generating traffic and moving your point of view beyond the reach of your blogs but it must be well thought out if the benefit is to be as positive as possible. Just my experience polished 2 cents.

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