Assignment #6

I can think of several ways one could use these tools for school or home. By using website, such as Digg, you can filter news to only subjects that you need to research or find interesting. Also the ability to see how others voted on an story can aid in seeing if a news article is worth your time. Mainly due to the fact it is unlikely an article poor in information or style will be voted for positively. In addition the ability to leave and read comments opens the doors to new research ideas or opinions by seeing the other side of the issue stated by another user.
Since there is a limited use of news articles, in my opinion, in college level work and reading is mostly being a leisure activity. I would consider theses tools for the most part a productivity detractor and more of an entertainment tool. Especially at work, since most work places discourage you from doing leisure activities during them. I should add though that my uses of these sites are limited. In fact I have never read a story as a result of seeing it on one of these sites.
When compared to other social sharing sites like Del.icio.us , I think they are both equal and should actually take pointers from each other. On the side of Del.icio.us they should implement the ability of users to rate the tags on their accuracy, and have those results influence the tags themselves. On the side of sites like Digg, they should implement a tagging system for easy searching of specific subjects and expand uses to more then news sharing.

My recommended site.
http://digg.com/football/Mistakes_cost_Vikings_in_high_scoring_loss_to_Bears