The user-submitted, Web 2.0 world is, in theory, built upon the idea of a democratic, free-flow of news and ideas: free of the framing, restraint and editorial control of the mainstream media. Unfortunately, much has been made recently of the not-so-egalitarian power structure that exists on bookmarking sites such as Reddit and, particularly, Digg.

With an estimated 75,000 new blogs created every day, the sheer volume of information—particularly news and commentary—is absolutely overwhelming. As such, many (if not most) web users turn to the bookmarking sites to help them separate the wheat from the chaff, so to speak. And why not? Supposedly the Diggs of the world are open forums where any material can be bookmarked and raised to front-page status by the very worth—or at least novelty—of its content as determined by the community. Fantastic! No corporate overlords or press corps controls to inhibit what the people read! Viva la Revolucion!!

Ah, not so fast my friends: enter the “Digg 100”, as I’ve dubbed them (hey, if they’re going to be infamous, they may as well have a cool gang name). As Rand posted a while back, the top 100 Digg users are responsible for nearly 60% of front-page content on the site. This begs the question: If a small, powerful handful of people are seemingly in control of which content is readily accessible to the public, how is Digg any different from mainstream, corporate media?

Are the Digg 100 the new media overlords? Are they the new Rupert Murdoch? Well, considering their apparent power to promote or bury bookmarks and thus the content that manages to see the light of day, the comparison may not be without merit. The Digg 100 may even be more powerful in a sense because they by-and-large avoid the scrutiny (especially via the blogosphere) placed upon the most powerful publishing and media framers. They manage to hide behind the visage of democracy that is the supposed foundation of the social bookmarking sites. They control a media outlet that many people trust to be totally egalitarian in nature, but in reality appears to be greatly influenced by a very small cabal of power-users.

It may be true that the Digg 100 don’t truly move stories to the front page by themselves. However, the incredible influence they carry, the friend networks they have in place and the frequency of their posting make them the tastemakers among the community. They’ve managed to create dominance and a leadership role that virtually gives them editorial control over the majority of content that the casual Digg user will see. For an excellent analysis of the group think, conformity, and other factors that allow the Digg 100 to lead the flock, see this article at shmula.

That is not to say the Digg 100 are a malevolent force attempting to consciously advance only posts that feed into their goal of world domination, but the potential is there. Not only is human bias an inevitable factor when these users decide what they feel is worthy of being Dugg (see the Bob Massa interview for a great take on bias), but corporate interests are bound to take notice of this phenomenon and exploit it as best they can.

Even the horned-beast Murdoch himself has already taken note of the power of social networking and bookmarking sites. Upon purchasing Intermix (parent company of Myspace) Murdoch noted that, “Young people don't want to rely on a God-like figure from above to tell them what's important." Murdoch clearly realizes that community-managed, user-submitted content sites such as Myspace present a certain illusion of freedom, honesty, and trustworthiness that most people don’t ascribe to Fox News.

So what happens when the Rupert Murdochs of the world realize that by controlling (or replacing) groups like the Digg 100, they can advance their agendas and media stranglehold into the last free market of ideas? While people may not want a God-like figure feeding them their news, apparently few take notice of a man (or group) behind the curtain. This is the true problem that faces the future viability, democracy, and worth of community bookmarking sites: how do you keep it fair, equal, and truly community moderated? The shmula article mentioned above discusses some interesting ideas to help level the playing-field and mitigate the powerful cult followings many of the Digg 100 have:

• To tackle Groupthink, make it truly democratic again — do not profile Top Diggers or elevate anybody higher than anyone else. This includes no special weights on previous digging history, etc. — level playing ground for everyone, no monarchies or philosopher-kings.

• To tackle the problem of conformity, do not show profile or # of votes for up-and-coming dugg articles. Just show the article link, with no profiles or votes attached to it. As a compromise, only show the profiles and votes on the articles that make the Digg front page, but make them un-diggable from the front page.

While these suggestions may not comprise a complete solution, it is clear that the minority control exercised by the Digg 100 and similar phenomena need to be addressed. If the current structure and landscape of community bookmarking sites can be gamed so that the flow of content is dominated by a few select people, one could infer that there is an incredible likelihood that the existing corporate information overlords will find a way to grab hold of those reigns.

The concepts of equality, freedom, and open access of information and ideas on the Internet make it the indispensable and inspiring realm that it is. The incredible and continuous growth of web-based information and innovation has managed to outpace the ability of the established media to wrangle it. It is only by maintaining a cautious eye on ourselves and the web communities we participate in that we can stay ahead of the game and keep our collective head out of the lasso.