{"id":249791,"date":"2025-10-30T09:33:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-30T09:33:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/249791\/"},"modified":"2025-10-30T09:33:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-30T09:33:09","slug":"digg-founder-kevin-rose-on-the-need-for-trusted-social-communities-in-the-ai-era","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/249791\/","title":{"rendered":"Digg founder Kevin Rose on the need for trusted social communities in the AI era"},"content":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe dead internet theory is real,\u201d Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian told Digg founder Kevin Rose, referring to the idea that much of the internet isn\u2019t human \u2014 it\u2019s mostly bots. <\/p>\n

The two entrepreneurs have since teamed up to re-envision how to build a social community in this world where, very soon, it will be hard to tell who\u2019s a real person online. <\/p>\n

Earlier this year, the two bought the remaining assets belonging to Digg<\/a>, the long-shuttered news aggregation site originally founded by Rose that was a staple of the Web 2.0 era. <\/p>\n

Now again under Rose\u2019s control, the new Digg is creating a place for people to socialize and connect online within communities, similar to Reddit, but it has different ideas about how such a platform should work at a time when bots are nearly indistinguishable from humans. <\/p>\n

Backstage at the TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 conference on Wednesday, Rose explained that he sees the future of social as being more focused on protected online spaces and \u201cmicro communities of trusted users.\u201d <\/p>\n

\u201cI just have to imagine that, as the cost to deploy agents drops to next to nothing, we\u2019re just gonna see\u2026bots act as though they\u2019re humans,\u201d he said. \u201cSo, small trusted communities, proof of heartbeat \u2014 there\u2019s an actual human on the other end\u2026is important.\u201d <\/p>\n

But today\u2019s verification methods often involve things like facial recognition, ID uploads, or small payments with a credit card to ensure that someone is a person and not a bot. Not everyone online will feel comfortable doing something like that to access an online social community, of course. <\/p>\n

That\u2019s why Digg is looking to use newer technology, like a ZK proof<\/a> (ZKP) to verify people using its platform in the future.<\/p>\n

Says Rose, the ZKP is a \u201cfancy piece of math\u201d which doesn\u2019t expose who someone is, but can verify something essential that would be important for their participation in an online community. <\/p>\n

For instance, a moderator of a community for Oura ring owners could use the technology to verify that someone is actually an Oura ring owner before allowing them to post. That identity could stay with them so they\u2019re known as a trusted member, but not necessarily one where they have to go by their real name. This could be particularly useful in communities focused on sensitive topics or health issues, as well. <\/p>\n

\"ConnieConnie Loizos, Editor-in-Chief & GM of TechCrunch, and Kevin Rose, Founder, Digg, speak onstage during day three of TechCrunch Disrupt 2025 at Moscone Center on October 29, 2025 in San Francisco, California Image Credits:Kimberly White\/Getty Images for TechCrunch<\/p>\n

The idea that moderators should have more of a say over their communities is also essential to the new Digg \u2014 and, Rose believes, these founding members should be compensated for their efforts. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhen we first started Digg in 2004 \u2014 before Reddit launched \u2014 we were very lucky because we had thousands and thousands of people, and eventually millions of people, that would come in and contribute content,\u201d said Rose, during his panel at the TechCrunch Disrupt event. \u201cAnd they\u2019re not getting paid.\u201d<\/p>\n

He said that some Reddit moderators are essentially working around the clock to handle things like spam and fighting, but aren\u2019t receiving any slice of the revenue, nor do they control the audience. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo you\u2019re talking about something where you\u2019re signing up and creating all this value for a platform, but you can\u2019t port that platform anywhere else. You can\u2019t capture any email addresses. You can\u2019t stay in touch on that platform. You can be ousted [from] that platform,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n

Rose also pointed to issues where larger Reddit communities can become trademarked \u2014 something that prevented the founder of the r\/WallStreetBets subreddit from writing a book using the name of the community they had created. <\/p>\n

\u201cIf anything, we should be more similar to Substack or Patreon, or some others that are actually giving you much more control of your community,\u201d he said. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThe dead internet theory is real,\u201d Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian told Digg founder Kevin Rose, referring to the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":249792,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20],"tags":[62,276,277,49,48,116881,116882,44677,44681,61],"class_list":{"0":"post-249791","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-ca","12":"tag-canada","13":"tag-digg","14":"tag-kevin-rose","15":"tag-techcrunch-disrupt","16":"tag-techcrunch-disrupt-2025","17":"tag-technology"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249791","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=249791"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/249791\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/249792"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=249791"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=249791"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ca\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=249791"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}