Digg revealed a new pilot project they’ll be kickstarting in a few months called Digg Ads. From Digg, they describe the change as following:
Digg Ads will give you more control over which advertisements are displayed on Digg. The more an ad is Dugg, the less the advertiser will have to pay. Conversely the more an ad is buried, the more the advertiser is charged, pricing it out of the system.
Now, this was obviously met with the usual cynicism on behalf of those who claim to be advocates of a utopian internet heaven, free of ads and brimming with pure, beautiful content. Here are some of the comments from Digg regarding the revelation:
so the bury brigade will come in and bury all the ads to infinity, so the ad people will have to pay a lot and eventually stop paying for ads here? how is this a good thing for Digg? - WiLLGT09
So basically Digg will be blurring the line between content and advertising. Ugh. - niradg
Try new Digg Comment Ads! Some people can’t even tell they’re computer generated! They fit right in to the Digg Comments so viewers will see them and not even know they’re being marketed towards! - D3koy
But like all extremists, these people fail to recognize the reality. By decrying this move and deliberately trying to sabotage the concept by burying the ads, they will be digging their own graves. That’s because in order for net neutrality to survive in an increasingly uncertain and hostile economy, websites such as Digg will need to learn how to make money off of advertising. Digg Ads is incorporating advertising in an innovative way that many websites, such as facebook and youtube, have already done.
So stop bitching, Internet World, and grow up. Anybody who writes this off as a suicidal move doesn’t quite have a firm enough grip on reality and, consequently, the future.
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