Digg is home to a lot of healthy debate. This list of the most controversial stories was put together by analyzing stories that received a massive amount of diggs and enough down votes to trigger a bury.
1. Paris Free = Justice Fail
Date: June 7th 2007
Diggs: 10309
Comments: 1089
This story broke when Paris Hilton was released from jail after just 3 days of a 45 day sentence after being convicted of drink driving.
2. How I learned to break into Apple and code for them without permission
Date: August 6th 2007
Diggs: 9581
Comments: 190
“One man was so determined to finish his project, he broke into Cupertino every day, to code for them without pay or permission. Six months later, he sneaked the app into the final version of Mac OS 9, without Apple ever knowing.” There’s a big PC/Mac divide on Digg and there are lots of jibes in the comments over lack of security, which might be where the buries come from.
3. Digg- what’s happening with HD DVD stories
Date: May 1st 2007
Diggs: 8403
Comments: 1054
A story with the HD DVD encryption key was submitted to Digg and removed before it had a chance to become very visible. This post from Jay Adelson explains why that submission, and others like it, had been censored.
4. The HD DVD number
Date: May 2nd 2007
Diggs: 7937
Comments: 523
Quite a few similar submissions could have made it onto this list. This was the most Dugg buried story with that controversial number in but if we’d combined them all, this story would definitely had beaten Paris Hilton to the top spot.
5. Good News Everyone
Date: January 25th 2009
Diggs: 7935
Comments: 494
One can only assume the buries for this excellent submission came via a bit of 4chan angst that you can explore in the comments as you wish. The tinypic link doesn’t work, but you can find the image here.
6. Netscape.com HACKED
Date: July 26th 2006
Diggs: 7866
Comments: 264
Fans of Digg hacked Netscape.com and posted humorous messages for fellow Digg fans. There’s a lot of back-story here because many diggers accuse Netscape of copying Digg’s functionality and design. This post’s controversy comes from two sources: a) it was a duplicate submission and b) some diggers expressed frustration with the immaturity of the hacking.
7. Help Bring Back TechTV
Date: July 24th 2006
Diggs: 7783
Comments: 365
TechTV was a channel dedicated to tech shows (and it regularly featured Kevin Rose before he was famous). It was taken over by G4 and stopped showing the same quality of tech shows.
8. Ron Paul goes on the offensive in Austin
Date: May 21st 2007
Diggs: 6576
Comments: 539
Ah, there was bound to be something about Ron Paul in here somewhere! This is one of many controversial submissions on Digg made by a large group of Ron Paul fans. This comment from an article entitled ’10 ways you can help Ron Paul online’ explains it all: “5. Digg.com: Go register at digg.com and do a search for Ron Paul. We have a double task here.
First, read through the articles before you digg them. If you notice something posted twice, only digg the one that has the most so far, and bury the other. This way, people on digg won’t become burnt out by The Ron paul campaign. We can’t be called spammers if we only post one article about a certain topic, and if everyone is digging the same articles, the likelihood that story being on the front page, with the most exposure, increases.”
9. Pakistan’s Benazir Bhutto killed by suicide bomber
Date: December 27th 2007
Diggs: 6513
Comments: 1046
An extremely sad day for Pakistan. There are lots of controversial comments about how America should react to the news.
10. Leave Britney Alone
Date: September 11th 2007
Diggs: 6291
Comments: 1112
A hysterical young man tells the world to leave Britney alone. Hilarity ensues.
11. Digg: Images and New Categories Launch Tonight
Date: December 3rd 2007
Diggs: 5962
Comments: 388
A much-requested update goes live at last. Some users obviously still aren’t happy thought.
12. Top 10 Reasons This List Will Be Popular On Digg
Date: January 7th 2008
Diggs: 5665
Comments: 260
Title says it all really. Probably buried by diggers who don’t like lists.
13. Man Arrested for Riding His Bike Home From the Airport
Date: June 19th 2007
Diggs: 5541
Comments: 412
This article receives a lot of slack in the comments for presenting too biased an opinion. For example, “Did the guy deserve to be tased? No way. Did he act in the calm and restrained manner that is portrayed in the article? No way. The truth likely lies somewhere between his story and the cop’s story.” The image above is from the guy’s blog.
14. Barack Obama ‘Just Words’ [Watch]
Date: February 17th 2008
Diggs: 5416
Comments: 708
Anything as politically loaded as this video is destined for burial.
15. Read this! The Internet is About to get messed up
Date: April 23rd 2006
Diggs: 5295
Comments: 139
News about restricting and regulating the Internet. The controversy probably comes from the claims that there is nothing more important in the world right now. Other Diggers suggest problems such as the war in Afghanistan or famine in Africa are more important than threats to the Internet.
Really had a laugh with the Leave Britney Alone Video! And these sure are controversial stories. Thanks for sharing.
So basically nothing controversial has happened on digg since 2007. No wonder the users are leaving in scores!
There is no confusion that all these stories are controversial stories, specially Netscape.com hacked. Thanks for sharing.
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