Internet users are increasingly determined to play an active role in influencing the way in which online information is viewed by others, according to the chief executive of one of the world's leading information-sharing websites.

Jay Adelson, the chief executive of Digg, said: “There's a groundswell of interest among internet users in actively contributing to the internet's content and, perhaps more importantly, influencing the way information is viewed by others.

“Users are increasingly participating in the kind of digital democracy the internet enables. New concepts, such as the social graph, social networking, citizen journalism and participatory media, have emerged that enable people to connect and interact online in entirely new and interesting ways.”

In a podcast for The Times, Mr Adelson described what he termed “the democratisation of information”. He pointed to the possibilities that virtually boundless access to knowledge create. “There's virtually no time or space limit, like you find in print or broadcast media, beyond our own attention-spans and ability to make use of all the content and information available to us. And anyone can produce and distribute content for virtually no cost.”

Not only are internet users keen to generate their own online content, he said, but there is also increasing participation in ranking, sharing and drawing attention to information.

Digg, which was founded by Kevin Rose in 2004, operates on the same principle. The site enables users to post online content - articles, blog entries or multimedia - and other users rank, or “digg”, the content. Among the site's most popular stories last week was one about an atheist who claimed to have seen an image of the Big Bang in a piece of toast and another about Barack Obama's victory in Maine. In October, the site drew 6.1 million unique users in the United States, a rise of 109 per cent since 2006. In Britain it numbered just over half a million.

Mr Adelson cited the video-sharing website YouTube as an example of the internet's democracy: “Anyone can create and post videos to YouTube, and any video, from a homemade video made by a couple of teenagers to a high-production value video created by a marketing firm, has the same chance of becoming popular.”

The changes have a particular relevance to news, Mr Adelson said. The “citizen journalist” has stepped forward and mobile phones have become a means of recording and transmitting breaking stories.

“This raw content, available on the internet, can quickly move up the hierarchy long before newsroom editorial cycles can process and publish news,” Mr Adelson said.

He said that accounts and pictures of atrocities such as the London Underground terrorist attacks were “spread on the internet by ordinary people ... faster, and with more unfiltered information, than traditional newsrooms were able to publish or broadcast.”

Mr Adelson also gave an example of how the free flow of online information offered hope in countries where the media was heavily censored or restricted. He recalled a conversation with a journalist from one country, who described how protesters at a politician's speech had been arrested and maltreated by the police.

“The next day the story that appeared in the local newspaper indicated that the protest was very small and peaceful, but as it turned out, other first-hand accounts and some amateur photos of the events that day made it on to the internet. Some of these accounts were linked and ended up being shared via a large, prominent social network, and as many citizens of this country had internet access, the people ensured the story was published.”

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