Digg’s Decline by the Numbers: Plummeting Traffic, Waning Power [STATS]

When it comes to releasing a new product, users and pundits’ opinions only count for so much, but numbers — including revenue and traffic– don’t lie.

We’ve been watching DiggDigg closely ever since we got wind of its fourth version, a.k.a. “New Digg,” last month.

While we’ve gathered plenty of anecdotal evidence from power users and average users alike, we’ve yet to publish anything definitive about how the site is doing traffic-wise.

Users have “revolted” against the new version of Digg since Day One of its public launch. We knew loyal Diggers were complaining, so we decided to poll our own readers about the situation. It turned out that Mashable’sMashable own readers preferred the old version by a huge margin — 78.4% of respondents, all told.

But this kind of evidence only showed the New Digg was unpopular, not necessarily faring badly in reality. After all, FacebookFacebook users “revolt” over new features all the time, but that site’s growth continues at a mind-boggling rate.

This week, the web analysts at Hitwise gathered data showing a 34% decline in visitors in the U.K. and a 24% decline in the U.S. in the past 11 weeks.

What could have caused this drastic drop-off?

For one thing, Digg hasn’t made any truly significant changes for around four years. Unlike Facebook, which we used for comparison earlier and which makes incremental changes on a near-monthly basis, Digg dumped on its users an entirely new interface, a new algorithm for story popularity and a new paradigm for power users all at once.

Digg’s traffic was reportedly shaky before New Digg was revealed, but the new version of the site seems to have nailed the coffin, to an extent.

The other issue is that one of Digg’s main benefits for users was its ability to direct traffic. But we’re hearing from site owners and content producers around the web that as Digg’s onsite traffic drops, their Digg referrals are tanking, while TwitterTwitter and other sources are on the rise.

We recently postulated what Digg needed to do to survive. With both inbound and outbound traffic on the decline, and with this decline being so precipitous, we wonder if Digg’s “do or die” moment hasn’t already come and gone.

What do you think of Digg’s chances these days? Or, more to the point, when was the last time you visited Digg.com? Let us know in the comments.

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