Digg?
Before you know what a Digg circle is, it would be helpful to know what Digg is. Digg is a social networking site where people can go to promote content and news that they appreciate. They "Digg" it. If enough people Digg something, it gets on the front page. Once it is on the front page it is sure to generate tons of traffic.

So What is a Digg Circle?
A Digg Circle is really simple, it is simply a group of people that agree to Digg each others articles whenever they are posted. The goal is to get enough hits to get on the front page. Since each front page article generally has a couple hundred diggs, you need a fair number of people. A forum is generally the place that they get started.

So Why Do People Make Them?
Well the problem with Digg, at least from the individuals site, is that is extremely hard to get on the front page. It is a very hit or miss proposition. Generally, even if you have good content, a person submits their site, get a few hits and even a few Diggs, and then the site moves up the vine and dies. Eventually it moves out of the upcoming que without ever making it to the next level. The net result is that a person gets a couple of hits, and that's it.

The Problem With Digg
One of the things about Digg is that it is a lot like Ebay. If you digg someone's page, they are more likely to digg yours in return. This is how informal Digg circles get started. This is also the reason that the top 100 users on Digg control over half of what makes it to the top page. It only takes approximately 50 diggs, if they come quickly to make it to a content leader board. After that, many more people see your posts and it is easy to make the jump to the front page.

So What Should You Do?
Basically the average person has a couple of options to get their content on digg.

1. Do Nothing, just write lots of good content and hope that someone will digg it sooner or later.

2. Submit the content to digg yourself, get some hits, and then watch the site move up the tree and expire.

3. Go Digg Crazy - Submit all of your stuff to digg, try to befriend all of the top digg users, and basically use all of your time sucking up to people, leaving you with no time to actually improve your site and create interesting material yourself.

4. Find 100 people and start a Digg circle of your own.

The first is the least likely to get results, the second can work somewhat but is slow, the third is annoying and won't work if you want to do anything other than digg. No wonder forming a digg circle can begin to look good to bloggers.

Is gaming the system wrong? I don't know... but does anyone want to form a digg circle?

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