Kevin Rose just posted a statement saying that Digg will no longer remove posts containing a banned HD DVD cracking code.
It was, the Digg founder says, an insane day. After taking down a Digg user's post that contained a copyrighted series of hexadecimal codes -- a series that is key to unlocking the encryption on HD DVDs -- the Digg community erupted in protest. Post after post contained nothing but the banned code. At several points the Digg home page contained nothing but posts whose titles included the code. A Google search at 11pm Pacific tonight reveals 238,000 hits for the banned code. The cat is out of the bag. The genie is out of the bottle. The toothpaste is out of the tube.
Rose saw the writing on the wall. The publicity may have been terrific for Digg, and after all it was just trying to comply with the legal threats it was receiving from the owners of the copyrighted code. But the site's users were angry at what they perceived as an attempt to censor their free expression. Rather than fight his enormous (and uncontrollable) user base, Digg threw in the towel:
Defiantly enough, Rose's own post even follows the model set by his users, and includes the banned code right in its title.
As for Digg itself, the site is currently offline, with a note saying "We'll be back shortly." Some kind of server reconfiguration in the wake of today's Diggstorm? If you have any information, let me know.
