Digg competitor Mixx landed another big distribution deal. CNN.com will be adding a “Mixx It” button after every article on the site. This will be right next to the “e-mail” and “share” buttons. Last March, the Mixx bookmark button was adopted by the New York Times, but only as one of many options. Similarly, when CNN.com readers click on the “share” button, they have the option to send the story to Digg, Facebook, del.icio.us, Reddit, and StumbleUpon. But Mixx will be highlighted as a separate button, apart from the regular share options.
The deal with CNN could give a huge boost to Mixx’s small-but-growing membership base of 500,000 registered users (and between 70,000 and 180,000 monthly unique visitors, depending on which measurement service you look at). CNN.com has 22 million monthly uniques in the U.S., according to comScore (and 30 million worldwide). CNN.com readers who decide to Mixx their stories will be able to bypass Mixx’s registration process when they get taken to the site so that they can browse immediately. They will still have to register, however, to save a story or set up a personal Mixx page.
For CNN, the appeal of Mixx might have something to do with the fact that Mixx really lets readers get extremely granular in their interests. Categories are based on tags, with already 300,000 different tags on Mixx. So if you are interested in Alzheimer’s, for instance, you can add that tag to your personalized Mixx page or search for stories explicitly categorized with that tag. On Digg and other social news sites, you can search for stories about Alzheimer’s also, but there is no Alzheimer’s category. Notes Mixx CEO Chris McGill:
When you are looking at Yahoo Buzz or Redditt or Digg, they are really playing a one-size fits all game. All the stories are just shooting for the popular board.
Mixx, he thinks, can do a better job to help you find and share stories around your particular interests, no matter how obscure they may be. Of course, to gain all the benefits of such a system, you have to be willing to do a little more work in setting up your preferences. And, ultimately, the quality of the stories you find on Mixx will depend on the quality (and number) of submissions. With 13.3 million monthly visitors adding and voting stories on Digg, that is going to be a very difficult network effect to overcome. But if Mixx can convince enough CNN readers to join its bookmarking club, it could survive become a solid Digg alternative, or at least survive long enough to get bought.
This is fabulous news for Mixx, and will hopefully be a good boost for the site in terms of stories, visitors, and members. The site has been growing so much over the last few months, things keep getting better and better. And yes, I’ll admit my bias because I use and love the site - but bias be damned, because once you get bitten by the Mixx bug, you’re hooked.
Are you kidding me?- man these guys are blowing up!
Damn–the news coming from these guys doesn’t stop. Watch out Digg, i think ther is a new, sexy kid on the block who is about to sneak up on iyou
Does anyone have any hard data on whether users actually use these buttons?
The “share this” icons on the bottom of every page on every website these days is getting over-cluttered — reminds one of the WAP deck on a mobile phone.
Me thinks this is a great pickup for Mixx. I am curious as to whether users ever click on these buttons and what sort of traffic they provide.
This is really exciting news for Mixx and users. It is great that CNN continues to embrace social media. As a Mixx user, I am a strong believer in the potential of Mixx as a site. I am glad CNN realized that as well…
What these news sites really need is Add to Any’s share menu…
http://www.addtoany.com/buttons/
whats the incentive for mixxing stuff?
id rather just go to cnn.com then mixx
testing…my last one didn’t show up?
Mixx is just great. I use it all the time, and I used to use Digg, but Digg is now buried in my book, who needs all that noise, and i do mean noise.
The one thing about Mixx is the accountability, and stories never go away.
For the Best of Mixx check out the “Hall_of_Fame: General” group…that would be a good place to start.
It’s a great group of conscious people who actually seem to care about each other’s well being, and a great group of owners and employees that will respond to your needs, and also, now there is an API. I’m gonna be building something with that pretty soon, myself.
cGt2099 (above) is another great source of good submissions, but i’d seriously check out the Hall or Popular (all time tag) too. You can see that there are some Digg Refugees (including cGt and the occasional appearance by MrBabyMan, among others) and also, just a lot of wonderful people who really Mixx up some excellent Web cocktails.
Be forewarned: it could take over your life, at least your online life!
peace,
yoda
oh, and May The Force Be With You…..always.
The answer is: no, people *don’t* click on those icons. Hardly ever, actually. Erick, why don’t you ask the Mixx fellas how many clicks they get on day one? I’ll give you a dollar if it’s more than a few hundred.
And Mixx doesn’t have 500,000 registered users. I think you added an extra zero.
It is always stated that a lot of Digg refugees use Mixx and come there once they’re tired of Digg, hate it or get banned. While this is true, there are also a lot of hardcore Digg users that still like Digg too that are also madly in love with the new brain child in Social News, Mixx.com.
I do like the individual groups on Mixx but what I really like the most is the intelligent, well-mannered and grown up conversations that take place in the comments of the submissions. Digg use to be this way until it was over run with a certain demographic or maybe just the zombies of the social internet world.
In addition to those things I like above about Mixx, one more thing that you will certainly notice too if you ever hop on over and join us there is the staff of Mixx and the CEO Chris McGill. These guys are truly open to the community and looking to improve it every step of the way, a class act. The communication channel is always open to talk to the people at Mixx that matter and I have never went more than an hour to have any concerns addressed. To me, this is one of the most important things of a site that you nearly dedicate a portion of your life to because in the end, when the site grows to an incredible level and the people at the top make the call, it’s important to know that they are level headed, well-mannered, intelligent, honest and most of all looking out for the community as a whole.
I’m glad to see that CNN has added Mixx and not just to the list but in a featured position. This truly is big.
Mixx on! … my Mixxing buddies and future Mixxin’ buddies
- webaddict
Mixx is on a roll !!
I just stumbled upon their API Blender Page and saw a new Application”NachoMixx”. I am suprised this news dint hit Mixx Landing Page
*yawn*
Don’t remember the last time I visited either of those sites. I just added the AddThis widget to my blog. Now that’s newsworthy!
The logo and tagline leave me feeling slightly queasy.
I guess it’s a typically American thing to comapre a website to a generic white drink being with a swizzle stick.
I can only imagine what kind of heinous concoction is being mixed in that cup… Horseradish, tequila and vanilla ice cream, maybe?
And “your blend of the web”? Did they really need to play off the word “mix” with the obious pun?
This is grade-school level market positioning and seems to be directed at morons.
well Joe T won’t be joining Mixx, and that is……..uh, precision.
Is this a joke?
http://siteanalytics.compete.c.....?metric=uv
Why are you even mentioning them still?
Obviously Joe T has yet to use the site and realize it is breaking grounds in Social Media. Mixx since launch has been ahead of the game in every single way. Digg users had been screaming for a picture section, Mixx launches with one. Mixx has transparency which requires users to be held accountable. At other sites you can just be a screaming jackass and bury away. Mixx has a daily leader board. Other sites rely on a third party website to see leaders. Mixx rewards it’s users with medals and badges. Other sites are thinking about doing this. Mixx has a Breaking News section, this has never been done in Social Media ever. So I ask you, if you like Social News and Social Media, what is stopping you from heading over to Mixx? Now with the integration of CNN it will make it easier for me to submit content to Mixx from the CNN page. Yes I do click the buttons, it makes it easier for me to submit either a good or breaking story.
Oh yeah, a Mixx user launched a website called Mixxingbowl.com it hosts the Unofficial Mixxed Podcast called Social Blend and is a user forum. Now the site is not affiliated with Mixx.com and receives no funding from it. Mixx.com could have very well sent a C & D but instead they embraced it and are feeding off of their users feedback. If Social Media sites want to know how to break ground and become really awesome, it’s simple, GIVE THE COMMUNITY WHAT THEY WANT AND LISTEN TO THEM. Mixx does this, and they do it well.
@jon
Why do they still mention them?
Because at one time, you could have graphed Facebook against MySpace and seen a similar picture. You could have graphed YouTube against Revver and seen a similar disparity.
Websites don’t just spring fully formed out of Zeus’s head. They have to differentiate, find a market position, reach tipping points and GROW into the next great thing.
So ones that continually make news by signing up with large partners, create new never-before seen features (breaking news, related contnet), are worth covering as they go down the path of hunting down the industry leaders.
Why do fans of Digg LOVE the Digg monopoly in social news, but with the same breath vote up “i hate microsoft they are an evil monopolist” story? Ah, so hypocritical.
The world is a better place with competition and Mixx is bringing competition to the space that no one has seen since it was invented by Reddit and Digg.
@Jon
Your logic is flawed, as it is constricted
http://mixxingbowl.com/2008/01.....is-part-2/
Older article at the Mixxing Bowl, but still relevant
On the issue of making comparisons between newer social media sites with Digg
@ yoda on mixx
“oh, and May The Force Be With You…..always.”
Hell yeah
Universal Day of the Jedi on May 25, dude
(sorry, off topic, but I’m a Star Wars nerd - couldn’t resist)
500,000 registered users is small-but-growing? Are you sure that number is right?
I use mixx for the afore mentioned reason of the “grown up conversations.” I, for one, am glad that Joe T won’t be joining us. If I wanted a direct, insipid assault on my self esteem I’d go back to digg.
Not a techie person, so I can’t really add to that conversation. But I will say, as a psychology major (with my own group at mixx entitled psych majors) mixx has a lot more to offer people, not just tech people.
Here is an interview of Chris, the CEO, presenting Mixx
http://www.loiclemeur.com/engl.....-j-11.html
Digg apologists/trolls are so cute when they’re vexed.
Good news for mixx
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