'A lot of blogs, good and bad, often get buried as spam just because they are a blog. I have a potential solution that may help.
We already know that, according to Digg's TOS, you are able to submit blog entries and you can submit your own blog entries. This is often frowned upon by other Digg users.
1) To submit your own blog is often seen as Blog Spam. It does not matter how good the content is, some users will just mark it spam and move on.
2) Blogs, on Digg, are often maligned as AdSense whores and are treated as leeches to be buried on sight.
What if Digg provided a checkbox when you submit a story to mark it as a blog? Or better yet a tag!
What if Digg also allowed users, in their profile settings page, to check off a box that said, "Show me blogs" or something to that affect.
The funny thing about blogs is that there is no clear demarcation line for when a blog goes from being a personal opinion site to a site worth reading.
There are sites on the web that are nothing more than blogs by famous people that get a pass on Digg. Any website by a political pundit is, more than likely, just a blog with a big name attached to it.
If the checkbox option is to much why not add a new topic to each of the existing groups on Digg and just label it "blogs." This way, when a user submits content to Digg they can put it in "Technology-Blogs" rather then "Technology-Industry News."
While I'm on the subject, here are a few more ideas:
1) Tags
Lots of sites use tags now to help the members sort articles. When will Digg add tags?
2) Bookmark Option
I started using Digg when it was a "social bookmarking" site. I would like an option to bookmark a story for later reading instead of Digging it.
When I get the chance to read it I can then decide if it deserves a Digg.
3) Better Dupe Guards
I would like for Dupes to be clumped together. If a user reports a story as a dupe the user should be able to insert a pointer to the article they feel it is a dupe of. It might be a little bit more work for the user but the Digg engine could then merge the entries together in some manner.
4) Timestamps on Diggs
We know who Digged a story and in what order but we don't know when. Digg Spy shows this information but only as it happens.
Why can't we see timestamps next to userIDs in the "Who Dugg This" section?
Can we also get any bury reports (type and time) added in as well? I don't want to know who buried it, just when and why.
5) More Categories
What happened to the "Links" category? Sometimes you find something good to Digg but you have no idea where to put it.
6) Better Bury System for the Politics Section
Due to the often partisan nature of the politics section I propose that if a user is found to continually bury stories that favor one political opinion and Digg up the opposing view that the user in question no longer count, for burying purposes, in that area.
This was real bad when the section was first added as Dems would bury all Republican entries as inaccurate and vice versa.
I'm just trying to think of some ways to improve the Digg but, what do I know, I'm just a blogger...
