What a nightmare. I think Digg v4 should have been launched as a separate startup, helmed by Kevin ala Pownce. It's just too different, and it looks like they may have killed the goose that laid the golden egg. What a disaster..
I'm not really sure how golden those eggs were, truth be told. Was digg profitable? How profitable? Not enough for a company that has taken in $40 million in VC money, for sure...
It could have been profitable if it wasn't. Up until recently Reddit was being run by only two or three engineers on a shoe-string budget. Digg had way too many employees, way too much ambition.
Instead of a separate startup (with a different brand/trade-dress) maybe a v4 as an opt-in alternative on a subdomain similar to what Facebook offered with lite.facebook.com would have been better received.
(Or alternatively v4 at digg.com and v3-features at discussion.digg.com with some tie-in.)
