This is an interesting article from MediaShift on digg’s evolution from a site mostly focused on technology stories to expanded issues, including their now most popular section–politics. The biggest complaint from some users is the liberal leanings of the posts (but maybe that just shows the organizing savvy and advanced use of technology by liberal media producers and their audiences? Hmmm?). Of course, there is also a nod to the tech-savvy of the “Ron Paulites.”

But the article also tells the story of AJ Wysocki, who was turned onto digg and social story sharing because of his affiliation to the liberal media outlet, The Young Turks. (Long quote from article, but I thought it was a great little case study. More below the excerpt…)

AJ Wysocki, 27, has only been a member and reader of Digg since June. He opened his account because a liberal political radio show he frequently listens to, The Young Turks, enlisted him as a “web soldier” and charged him with promoting the content of the show online.

“They were looking for people to do stuff on Digg and Facebook and MySpace,” he told me in a phone interview. “So I basically took Digg. What that meant is that every day I go on and submit video clips they do on Digg, and I also submit all the blog posts they write. That’s how I got started on the site really.”

Wysocki became a heavy listener of “The Young Turks” after the 2004 election; it was then that he grew increasingly interested in politics, and he followed the hosts as the program traveled from Sirius Satellite Radio to Air America and then later when it was dropped from the liberal radio network and became an independent entity. When they asked him to help them promote content on the social news site, he only had a vague idea of what it was.

“I’ve seen the little icon, because I read Huffington Post a lot, and I saw that little Digg icon but I never really looked at it,” Wysocki said. “And then I visited it and I thought this is a good idea because you can really build hype. If someone has an interesting story and you have enough friends to vote on it, it’s kind of like democracy. If you really like it then a lot of people see it and then it gets to the front page and a whole bunch more people see it.”

In the short time that he’s been a user of the site he has become a heavy reader, eventually expanding his submissions to include content not created by the Young Turks. In the process, a few of his submissions have ended up on the coveted front page.

Curious about how The Young Turks had engaged the young Wysocki to become their “web soldier”, I went on an investigation (i.e. visited their site) and saw that they had the specific link “Promote” that details out ways for their audience members to market and support the program through social networking and sharing. For example, they tell audience members what to do with Digg:

Digg our podcast and our video clips
Help get our podcast on the top of the news podcast page on Digg. Vote for our podcast on Digg here.
Don’t forget to Digg our daily clips, found on our Web site or YouTube.
Why stop at Digg? Don’t be shy. You can also support the show by ranking our clips, videos, and blogs through Google Trackback, Technorati Trackback, del.icio.us, and Reddit. So start clicking!

Now, for many of us in the media world, this is pretty elementary stuff. But how many of us explicitly ask and describe for our audience members how to share the info and what the result will be ? Most of us just have the little icons on the bottom of our posts. Maybe many of us think that our audience members already know what to do with these buttons and what the results will be, but if the story of A.J. is a good example, that’s clearly not the case. So the lesson is: If it seems so simple, it’s stupid to do–then it’s a probably a good idea.

So–oh yeah. If you’re reading–go digg this post! The little button is the first one on the left. And post to delicious and share on Facebook and, well… you get the point.

Once again my delicious integration with this site has gone all wonky (where is the tech goddess when I need her?). So I thought I’d do a quick round up of some of my favorite links over the last couple days. You can also always look at the right hand side bar as they do appear there–just without my pithy comments or pulling out the most juicy parts of the post. What’s been some of your favorite media-related articles of the last couple days?

Aug. 12 Salon Launches Blogger Tipping System – CNET
“Tipping” a paid journalist for their online content hasn’t even caught on quite yet, but Salon.com is taking it a step further. Audience members can now “tip” each other for good content and drive that story to Salon’s front page. It’s putting the publishing power in the audience’s hands, from editorial control to actually paying for good content. (I wonder if this is a not-so-subtle lesson for audience members about the pains of not having enough money to pay your really great writers???)

Highlight: “Salon’s micropayments are handled through technology from Revolution MoneyExchange, a member of the Revolution corporation founded by former AOL czar Steve Case. Each Open Salon member who registers for Revolution MoneyExchange is given a complimentary $10 with which to start rewarding other bloggers for their stories, images, and videos uploaded to the site. But those would-be recipients can only accept the compensation if they’ve registered for MoneyExchange accounts themselves. “Open Salon eliminates the gatekeepers,” editor-in-chief Joan Walsh said in a statement. “It makes our smart, creative audience full partners in Salon’s publishing future.”

Don’t Forget The Audience – News Leadership 3.0
Highlight: “Building on the idea of product differentiation, I want to underscore a second critical factor—how people use media. A lot of news organizations are still thinking about content and presentation in terms of medium and technology (or worse, in terms of tradition and comfort level) when they should be thinking about content and presentation in terms of audiences—in which I include people who read of print newspapers and people who read their news online or go there for more interactive experiences. For an example of this, look no farther than your spiffy new iPhone and then check out what content your organization is providing to users there or on other mobile devices. The news industry’s capacity to deliver news, information and interactivity to mobile seriously lags audience adoption and use.”

The Media Equation-All of Us, The Arbiters of News - NY Times
Highlight: “How much more powerful is that networked intelligence than a reporter with a phone, a Rolodex and the space between his or her ears? As the former newspaperman and Web evangelist Jeff Jarvis (who has also consulted for The New York Times) has been saying since before broadband, the Web is not just a way to shout, it is a way to listen, one that can lead to deeper, more effective journalism. (His response to the Philly injunction against early Web publishing was predictably measured and careful: “It is suicide. It is murder. You should be ashamed of yourselves.”) For the last few years, the locus of control has been shifting and consumers not only expect to customize their media experience, they demand it as a condition of engagement. The horizon line for when a newspaper on the street is serving as a kind of brochure of a rich online product does not seem far off.”

How Newsrooms Throw Away Value By Not Linking to Sources on the Web-Publishing 2.0
Highlight: “The problem is that the editorial workflow for most newsrooms doesn’t include a process whereby journalists can collect source links as part of their research process and provide them as work product to be published on the web along with the article. As Jay Rosen explains in this video, understanding the value of links, and how they connect content, ideas, and people, is fundamental to understanding the value of the web. And understanding the value of the web is the key to unlocking the new business models that journalism needs to survive and thrive in the digital age:” [CLICK IN TO WATCH VIDEO.]

These social networking tools are flowing faster than I can learn them! Today’s craze among my cohort is a new browser called Flock; I’m using it right now to post to the BTE blog. Last week’s was FriendFeed; next on the docket is called “Pipes.” How many different ways can I slice and dice my media and my friends’ recommendations before I lose my mind?

Tags: web_30

Check out this month’s In These Times for my editorial contrasting this year’s YearlyKos conference to the recent Journalism That Matters gathering in DC. A snippet:

The bloggers and readers at the YearlyKos conference don’t all agree on politics or tactics—their approaches range from investigative journalism to rhetorical Molotov-throwing. They don’t always know if they’re practicing journalism—and don’t care. They do know that the public demands accountability and truth-telling from media and government alike.