Digg, a link-based aggregator website that was an Internet staple circa 2012 then faded, has been acquired by founder Kevin Rose in partnership with Alexis Ohanian, who co-founded Reddit. The site gained popularity by tapping crowdsourced voting, allowing users to vote content up or down. Thanks to AI, the duo feel the timing is right for Digg to make a comeback. “We’ve hit an inflection point where AI can become a helpful co-pilot to users and moderators, not replacing human conversation, but rather augmenting it, allowing users to dig deeper, while removing repetitive burdens,” Rose says.

Rose will chair the new venture, with Ohanian serving as an adviser and product designer Justin Mezzell brought aboard as CEO.

Digg launched in 2004 and in 2012, Rose sold the social media aspects of the site to incubator Betaworks, while LinkedIn acquired its patents and other assets. The domain wound up with brand marketing firm Money Group, which The Verge says sold it to Rose and Ohanian for an undisclosed price.

While Digg has been relaunched “in a limited form” there is more to come, notes The Verge, adding that “its ultimate ambitions are enormous. Digg aims to build the kind of community-first social platform that basically no longer exists on the Internet.”

In an announcement, Rose says he was approached several times throughout the years about acquiring the site, but said the timing was never right. “The technologies to solve our biggest pain points didn’t exist,” Rose explains, noting an “inflection point” as a result of AI.

Digg will take a mobile-first approach, using what the announcement says is “the best of AI” to create a user-driven experience that leverages technology while remaining “human-centered.”

Rose and Ohanian have assembled a small team, and are “meeting with experienced community managers from various online forums” to come up with best practices for managing crowdsourced content Digg lets users “digg” (upvote) or “bury” (downvote) content, creating trending patterns.

“Digg and Reddit were once fierce rivals in the online social news aggregation space, launching within a year of each other some two decades ago,” TechCrunch reports. At its peak, Digg managed to attract 40 million monthly unique visitors, the new owners say. But Digg failed to achieve the success of Reddit.

“Online communities thrive when there’s a balance between technology and human judgment. We’re bringing Digg back to ensure that balance exists,” says Ohanian, founder and general partner at venture capital firm Seven Seven Six, which along with Rose’s new homebase, True Ventures, is funding the reinvention of Digg.