Putvote's pitfalls

Oflate, putvote.com has gained popularity. The site is modelled on Digg, only at a concept level. The flavor of the public bookmarking portal is essentially desi. The site allows registered and guest users to cast their votes to an article submitted. They call it "putvoted". The English used on the site is typical of the ill-educated Indians who do not pay attention to grammar or constructs. That is a taste, an accepted taste. And its most unique offering is in it being a platform where Indians can share links to good blogs, good articles and the like.

However, with all its unique offerings, there are pitfalls. I have been analysing it steadily over a long period of time. There have been times when I have frantically "putvoted" on the site. I have seen my ranking go up. And then, I decided to test the flavor of the people that visit the site.

One of the biggest pitfalls is that the site allows too much democracy. While it is good in one way, we Indians are known to make such a mess of a good thing that this site also has become one such example. For one, I found "puke" the most insensitive thing on the site. And it is like, people are waiting to pounce on one blogger who has been "puked" upon at the site. People are taking out their prejudices on a blogger that should rather have been personal and discrete. Join the melee seems to be the buzz then. Virtual wars start with one section favoring one blogger, then others dedicated to tearing that blogger down. These are absolutely unnecessary. Waste of time, effort, bytespace, broadband time and everything thereof.

Another pitfall is recursive promotion. It is like this. The user group consists of some close knit friends all of whom blog (not necessarily). These friends invite their friends and therefore it is one huge network of friends looking at the putvoted articles from their own blogs. It is not considered wise for one blogger to self-promote. So some of his friend who frequents the first blogger's blog will putvote one of his posts. Comments are the most recognizable way to check on a blog's popularity. When a post is putvoted, inevitably traffic flows and comments happen. Likewise, probably to return the favor, our putvoted blogger will putvote his friend's blog post. So, there you see... recursive promotion circle happening. It is not the absolute thing that happens. There are other blog posts also shared. But a lot of it is this.

Next comes the desi tag. How desi are we talking? Do we have gujjus participating? Do we have bongs participating? Take a look at the top putvoters list and you should not be surprised that most of them originate from the same linguistic background. And it reflects in some of the putvoted posts too. If I were a inquisitive reader from Kashmir, that would really put me off. Why do you have to make it desi then? Make it Tamizh only!

Now, for the observation about people's taste. Now, putvote readers are not in for some serious bookmarking. Let that be known. It is only some fun collaboration site. Articles that mean fun are well received. The fun could be dry wit, sarcasm, a pitiful take on something, a ridiculous jab at someone etc. Try some of the more serious putvoted articles. Barely any readership at all. They remain consigned to nothingness and disappear into the underground when the nonsense keeps bubbling on the top. There are lots of categories created for putvoting. But how much does it help?

It is for the creators of this site, whom I know personally, to do something about these. They can, if they wish and have the bandwidth to, really change the allure of the site to something great. I sincerely wish they do. For putvote's own good!