• Roads in the United Kingdom

• Motorways
• A and B road zones

The M62 is a west–east trans-Pennine motorway in Northern England, connecting Liverpool and Hull via Manchester and Leeds. The road is 107 miles (172 km) long; for 7 miles (11 km), it shares its route with the M60 orbital motorway around Manchester. The road also forms part of the unsigned Euroroutes E20 (Shannon to Saint Petersburg) and E22 (Holyhead to Ishim).The motorway, which was first proposed in the 1930s, and originally conceived as two separate routes, was built in stages between 1971 and 1976, with construction beginning at Pole Moor and finishing in Tarbock on the outskirts of Liverpool. The motorway also absorbed the northern end of the Stretford-Eccles bypass, which was built between 1957 and 1960. Adjusted for inflation to 2007, the motorway cost approximately £765 million to build. The motorway is relatively busy, with an average daily traffic flow of 144,000 vehicles in Yorkshire, and has several areas prone to gridlock, in particular, between Leeds and Huddersfield in West Yorkshire.On 4 February 1974, a coach bombing shocked the nation, as did a rail crash on 28 February 2001. The motorway is also notable for Stott Hall Farm, a farm in the Pennines situated between the carriageways that has since become one of the best-known sights in West Yorkshire. The M62 has no junctions numbered 1, 2, or 3 (or even an officially numbered 4), because the motorway was intended to start in Liverpool proper, and not on its outskirts.The road passes the cities of Salford, Manchester, Bradford and Leeds. Between Liverpool and Manchester, and east of Leeds, the terrain of the road is relatively flat. Between Manchester and Leeds the motorway traverses the Pennines and its foothills, rising to 1,221 feet (372 m) above sea level east of Junction 22 in Calderdale, not far from the boundary between Greater Manchester and West Yorkshire.Contents

• 1 History
• 2 Construction

  2.1 Liverpool Inner Motorway
  2.2 West of Manchester
  2.3 In Greater Manchester
  2.4 Between Windy Hill and Lofthouse
  2.5 East of Lofthouse

• 2.1 Liverpool Inner Motorway
• 2.2 West of Manchester
• 2.3 In Greater Manchester
• 2.4 Between Windy Hill and Lofthouse
• 2.5 East of Lofthouse
• 3 Development after opening
• 4 High traffic levels
• 5 Proposed developments

  5.1 M62 J25 to J30 managed motorway

• 5.1 M62 J25 to J30 managed motorway
• 6 Stott Hall Farm
• 7 Incidents

  7.1 M62 coach bombing
  7.2 Selby rail crash

• 7.1 M62 coach bombing
• 7.2 Selby rail crash
• 8 Route

  8.1 Junctions
  8.2 Coordinate list

• 8.1 Junctions
• 8.2 Coordinate list
• 9 References
• 10 External links

• 2.1 Liverpool Inner Motorway
• 2.2 West of Manchester
• 2.3 In Greater Manchester
• 2.4 Between Windy Hill and Lofthouse
• 2.5 East of Lofthouse

• 5.1 M62 J25 to J30 managed motorway

• 7.1 M62 coach bombing
• 7.2 Selby rail crash

• 8.1 Junctions
• 8.2 Coordinate list

History

The origins of the M62 date to the 1930s, when the need for a route between Lancashire and Yorkshire had been agreed after discussion by the respective county highway authorities.[1][2] At the same time, it was envisaged that a route between Liverpool and Hull was also needed, connecting the two ports to industrial Yorkshire.[3]After World War II, the Minister of Transport appointed engineers to inspect road standards between the A580 road in Swinton and the A1 road near Selby.[3] The 1949 Road Plan for South Lancashire identified the need to upgrade the A580 to dual carriageway with grade separation and provide bypasses for Huyton and Cadishead.[4] In 1952, the route for a trans-Pennine motorway, the Lancashire–Yorkshire Motorway, was laid down, with Ferrybridge at the eastern terminus rather than Selby.[3] By the 1960s the proposed A580 upgrade to dual carriageway was considered inadequate, and there was an urgent need to link Liverpool to the motorway network.[4] The route of the Lancashire-Yorkshire motorway was also considered inadequate as it failed to cater for several industrial towns in Yorkshire.[3] When James Drake visited the United States in 1962, his experience with the Interstate Highway System led him to conclude that the Merseyside Expressway, planned to run between Liverpool and the M6, would need to be extended to the Stretford-Eccles Bypass, to create a continuous motorway between Liverpool and Ferrybridge (a link between Ferrybridge and Hull was not considered until 1964).[5] Initially the plans were unpopular and not supported by the Ministry of Transport, but the scheme was added to the Road Plan in 1963.[4]

Construction

Liverpool Inner Motorway

It was the intention to build urban motorways in Liverpool, Manchester, Leeds and Newcastle.[6][7] Motorways were constructed in Manchester, the A57(M) Mancunian Way, in Leeds the A58(M) and A64(M) inner ring road and in Newcastle, the A167(M). The M62 was intended to terminate at Liverpool’s Inner Motorway which was not built constructed.[8] The proposed route would have followed the railway into Liverpool as far as Edge Hill, with junctions at Rathbone Road and Durning Road where it would drop to two lanes before terminating at the Islington Radial.[8]

West of Manchester

The section west of Manchester was intended to be a separate motorway, the M52, linking Liverpool with Salford, but a continuous motorway between Leeds and Liverpool was deemed more feasible,[9][10] Construction between Liverpool and Manchester started in 1971, with the building of a link between the M57 and M6 motorways.[4] Concurrently, a contract to link the M6 with Manchester was under way, which required the removal of unsuitable material and land drainage. This section was completed in August 1974, creating a continuous link between Ferrybridge and Tarbock.The section between Tarbock and Liverpool was the last to be completed in 1976, due to difficulties building the urban motorway. In total, two viaducts, ten bridges and seven underpasses had to be constructed to secure the structural integrity of the surrounding residential areas. The motorway was constructed only as far as Queens Drive (junction 4).[4]

In Greater Manchester

The first part of the M62 to be built was the Stretford–Eccles Bypass, which now covers junctions 7 to 13 of the M60.[11] Construction started in 1957, and opened in 1960.[12]Two motorways were planned, the M52 from Liverpool to Salford and the M62 to link Pole Moor with the Stretford–Eccles Bypass.[9] The section between the interchange with the Stretford-Eccles Bypass and Salford is now occupied by the M602 motorway.The Eccles–Pole Moor section was opened in 1971.[13][14] Between Eccles and Pole Moor, 67 motorway crossings were required, including seven viaducts and eight junctions.[2]

Between Windy Hill and Lofthouse

The first section of the motorway in Yorkshire was completed between the county boundary at Windy Hill and Outlane in 1970.[1][15] Construction between Windy Hill and Pole Moor was difficult through inhospitable hilly terrain, peat bogs, and in undesirable weather conditions. The motorway’s highest point, 1,221 feet (372 m) above sea level at Windy Hill near Saddleworth Moor (53°37′47″N 2°01′07″W / 53.62982°N 2.018561°W / 53.62982; -2.018561 (Windy Hill)) is the highest point of any motorway in England.[16]To build this section, 12,000,000 cubic yards (9,200,000 m3) of material was moved, 8,000,000 cubic yards (6,100,000 m3) of which was solid rock and 650,000 cubic yards (500,000 m3) of peat which had to be cut from the rock strata and deposited on adjacent hillsides. The geology of the moors resulted in the engineers splitting the carriageways for 3⁄4 miles (1.2 km) in the middle of this section, sparing Stott Hall Farm from demolition.[15][17]Two notable constructions were the pedestrian bridge carrying the Pennine Way, which is curved downwards with 85-foot (26 m) long cantilevers, and Scammonden Bridge, the longest single-span non-suspension bridge in the world when it was built.[18][19] It carries a B road 120 feet (37 m) above the motorway.[15] The 1-mile (1.6 km) section between Pole Moor and Outlane suffered fewer problems as the summer weather was satisfactory.[20]The section of the motorway between Gildersome and Lofthouse was built at the same time,[1] resulting in the demolition of a significant proportion of the village of Tingley to build the eponymous interchange.

East of Lofthouse

Two contracts were awarded for the section between Lofthouse and Ferrybridge in 1972, and both were completed in 1974.[21][22] On the first contract, care was needed at the River Calder crossing due to the alluvial bedrock. On the second contract precautions were taken as the length was built on old coal mine workings.The section between Ferrybridge and North Cave was the last to be planned[5] and built.[13] The bridge crossing the River Ouse west of Goole commenced in January 1973 and is nearly 1 mile (1.6 km) long and rises to 98.4 feet (30.0 m) above ground level. Completion of the bridge was delayed due to “steel supplies [being] a chronic headache”[23] and a partial collapse of the framework caused by bolts joining a cross-beam to a trestle shearing.[5] Problems with the bridge delayed the opening of the section east of Goole to May 1976.[5][13]

Development after opening

In 1987, the Department of Transport proposed a parallel relief road to combat congestion around Manchester. It would have been restricted to long distance traffic, and the current route, part of the Manchester Outer Ring Road (later the M60), used for local traffic. The proposal suggested the closure of junction 13. The proposal was designated a “long term” improvement in 1994, and cancelled on 23 November 1995.[24]In 2000, the section Eccles Interchange and Simister Interchange (junctions 12 to 18) was renamed the M60.[25] Since then, two junctions were opened—in December 2002, the missing junction 8 was opened to allow access to the A574 and the Omega Development Site,[26] while in January 2006, junction 32a was opened to link to the upgraded A1(M).[27] The UK’s first motorway car-sharing lane was opened at junction 26 in 2008 for eastbound traffic from the M606 with more than one occupant.[28]

High traffic levels

The section between Halifax and Gildersome is one of the most congested roads in Britain,[29] and regularly slows to gridlock at junction 27.[30]Annual average daily traffic flows of 100,000 cars were recorded east of the Pennines (junction 22) in 2006 and 78,000 cars west of the Pennines.[31] The figures were increases from 90,000 and 70,000 respectively in 1999.[32] By way of comparison, the UK’s busiest motorway, the M25 carried 144,000 cars between junctions 7 and 23 in 2006.[31]

Proposed developments

M62 J25 to J30 managed motorway

Prior to 2009 there were proposals in place to widen the M62 between junctions 25 and 28 to four lanes. In January 2009 the schemes were withdrawn and replaced by a wider project to install hard shoulder running and a managed motorway system between junctions 25 and 30.[33]

Stott Hall Farm

The 18th-century Stott Hall Farm (53°38′30″N 1°57′08″W / 53.641599°N 1.952222°W / 53.641599; -1.952222 (Stott Hall Farm)) on Windy Hill, above Booth Wood Reservoir is situated between the carriageways between junctions 22 and 23.[17][34][35] The road divides around the farm for engineering reasons because of surrounding geology, though a local myth persists that the road was split because the owners refused to sell the land.[17] The farm has been nicknamed the Little House on the Prairie by lorry drivers using CB radio and by Sally Boazman, BBC Radio 2′s traffic reporter. The farm is separated from the motorway by crash barriers and a high fence to keep livestock in and drivers out, after stranded motorists attempted to get aid when broken down.[17][36] The farm was occupied by Ken and Beth Wild at the time of the motorway’s opening[34] It is one of the ten best-known sights on the motorway network[37] and in West Yorkshire.[36] The farm was used as a location for an episode of the ITV drama series Where the Heart Is and was the subject of a BBC Radio 4 documentary and a short documentary film.[38]

Incidents

M62 coach bombing

On 4 February 1974, a bomb was detonated on a coach containing off-duty army personnel and family members, between Chain Bar (junction 26) and Gildersome (junction 27), resulting in the deaths of 12 people and injuries in 38 other people. After the attack, the nearby Hartshead Moor service station was used as a makeshift hospital and base of investigation.[39] The Provisional Irish Republican Army were deemed responsible for the attacks.[39][40]A memorial to the victims was erected at the Hartshead Service Station in 2009.[41]

Selby rail crash

On 28 February 2001, at 06:13 GMT, Gary Hart, a sleep-deprived driver, swerved off the M62 onto the East Coast Main Line near Selby. While Hart was calling the emergency services, a GNER southbound train collided with Hart’s Land Rover, and subsequently derailed into the path of an oncoming goods train. Ten people were killed, including the drivers of both trains, and a further 82 were injured.

Route

In addition to passing Warrington, Manchester, Huddersfield, Halifax, Bradford, Leeds and Wakefield, the towns of Huyton, St Helens, Widnes, Bury, Rochdale, Dewsbury, Pontefract, Selby and Goole are designated as primary destinations along the road. The road is a terminus to two motorways: the M57 motorway near Prescot and the M18 motorway near Rawcliffe; and has four spur routes: the M602 motorway, which serves Manchester, the A627(M) motorway, which serves Oldham and Rochdale, the M606 motorway, which serves Bradford, and the M621 motorway, which serves Leeds. Despite Hull being listed as a primary destination,[42] the motorway downgrades near North Cave, 16 miles (26 km) west.[1][43] The motorway starts on Queen’s Drive, on Liverpool’s middle ring road. From there it runs eastward to Liverpool’s outer ring road, the M57. The route has four exits for Warrington: junction 7, an interchange with the A57 road, junction 8, which also houses IKEA,[44] Junction 9, which interchanges with the A49 road, originally intended to be a motorway itself,[45] and junction 11. Between these is junction 10, which is a cloverstack interchange with the M6 motorway. The M62 then crosses Chat Moss before interchanging with the M60 motorway.[46] Due to original plans being to extend the section of the motorway into Manchester, motorists must turn off to stay on (TOTSO) the route into Yorkshire.In Greater Manchester, the motorway shares seven junctions, 12 to 18, with the M60 motorway. Junction 13, which is signposted for Swinton, is situated only 1⁄2 miles (0.80 km) from junction 12, leaving exiting motorists the hazard of crossing the still-merging M62 traffic.[47] After this, there is Worsley Braided Interchange, which, in addition to serving junctions 14 and 15, also serves junctions 1 to 3 of the M61 motorway, which terminates to Preston.Between junction 21 and junction 22, the motorway has four lanes eastbound to climb Windy Hill,[48] before crossing the border into Yorkshire and interchanging with the rural A672 road, reaching the highest point of any motorway in England 1,221 feet (372 m).[16] There is then a 7-mile (11 km) travel through the Pennines to the next junction, passing Scammonden Water and Stott Hall Farm. The next junction is 23, which is accessible only for westbound traffic. After this, the road dips through a valley to junction 24[49] and drops slowly before interchanging with the A644 road at junction 25.[50] Between junctions 22 and 25, the road is used as a border between the metropolitan boroughs of Calderdale and Kirklees.[51]At junction 26, Chain Bar, the motorway interchanges with several roads: the M606 motorway, a spur into Bradford, the A58 road, which runs between Prescot and Wetherby, and the A638 road, which runs to Doncaster, then follows the old route of the A1 through Bawtry and Retford, to Markham Moor where it rejoins the A1. The next junction also serves a spur route: the M621 motorway, before bypassing Leeds to the south to the interchange with the M1 motorway, Lofthouse Interchange, at junction 29. East of Leeds, the motorway serves Wakefield at junction 30 and crosses by the River Calder. At junction 32a, the road is crossed by the A1(M) motorway, which also runs parallel to it for a short distance. The next junction serves the A162 road, previously the A1, and Ferrybridge service station. After Ferrybridge, the motorway becomes relatively flat, except for a 1-mile (1.6 km) bridge that crosses the River Ouse. For approximately 10 miles (16 km) after this, the road runs towards Hull, serving Howden and North Cave, before downgrading to the A63 road.

Junctions

Data from driver location signs are used to provide distance and carriageway identifier information.[52][53]

•       Motorway
•       Primary road
•       Secondary road

•       Concurrency terminus
•       Closed/former
•       HOV only
•       Incomplete access
•       Tolled/ETC
•       Unopened

Coordinate list

References

External links

• Display on Google Maps
• Display on Bing Maps

• Chris’s British Road Directory

  Motorway database entry
  Video travelling between junctions 21 and 23
  Liverpool Inner Motorway

• Motorway database entry
• Video travelling between junctions 21 and 23
• Liverpool Inner Motorway
• The Motorway Archive

  The Lancashire – Yorkshire Motorway M62
  Queens Drive to Eccles
  Eccles to Yorkshire county boundary
  In West Yorkshire
  In East Yorkshire

• The Lancashire – Yorkshire Motorway M62
• Queens Drive to Eccles
• Eccles to Yorkshire county boundary
• In West Yorkshire
• In East Yorkshire
• “Walking the M62″, a blog, and later a book, about hiking along the M62.
• BBC News Article on Stott Hall farm.

• Motorway database entry
• Video travelling between junctions 21 and 23
• Liverpool Inner Motorway

• The Lancashire – Yorkshire Motorway M62
• Queens Drive to Eccles
• Eccles to Yorkshire county boundary
• In West Yorkshire
• In East Yorkshire

• v
• t
• e

• M1
• M2
• M3
• M4
• M5
• M6
• M6 Toll
• M8
• M9
• M11
• M18
• M20
• M23
• M25
• M26
• M27
• M32
• M40
• M42
• M45
• M48
• M49
• M50
• M53
• M54
• M55
• M56
• M57
• M58
• M60
• M61
• M62
• M65
• M66
• M67
• M69
• M73
• M74
• M77
• M80
• M90
• M180
• M181
• M271
• M275
• M602
• M606
• M621
• M876
• M898

• A1(M)
• A3(M)
• A38(M)
• A48(M)
• A57(M)
• A58(M)
• A64(M)
• A66(M)
• A74(M)
• A167(M)
• A194(M)
• A308(M)
• A329(M)
• A404(M)
• A601(M)
• A627(M)
• A823(M)

• M1
• M2
• M3
• M5
• M12
• M22
• A8(M)

• M10
• M41
• M63
• A18(M)
• A40(M)
• A41(M)
• A102(M)
• A6144(M)

• New M4
• M12
• M15
• M16
• M31
• M64

• Category
• Commons

• v
• t
• e

• Transport for Greater Manchester
• Museum of Transport
• Readycard

• City Airport Manchester
• Manchester Airport

• Arriva North West
• Bluebird
• Bullocks
• Checkmate
• Finglands
• First Greater Manchester
• GM Buses
• Jim Stones Coaches
• JPT
• Maytree Travel
• Metroshuttle
• Rossendale Transport
• Stagecoach Manchester
• South Lancs Travel
• Stotts
• Warrington Borough Transport

• European route E22
• Kingsway
• M6
• M56
• M60
• M61
• M62
• M66
• M67
• M602
• A57(M)
• A627(M)
• Manchester Inner Ring Road

• Manchester Metrolink
• Greater Manchester Metrolink Limited

• List of open railway stations
• List of closed railway stations

• Congestion charging in Greater Manchester
• Greater Manchester Transport Innovation Fund
• United City

• Motorways in England
• Roads in Greater Manchester
• Transport in Merseyside
• Roads in Cheshire
• Roads in Yorkshire
• Transport in the East Riding of Yorkshire
• Transport in South Yorkshire
• Transport in West Yorkshire

• All articles with dead external links
• Articles with dead external links from May 2012
• Use dmy dates from January 2012
• Infobox road temporary tracking category 1
• Spoken articles
• Articles with hAudio microformats
• Lists of coordinates
• Geographic coordinate lists
• Articles with Geo
• Featured articles

• 1 History

  1.1 Sale
  1.2 Redesign

• 1.1 Sale
• 1.2 Redesign
• 2 Features

  2.1 Facebook Connect
  2.2 Digg Dialogg
  2.3 DiggBar
  2.4 Digg API
  2.5 Digg App

• 2.1 Facebook Connect
• 2.2 Digg Dialogg
• 2.3 DiggBar
• 2.4 Digg API
• 2.5 Digg App
• 3 Criticism

  3.1 Mob mentality
  3.2 Organized promotion and censorship by users
  3.3 AACS encryption key controversy
  3.4 Digg v4

• 3.1 Mob mentality
• 3.2 Organized promotion and censorship by users
• 3.3 AACS encryption key controversy
• 3.4 Digg v4
• 4 Timeline
• 5 See also
• 6 References
• 7 External links

• 1.1 Sale
• 1.2 Redesign

• 2.1 Facebook Connect
• 2.2 Digg Dialogg
• 2.3 DiggBar
• 2.4 Digg API
• 2.5 Digg App

• 3.1 Mob mentality
• 3.2 Organized promotion and censorship by users
• 3.3 AACS encryption key controversy
• 3.4 Digg v4

History

Digg started as an experiment in November 2004 by collaborators Kevin Rose, Owen Byrne, Ron Gorodetzky, and Jay Adelson. The original design by Dan Ries was free of advertisements. The company added Google AdSense early in the project but switched to MSN adCenter in 2007.[12]The site’s main function is to let users discover, share and recommend web content. Members of the community can submit a webpage for general consideration. Other members can vote that page up (“digg”) or down (“bury”). Although voting takes place on digg.com, many websites add “digg” buttons to their pages, allowing users to vote as they browse the web. The end product is a series of wide-ranging, constantly updated lists of popular and trending content from around the Internet, aggregated by a social network.Additions and improvements were made throughout the website’s first years. Digg v2 was released in July 2005, with a new interface by web design company silverorange. New features included a friends list, and the ability to “digg” a story without being redirected to a success page. One year later, as part of Digg v3, the website added specific categories for technology, science, world and business, videos, entertainment and gaming, as well as a “view all” section that merged all categories. Further interface adjustments were made in August 2007.By 2008, Digg’s homepage was attracting over 236 million visitors annually, according to a Compete.com survey.[13] Digg had grown large enough that it was thought to affect the traffic of submitted webpages. Some pages experienced a sudden increase of traffic shortly after being submitted; some Digg users refer to this as the “Digg effect”.CEO Jay Adelson announced in 2010 that the site would undergo an extensive overhaul. In an interview with Wired magazine, Adelson stated that “Every single thing has changed” and that “the entire website has been rewritten.”[14] The company switched from MySQL to Cassandra, a distributed database system; in a blog post, VP Engineering John Quinn described the move as “bold”.[15] Adelson summed up the new Digg by saying, “We’ve got a new backend, a new infrastructure layer, a new services layer, new machines — everything.”[14]Adelson stepped down as CEO on April 5, 2010 to explore entrepreneurial opportunities, months before the launch date of Digg v4.[16] He had been the company’s CEO since its inception. Kevin Rose, another original founder, stepped in temporarily as CEO and Chairman.Digg’s v4 release on August 25, 2010, was marred by site-wide bugs and glitches. Digg users reacted with hostile verbal opposition, and some used Digg’s own auto-submit feature to flood the site with articles from its competitor, Reddit. Beyond the release, Digg faced dwindling web traffic and heavy competition from Facebook, whose Like buttons started to appear on websites next to Digg’s.[17] High staff turnover included the departure of head of business development Matt Van Horn, shortly after v4′s release.[18]On September 1, 2010, Matt Williams took over as CEO, ending Rose’s troubled tenure as interim chief executive.

Sale

In July 2012, Digg was sold in three parts: the Digg brand, website and technology were sold to Betaworks for $500,000; 15 staff were transferred to the Washington Post’s SocialCode project for $12 million; and a suite of patents were sold to LinkedIn for around $4 million.[9][10][11]There are reports that Digg had been trying to sell itself to a larger company since early 2006.[19] The most notable attempt took place in July 2008, when Google entered talks to buy Digg for around $200 million. Google walked away from negotiations during the deal’s due diligence phase, informing Digg on July 25 that it was no longer interested in the purchase.[20] Digg subsequently went into further venture capital funding, receiving $28.7 million from investors such as Highland Capital Partners[21] to move headquarters and add staff.[22] Several months later, CEO Jay Adelson said Digg was no longer for sale.[23]

Redesign

On July 20, 2012, new owners Betaworks announced via Twitter that they were rebuilding Digg from scratch, “turning [Digg] back into a start-up”.[24] Betaworks gave the project a six-week deadline. Surveys of existing users, through the website ReThinkDigg.com, were used to inform the development of a new user interface and user experience.[25][26][27]Digg v1 launched a day early on July 31, 2012. It features an editorially driven front page, more images, and top, popular and upcoming stories. Users can access a new scoring system. There is increased support for sharing content to other social platforms such as Twitter and Facebook.

Features

Facebook Connect

In May 2009, Digg launched a new feature integrating Facebook Connect with Digg.[28] Users of Digg and Facebook can connect their accounts. When a Facebook account is connected to a Digg account, Digg articles can then be shared on the user’s Facebook page.[29] Facebook Connect also allows Facebook users to log into Digg with their Facebook account, bypassing the need to create a Digg account.

Digg Dialogg

Digg users can submit questions to a preselected famous individual who agrees to participate in an interview with a reporter chosen by Digg.[30] This feature is somewhat similar to Reddit’s IAmA.

DiggBar

The DiggBar was a frame that gave users access to Digg features without leaving their current webpage. A toolbar above the page allowed users to access Digg comments and analytics.[31] The DiggBar was removed in Digg v4. Kevin Rose said on April 5, 2010, “Framing content with an iFrame is bad for the Internet… It’s an inconsistent/wonky user experience, and I’m happy to say we are killing it.”[32]

Digg API

Digg opened their API to the public on April 19, 2007.[33][34] This allowed software developers to write tools and applications based on queries of Digg’s public data, dating back to 2004. It is no longer available. [35][36]

Digg App

Digg released free apps for iPhone and Android in early 2010. The app allowed users to browse stories and digg content. It featured close integration with other social media platforms: users can connect using Facebook or Twitter and share Digg content through them.The Digg app for Android is no longer available.[37]

Criticism

Mob mentality

The present Digg algorithm samples a diverse group of users to identify trending content, but in the past it was much more dependent on flocking behavior. In 2006, an anonymous user wrote a blog post accusing an O’Reilly writer of stealing Digg’s CSS and HTML.[38] Digg users flocked to the story and it was promoted with nearly 3,000 votes;[39] Digg founders Kevin Rose, Jay Adelson and Daniel Burka promptly expressed dissatisfaction on finding Digg’s code on writer Steve Mallett’s sites.Mallett’s code came from the open source project Pligg, which replicates some of Digg’s features and backend. Pligg is based on a similar Spanish project called Menéame. Menéame copied CSS and HTML code from Digg; this was distributed to Pligg, then to Mallett. On downloading the code from Pligg, Mallett had “assumed the open source code didn’t violate copyrights, as we all do, and was surprised to learn otherwise.”[40] Which is to say, “the main claim of stealing CSS was superficially true, but substantially false.”[40] Mallett defended himself in a blog post[41] supported by O’Reilly.[42]Digg’s executives were quick to make amends. Rose acknowledged the misunderstanding and notified Pligg developers of the issue,[43] while Adelson expressed support for Mallett’s claims and personally thanked him for clearing the issue. Nonetheless, O’Reilly writer Nat Torkington noted in her defense of Mallett that thousands of Digg voters had already supported an article claiming Mallett was a thief and a spammer.[40]This error has been attributed to the wisdom of the crowd, where the collective opinion of individuals is given greater weight than a single expert. Another explanation is groupthink, which differs by requiring independence among its nodes.[44]

Organized promotion and censorship by users

It has been possible for users to have disproportionate influence on Digg, either by themselves or in teams. These users are sometimes motivated to promote or bury pages for political or financial reasons.Serious attempts by users to game the site began in 2006.[45] A top user was banned after agreeing to promote a story for cash to an undercover Digg sting operation.[46] Another group of users openly formed a ‘Bury Brigade’ to remove “spam” articles about US politician Ron Paul; critics accused the group of attempting to stifle any mention of Ron Paul on Digg.[47]Digg hired computer scientist Anton Kast to develop a diversity algorithm that would prevent special interest groups from dominating Digg. During a town hall meeting, Digg executives responded to criticism by removing some features that gave superusers extra weight, but declined to make “buries” transparent.[48]However, later that year Google increased its page rank for Digg. Shortly, many ‘pay for Diggs’ startups were created to profit from the opportunity. According to TechCrunch, one top user charged $700 per story, with a $500 bonus if the story reached the front page.[49]Digg Patriots was a conservative Yahoo! Groups mailing list, with an associated page on coRank, accused of coordinated, politically motivated behavior on Digg. Progressive blogger Ole Ole Olson wrote in August 2010 that Digg Patriots undertook a year-long effort of organized burying of seemingly liberal articles from Digg’s Upcoming module. He also accused leading members of vexatiously reporting liberal users for banning (and those who seemed liberal), and creating “sleeper” accounts in the event of administrators banning their accounts. These and other actions would violate Digg’s terms of usage.[50][51] Olson’s post was immediately followed by the disbanding and closure of the DiggPatriots list, and an investigation into the matter by Digg.[52]

AACS encryption key controversy

On May 1, 2007, an article appeared on Digg’s homepage that contained the encryption key for the AACS digital rights management protection of HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc. Then Digg, “acting on the advice of its lawyers,” removed posting submissions about the secret number from its database and banned several users for submitting it. The removals were seen by many Digg users as a capitulation to corporate interests and an assault on free speech.[53] A statement by Jay Adelson attributed the article’s take-down to an attempt to comply with cease and desist letters from the Advanced Access Content System consortium and cited Digg’s Terms of Use as justification for taking down the article.[54] Although some users defended Digg’s actions,[55][56][57] as a whole the community staged a widespread revolt with numerous articles and comments being made using the encryption key.[58][59] The scope of the user response was so great that one of the Digg users referred to it as a “digital Boston Tea Party”.[60] The response was also directly responsible for Digg reversing the policy and stating: “But now, after seeing hundreds of stories and reading thousands of comments, you’ve made it clear. You’d rather see Digg go down fighting than bow down to a bigger company. We hear you, and effective immediately we won’t delete stories or comments containing the code and will deal with whatever the consequences might be.”[61]

Digg v4

Digg’s version 4 release was initially unstable. The site was unreachable or unstable for weeks after its launch on August 25, 2010. Many users, upon finally reaching the site, complained about the new design and the removal of many features (such as bury, favorites, friends submissions, upcoming pages, subcategories, videos and history search).[62] Kevin Rose replied to complaints on his blog, promising to fix the algorithm and restore some features.[63]Alexis Ohanian, founder of rival site Reddit, said in an open letter to Rose:Disgruntled users declared a ‘quit Digg day’ on August 30, 2010, and used Digg’s own auto-submit feature to fill the front page with content from Reddit.[65][66][67] Reddit also temporarily added the Digg shovel to their logo to welcome fleeing Digg users.[68]Digg’s traffic dropped significantly after the launch of version 4,[69] and publishers reported a drop in direct referrals from stories on Digg’s front page.[70] New CEO Matt Williams attempted to address some of the users’ concerns in a blog post on October 12, 2010, promising to reinstate many of the features that had been removed.

Timeline

See also

• Delicious
• diggnation
• Facebook
• Fark
• Mixx
• Propeller.com
• Reddit
• Slashdot
• Social bookmarking
• StumbleUpon
• Svět hvězd
• Virato Social News
• Web 2.0
• Wykop.pl

References

External links

• Official site
• Inc. Magazine profile of Kevin Rose

• Blogs
• Community websites
• News websites
• Social bookmarking
• Internet properties established in 2004
• Social information processing
• 2004 establishments in California
• Companies based in New York City

• All articles with dead external links
• Articles with dead external links from October 2010
• Articles containing potentially dated statements from April 2013
• All articles containing potentially dated statements

• 1 History
• 2 Awards and Accolades
• 3 References
• 4 External links

  4.1 Events
  4.2 Interviews

• 4.1 Events
• 4.2 Interviews

• 4.1 Events
• 4.2 Interviews

History

The original blog was founded on blogspot by Lisa Niver Rajna and George Rajna, both members of the Travelers’ Century Club. The We Said Go Travel[1] website with earned ratings of PR 5 and PA 50 began in May 2010. The first content was the newsletters previously published online during their eleven-month sabbatical in South-east Asia from August 2008-July 2009.The Rajnas started the site to create a platform for their travel memoir[2] about their sabbatical year where they got engaged underwater, Niver Rajna lost sixty pounds and they visited twelve countries.With the first event in March 2011[3], a larger platform was required and a website was built on weebly.com at www.wesaidgotravel.com with the blog being on www.wesaidgotravel.net. As the number of followers and events grew, it was necessary to combine the two sites into one on wordpress on www.wesaidgotravel.com.In April 2011, Niver Rajna was invited to have a “We Said Go Travel” Blog on the Jewish Journal[4] .At the fourth We Said Go Travel event in October 2011[5], Bill Rosendahl gave an award in honor of the contributions to the city for leadership and community building efforts of the founders and the site.Various social media sites, including Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest, and Google+, were added for promotion and to increase traffic and views. In April 2011, a YouTube channel was started currently at over 130 videos and 80,000 views.Highlights of recent articles: “A Royal Cremation in Ubud” in National Geographic Intelligent Traveler[6], and in print about the festival at Inle Lake in the Myanmar Times.[7]In January 2013, Kred recognized the site with a Top 5% Elite Influencer in Travel Badge[8]. The founders were invited to speak in Kathmandu in April 2013 by the Nepal Tourism Board, where they read from their travel memoir for the first time. The feature editor interviewed them and had a full-page article was published in the Himalayan Times.[9]In March 2013, The Nomadic Family awarded We Said Go Travel as #5 of the Top 50 Best Travel Blogs of 2012.[10] In May 2013, Kred recognized the site with a Top 1% Elite Influencer in Travel Badge[11].Both are bloggers for Huffington Post[12] as well as the Jewish Journal.[13] Their first Huffington Post articles were a “He Said, She Said” on their travels in Bagan, Myanmar. George’s article: “One Thing My Wife and I Don’t Agree on” [14] Lisa’s article: “Terrorized by My Bike For My Birthday in Bagan” [15]

Awards and Accolades

• From City of Los Angeles City Council Member, Bill Rosendahl October 2011[16]
• Top 5% Elite Influencer in Travel Badge, January 2013[17]
• Number Five in Top 50 Best Travel Blogs of 2012 [18]
• Top 1% Elite Influencer in Travel Badge, May 2013[19]

References

External links

Events

• “Interaction with American Journalists—Lisa Niver Rajna and George Rajna on their experiences and Travel Writing” Himalayan Times April 13, 2013: Sponsored by Nepal Tourism Board, Kathmandu with Reader’s Club
• “Grateful at Thanksgiving” Huffington Post Impact Section October 2012: 45×45 Project Solar Cookers
• “Fundraiser for Caine’s Arcade” Westside Today June 12, 2012 Travel Raffle to Do Good.
• “In Conversation with Johnny Jet”Technorati Travel February 2, 2012
• “Giving Back October 18, 2011:Books for Bhutan
• “Using Travel and the Seasons to Gain Perspective” Westside Today September 6, 2011: book reading, The Good Girl’s Guide to Getting Lost.”
• “Uncovering Jewish Morocco” Westside Today March 24, 2011: Speaker: Lisa Niver Rajna

Interviews

• in the “Himalayan Times”
• “10 Contiki Questions”
• “Interviewed by Johnny Jet
• “Interviewed by Dave’s Travel Corner”
• “Budget Traveler: He Said, She Said”
• “Travelling Couples: Lisa and George Rajna”
• “Interview with 11 Traveling Duos”
• “Trippers of the Week: George and Lisa Rajna”

• Travel websites
• Adventure travel
• Travelogues
• Travel
• Travel autobiographies
• Tourism

• to drive traffic on blogspot you must post there unique content.
  but it is very useless to do hard work on blogspot kind portal.
• you can made relevant, unique links and rich content on the blog.

  source (s)
  http://www.myperfectearth.com/alexa-traffic

• The most important part of a webpage to a search engine (like Google or Bing) lies in the meta tags. The meta tags are a part of the HTML code that makes up a webpage, and basically tells the search engines what is on a particular website (site title, keywords, description, etc.). When you go to Google and search for something, Google brings back a bunch of results with a website title and a short description. This website title and description is pulled from the site's meta tags.

  I also use blogspot for my blog and had to do some research to figure out why my site wasn't even showing up in the search engines. Try using the step-by-step instructions in the link below to add meta tags to your HTML code. After a few days, you should see your website starting to show up in the search engines. This is the first step to driving traffic to your blog – to make it searchable! From there on, it's all about promoting your blog on technology websites, to your friends on Facebook, on forums, etc.

  Hope this helps!

• When you ask a question like this, you will find yourself beseiged with people trying to sell you traffic and SEO tricks. Save your money. You can do it yourself for free.

  Increasing traffic to your blog is all about what I like to call, the Famous Five…

  1. Write guest posts on other blogs that are more popular than yours. The owners will always be happy to have great free content, and your blog will be visited by their readers! Technorati.com is a great option for a technology blog like yours.

  2. Comment in technology forums and leave comments on technology blogs – it's important to get your name known in your industry, but also, your blog will feature higher in the search engine results (e.g. Google, Yahoo, etc) if you have lots of "back links" to relevant (i.e. technology) blogs. A back link is when your blog URL features on someone else's blog – Google like you to have lots of them!

  3. Write amazing content regularly and often. At least once a week, and ideally everyday… It grows your audience and Google will reward you for it in their search engine results. If you want more traffic, write more!

  4. Do some research into keywords. Keywords are the sorts of phrases people type into the search engines. For example, "best thing about an ipad" – what you'll want to do is look on the Google Keywords Tool and find technology phrases that are high search (lots of people searching for them) and low competition (not many other blogs using the phrase). It's not a perfect system but it will give you a good idea.

  When you've found a phrase, make sure you include it 3 or 4 times in your next blog post – not too many times as it will diminish the quality of the article…and you will start to rank for that phrase on Google! Also use keywords for your "tags." Google it!

  5. Work it on the social networks! You should be sharing every blog post you write on your Twitter Account, Facebook page, and on social networks like blogbods.com and stumbleupon.com and creating youtube videos (vlogs).

  All of the above famous five strategies will see your traffic increase – it won't be overnight, but slow and steady wins the race! By the way, lots of people will try and sell you facebook likes or will offer an automated backlink programme, so you can shortcut this hard work….don't do it!

  Google is very clever and usually finds out when you're cheating…it likes to do updates to how it ranks blogs and websites – and many blogs that have tried to take a shortcut get penalized…..and have to start all over again…

• Let me tell you the secret behind the blog

  1. You will write the blog which will contain all those keywords which are not being used in the website in your product/services

  2. When you are updating the blog – you are sending the updates through RSS to twitter, facebook and other social media sites

  3. Further you updates may also be published to blog directory if you get listed there

  4. Overall your blog could also be publshed on your home page through RSS to HTML script and will keep your front page fresh

  Wish you all the best – and start blogging now and also promote it to other blogs

• yes ofcouse blogging is a great way to drive traffic to your website and it also makes your website achieve higher rank as by blogging you can continously upgrade your website with fresh and unique content. So always write optimzed blog( use proper title and metas and proper links) which is relavent to your website and which will help you boost traffic to your website.
• Of course, you are adding more content to your site which is bringing a wider range to your site, plus not to mention the more captivating the content the more people will come. If you are interested in starting a blog www.blogunexpected.com has step by step in starting a blog
• it is great to write a blog but be sure that blog you are writing should have your domain name i mean don't write blogs on free blogging websites, make a blog with your company domain name like blog.yourdomain.com that would drive more traffic to your website as this blog have your domain but if u write a blog on blogging website like Blogspot every one can read your blog but they are not on your website so traffic is at your blog not at your website so make a new blog with ur domain and you can give as many ink you wanted to give with optimized anchor text and google crawls these blogs much faster.
• YES! And then always include a link to your blog wherever you post anything, like this: http://in-vitro-meat.blogspot.com/

  That's my blog about building a robot army. And stuff.

  Good luck!