A social news website features user-posted stories that are ranked based on popularity. Users can comment on these posts, and these comments may also be ranked. Since their emergence with the birth of web 2.0, these sites are used to link many types of information including news, humor, support, and discussion. Social news relies on crowd sourcing to shape focus in a bottom-up fashion, forming a type of collective intelligence. Social news sites facilitate democratic participation on the web.^{[citation needed]}

Slashdot, started in 1997, was one of the first social news websites. It focuses mainly on science and technology related news. Users can submit stories, and the editors pick out the best stories each day for the front page. Users can then post comments on the stories.

Fark was started in 1997, and featured news of any topic. On Fark, users can submit articles to the administrators of the site. Each day, these administrators pick out 50 articles to display on the front page.

Digg, launched in December 2004, introduced the voting system. This system allows users to "digg" or "bury" articles. "Digging" is the equivalent of voting positively, so that popular articles are displayed first. "Burying" does not lower an articles score. However, if an article is buried enough times, it will be automatically deleted. Digg has a social networking aspect to it, as members can follow one another and build personal profiles accordingly.