Patrick Parise is the co-host of the Social Blade show, a weekly social media podcast. Patrick was known for being a well-connected, powerful Digg user – who promoted over 625 stories to the home page under several accounts (most recently Jenocide312). He stayed ‘under the radar’ and kept a low public profile until he got banned on Digg for the 3rd time, and recently decided to come out and share his knowledge with others. These days, you can follow him on Twitter…
Tell us a little about yourself?
Patrick podcasting at his dual-monitor workstation.
“I live in Lusby, Maryland, I have 4 boys and I’m recently divorced. I’m a business owner, but it has nothing to do with computers or technology. Digging and social media is a hobby – it’s what I do after work.”
You were actively involved in Digg and you were extremely successful at it. What motivated you so intensely?
“I just really enjoy it. I love finding a great story, and there’s a sense of accomplishment when it gets to the top. It’s fun when you’re friends with people and you can find the good stories first – and they’re like “Damn! How are you catching these already?” I’ve been offered some money (to digg stories) but I always turned it down – because I didn’t feel like it was worth the hassle. I get up and go to work every day and I stress over it – so one of the reasons I do social media is to escape from reality. When I come home, I wanna escape a little bit. Rather than getting drunk or falling asleep in front of a TV – I’d digg.
I had 3 strong accounts that got banned: Crackerpat, Brokebackcasket, Jenocide312. Cracketpat got banned because I was using the ‘Digg Friends Easy’ script (warning: do not use!) – which a lot of other people were using at the time. But once you’re banned on Digg, it’s forever. You can never come back. So my last 3 accounts got banned because they found it it was “me.”
What makes Digg more interesting than the more ‘mainstream’ sites, like Twitter and Facebook?
The home page of Digg.com is one of the most trafficked, competitive spaces in entire the social Web.
“It’s all about the stories. The constant stream of good content. It’s such a good way for me to pick up news from all different angles, whether it be high-tech security, computer industry news, faceplant videos on YouTube, celebrity gossip, or the strangest / wackiest stories you can imagine. And it’s filtered by the community – if I see something on the front page it’s because a lot of other people found it interesting, too.”
What feelings and emotions did you feel when you were digging?
“I’d be lying if I said I didn’t get into it. I’m sure everyone, including top diggers like MrBabyMan and Msaleem, still get a rush and get drawn to the excitement of it, too. However, I find it’s more frustrating when something really good doesn’t make the home page, than it is rewarding when something good does become popular.
There are certain milestones, like when you reach your 100th popular story, or when you pass a certain person. It was pretty cool when my last account got more home page stories than Kevin Rose’s account – which is kind of an honor – but sometimes he doesn’t submit anything for months. The week that I got banned (as BrokebackCasket), I was doing very well – I had 49 home page stories in one week.”
What kind of time do you have to put in to to build a power account?
image: Computer Choppers
“To start, you’re gonna have to spend, maybe, 6 hours a day. It would take a lot of digging people’s stories… but once you get enough of the right people following you and you get some momentum – you can do it it maybe an hour, or so. Nowdays you can only digg 200 stories a day, so you can’t really blind digg (vote on stories without reading them) like you used to. And that’s kind of missing the point me being there, which is to find the most interesting stuff.
It also takes a lot of behind-the-scenes networking. I have over 700 contacts on instant messenger. Probably 120 of them are green lights (active) at any time – all the way down into the red and the orange, I can’t even see them all.”
Do you know anyone who doesn’t spend hours digging friends’ stories that consistently does well on the site?
“No. Even the accounts where you look at ‘em and see that they only dugg 10 or 15 in the last 24 hours… those guys aren’t hitting the home page on a regular basis. They might break through occasionally – but that’s just Digg throwing those guys a bone to keep people’s attention. They can’t give out every single home page to people who submit a lot of good stuff – they have to keep the worker bees interested and involved.”
What percentage of active diggers do you suspect get some kind of financial compensation for endorsing stories?
“I’d say that there’s between 500 and 1500 daily diggers at any given time. Maybe 10% of them – or 50 to 100 of those (could be getting paid by someone) – it’s very possible. And you know, that catches up with you. For the bigger accounts, if they are getting paid, they sure aren’t telling anyone about it – because once you get to a certain level, you start to get haters. And those people would turn ya in. If anyone could prove it just a little, Digg support would have no choice but to ban them for being a ‘hired gun.’”
Does Digg.com arbitrarily ban people for just being “too good”?
“No. Why would they do that? Then MrBabyMan, and Msaleem and MakiMaki would be gone. Guys like LouieBaur would have been gone long ago – because guys like him are so ridiculously good at it. …They banned InsainCain02 they same day they banned my account, BrokebackCasket, because they found out I was a banned digger. And once you’re banned, you’re not allowed to come back.”
What kind of personalities do power users have?
“A lot of the people do it to pass time because it’s an escape from reality. Also… to be popular on Digg, you have to have a strong rapport with people and be friendly. And helpful. You’ve gotta be social and willing to give – help people with stuff, digg stories for people – and build up a good relationship with a lot of different people. You’ve really got to enjoy what you’re submitting or else you won’t be much good at it.”
What tools did you use for finding content and digging? Any tips or tricks?
- Google Reader. I have all my sites loaded into there and I could go there this second and find 4, 5 or even 6 stories that should be ‘home page material.’ I can pass those out to my friends and 70% of them should hit the home page. Finding the right content just became second nature, for me.
- Social Blade. Urgo’s site has incredible Digg analytics. You need to know that once you’ve dugg 199 stories, you need to stop. It also shows which sites are the most popular sources for home page stories, which diggers are most active, etc.
- The Bigg Board by Brainnovate. This is an real-time dashboard for Digg that lets you track your stories, see where they are on the site, whether they break into ‘upcoming,’ etc. Some people digg way too much stuff and aren’t seeing any of the results that I am. So I’ve been helping a lot of new diggers learn how to do it right. And Bigg Board is the best tool to let me see exactly what’s happening with their stories.
What are some of the all-time greatest headlines or stories you remember?
The online Susan Boyle phenomena got a nice boost from one of Patrick’s submissions on digg.com
“I guess the best story I ever had was given to me by MrBabyMan – because some unknown user had just submitted it and it wasn’t gonna make the home page. It was a Susan Boyle video – way before she became popular. The YouTube video had less than 10,000 views when I submitted it. It went viral and the next Monday I got e-mails from The Daily Mail wanting to know how I’d discovered it. Then before ya know, Demi Moore and Ashton Kutcher are tweeting about it. I didn’t make it go viral, it went viral by itself – but I just happened to be the power digger who ended up submitting it.”
Who are some people you think that have great social media skills or contributions to the community?
“The most influential person, to me, by far, was Diggboss. That guy has done wonderful things for me and for other people as well. He showed me everything – every trick you could possibly use – and he wanted nothing in return!
EmitStop (a 17-year old Web designer) does very, very well. He’s been around a lot longer than I have and he’s great a connecting with people and movies stories along. There’s a relatively unknown guy named Cancerkitty who finds the funniest articles – his stuff is just phenomenal and it just flies to the top. .”
What are your goals? At what point will you feel satisfied or feel like you’ve “made it”?
“ I don’t think I’ll ever be totally satisfied. I’m pretty family-oriented, so whenever all my kids are grown up, and are married and are living successful lives – then I’ll know I’ve done right. Money isn’t the most important thing. My kids are healthy, I’m grateful for what I’ve got, I’ve done well in social media – and I enjoy spreading it all out and helping people do well.
When not at work or doing social media coaching, Patrick coaches football and spends time with his kids.
Recently, I did a show with JD Rucker, Erin, Victor and Urgo- where we we interviewed the singer Josh Charles. All the money he makes from his song ‘Healing Time’ will go to rebuilding New Orleans after the hurricane – and we’re trying to raise a million dollars. It’s been 4 years since Katrina and a lot of people aren’t feeling the love, anymore, so much. So, by helping get the word out about important things like that, it feels pretty good…”
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