Just ignore the #reddit tag if you would not like to hear anything about roddit.
- Only, they soon realized that they couldn't cheat the system or get 'followers' to promote their crap content. Reddit simply didn't allow for it.
Let's take a moment and think about the notion that "Reddit doesn't allow for the promotion of crap content." What a joke! Even Reddit recognizes this (how many circlejerk-style parody subreddits exist?) Another exercise: take a glance at r/politics, and then take a look at some recent #politics Hubski posts. There's a big difference in both the variety of the posts (e.g. not everything is from DailyKos and ThinkProgress) and the follow up discussions (the same, bland, recycled opinion is not the top comment every time.)
To be fair, that's a different problem.
The fact that the first few votes are weighted so heavily over there, and that you need to get your first couple dozen as quickly as possible to avoid falling off /new encourages content which can be digested in about a half a second. The algorithm encourages crap content, definitely. Hubski, from what I can see, fixes that.
But the linked commenter is right in that power users have more pull here than they do on Reddit. Your power as a power user on Reddit is determined by your reputation. Which, considering the two easiest ways to grow a reputation are to be the victim of a witch hunt or to have a ridiculous amount of pictures of barely-legal tits on your hard drive you're willing to share, doesn't confer much power. Whereas on Hubski, my ability to influence what users see and what the talking points are is pretty much decided entirely by how many followers I have.
Fair enough. The power user issue I understand; I was a little worried that Hubski would promote demagoguery at first, because the whole scheme of having followers seems like the road to a positive feedback loop ending with very few "elite" users being followed by a huge mass of average users.
but
...that's still my naive assumption. I, like the commenter, have certainly not considered everything there is to consider in the complicated equation governing how info is, and will eventually be after substantial growth, disseminated on hubski. Reddit, on the other hand, is an experiment that has essentially already played out. It's degenerated; any merit Reddit gets for discouraging power users from getting "too much of a voice" is drowned out by the fact that the alternative presented is orders of magnitude worse!
I think there could be an interesting argument made that the Reddit hivemind is more dangerous than power users having too much influence. It's vastly more subtle because the golden comment is made by a different person each time, but the net effect is the same as getting too much content from a power user: a seemingly single minded analysis of every topic.
Ha! Similar setup. If someone has shit content, I ignore them or the tag that they're using. Hubski is no where near digg, there are no advertisers or content providers which are promoting content to the 'front page' (global posts? we don't really have a front page anymore). I'm surprised people can't seem to get out of the reddit/digg dichotomy. Also, fail on whose measure? mk has been receptive to community feedback and said that he would sacrifice growth for quality. Fail to be exactly like reddit but better? I would hope so.
I don't really understand that fear? There is no front page. Do a handful of people drive the conversations on twitter? The statements been made before here and I think it's true, if someone has 1,000,000 followers but I ignore that person it is conceivable that I may not even know they exist on Hubski. Where is the power?
edit
I know it is hard to believe this but it's true, Hubski existed 3 weeks ago. It existed populated by people that found it through many different avenues. For anyone that has any thoughts or concerns about this site, my advice is check it out for more than a few days. Kick the tires, take it for a spin, be mindful that others have been driving these roads for some time now. If you like how she drives, stick around we're glad to have you. If not, I'm sure there's a nice ride out there for you somewhere. But what I've gathered is a lot of people postulating about a place they know nothing of. Plus all these posts are boring. Let's have some real conversations about anything other than Hubski.
"Do a handful of people drive the conversations on twitter?"
Analysts do look for the sorts of users who can say something, or start a hashtag and get it started. Twitter does, even considering how massive it is, have people who frequently kick off ideas and set the tone. I imagine the lower volume of higher density content could strengthen that trend here.
Or eliminate that trend, who knows! I just wanted to point out that the answer to your rhetorical question isn't as clearcut as you might think.