Last night while inside Second Life doing some scripting working on a sign which SL residents can click and send me a message, a friend mentioned that Digg was blowing up. Sounded interesting so I asked him to pass along the link. He sent me digg’s home page URL (doh!) and said it had to do with takedown posts over the HD-DVD decryption key being hacked.

After I was done coding and being one not to follow digg much any more, I didn’t check into the story deeper. This morning’s RSS feeds are lit up over the subject. The front digg page as of this writing is still filled with stories about the subject.

The fascinating part of the story is the understory. Some digg users are claiming not only their posts were removed but their accounts banned. In this day of blogvengeance, they just posted about the experience and the digg effect promoted these stories.

First official reponse? Digg’s Jay Adelson posted an explanation that digg had to comply with the law and explained that they were notified that posting of the HD-DVD hack constituted intellectual property theft and they could be responsible.

After it was clear the digg community disagreed with the official position, Digg’s Kevin Rose indicated they changed their minds:

But now, after seeing hundreds of stories and reading thousands of comments, you’ve made it clear. You’d rather see Digg go down fighting than bow down to a bigger company. We hear you, and effective immediately we won’t delete stories or comments containing the code and will deal with whatever the consequences might be.

Check out the number of diggs to Kevin’s post on the official digg blog. 10,000+ and counting.

Download Squad sums up how users feel about DRM succintly:

Witness the modern equivalent of the 95 thesis’ Martin Luther nailed to the door of Wittenburg church. We, digital citizens –commonly referred to by the vulgar term of ‘consumers’ — have had enough of content lock-in. We’ve bought and re-bought entertainment media — repackaged and regurgitated digital vomitus — until we’re blue in the face. We’ve been told time and time again that DRM is for our own protection, and we’re finally and inconsolably fed up.

Be sure to read the Download Squad comments for reports from digg users complaining about the heavy hand of digg.

Om Malik ponders:

1. Is it legally liable for the actions of its community which was initially pointing to a story published by an independent publications? If that is the case, then YouTube-Viacom drama becomes even more intriguing.
2. If not, then did Digg act rashly?
3. Can Digg recover from this set back?

Let me try answering Om’s questions.

1. The courts already ruled that a site isn’t responsible for messages posted on comments and messageboards.
2. Digg clearly made things worse by taking down the posts with the hacked code and nuking users when they didn’t have a rule which specifically forbid these types of posts. Adelson’s post was too little, too late. Rose mentioned they remove some types of stories, but they didn’t have a rule specifically forbidding the HD-DVD hack posts. As for banning users over posting something that they didn’t have a specific rule in place? Way too heavy-handed. Banning users is lame anyway unless somebody is trying to hack your server.
3. This is digg’s first major credibility hit. It also proves that there is no such thing as unedited community content. There can’t be. Digg clearly does have some editorial criteria making it at least a little Slashdot-like in that sense. Again, banning users over posting stories that are on the gray line is the type of thing AOL would do with terms of service violations.

Wikipedia weaknesses shining through digg? Is digg wrong to change their position? The hacked HD-DVD code also made the del.icio.us most popular list. If the MPAA is going to pursue takedown notices, they’ve got their hands full.

Hmm thoughts
We don’t own an HD-DVD player or a single HD-DVD yet. Do own Blu-Ray player with the PS3 and bought the Mission Impossible set on Blu-Ray. That’s our one and only HD quality movie purchase to date. We haven’t even bought and downloaded through Xbox Live the HD quality movies. Might try one someday, but I’d rather save the Microsoft Points and use them for something else.

Personally and professionally, I don’t like or want to support warez or cracks. I don’t use bittorent for illegal purposes. Don’t link to sites like that and ask other readers to please not do that here either. Plenty of other places to do that and you know what? I wish to respect copyright owner’s wishes because, well, I’m somebody who publishes copyrighted material and would like my copyright respected. However, if somebody posts the HD-DVD hack string below which I’ve so carefully avoided using in this post, I’m not going to remove it. That’s on your head and I’ll dutifully hand over the IP of the commenter if the MPAA comes knocking with court order. Fair warning.

We all have our own value system. I don’t judge others, direct family not included (as a parent it’s my responsibility to influence and teach my children), who use bittorrent to get around DRM for MP3 and movies. If others want to surf warez and crack sites and/or use bittorent for illegal purposes (I think it’s great using P2P for legal purposes, BTW), then go to town. You decide what works for you and I’ll decide what works for me. That includes friends too.

I understand and agree with those who dislike DRM. I would prefer no movies, music or media be DRM protected. I believe strongly someday that will happen. I’ve never burned an archive copy of any of our 500+ DVDs. Conversely when I buy a CD one of the first things I do is rip it to MP3 so I can keep the source material safe and/or listen to it across multiple computer platforms (iTunes, Zune), so if that act makes me a hypocrite, I’m guilty as charged.

Where do you stand?

Did this post make you go hmm?

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