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Poll Favorite way to hide a hex number?
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Comments:1142 | Votes:3300

Digg.com Attempts To Suppress HD-DVD Revolt

Posted by kdawson on Tue May 01, 2007 10:26 PM
from the toothpaste-back-in-the-tube dept.
fieryprophet writes "An astonishing number of stories related to HD-DVD encryption keys have gone missing in action from digg.com, in many cases along with the account of the diggers who submitted them. Diggers are in open revolt against the moderators and are retaliating in clever and inventive ways. At one point, the entire front page comprised only stories that in one way or another were related to the hex number. Digg users quickly pointed to the HD DVD sponsorship of Diggnation, the Digg podcast show. Search digg for HD-DVD song lyrics, coffee mugs, shirts, and more for a small taste of the rebellion." Search Google for a broader picture; at this writing, about 283,000 pages contain the number with hyphens, and just under 10,000 without hyphens. There's a song. Several domain names including variations of the number have been reserved. Update: 05/02 05:44 GMT by J : New blog post from Kevin Rose of Digg to its users: "We hear you."

Related Stories

[+] Censoring a Number 1046 comments
Rudd-O writes "Months after successful discovery of the HD-DVD processing key, an unprecedented campaign of censorship, in the form of DMCA takedown notices by the MPAA, has hit the Net. For example Spooky Action at a Distance was killed. More disturbingly, my story got Dugg twice, with the second wave hitting 15,500 votes, and today I found out it had simply disappeared from Digg. How long until the long arm of the MPAA gets to my own site (run in Ecuador) and the rest of them holding the processing key? How long will we let rampant censorship go on, in the name of economic interest?" How long before the magic 16-hex-pairs number shows up in a comment here?
[+] EFF and Dvorak Blame the Digg Revolt On Lawyers 262 comments
enharmonix writes "A bit of an update on the recent Digg revolt over AACS. The NYTimes has taken notice and written quite a decent article that actually acknowledges that the take-down notices amount to censorship and documents instances of the infamous key appearing in purely expressive form. I was pleased to see the similarity to 2600 and deCSS was not lost on the Times either. More interesting is that the EFF's Fred von Lohmann blames the digg revolt on lawyers. And in an opinion piece, John Dvorak expands on that theme."
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  • I'd like to say... (Score:5, Funny)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:27PM (#18951023)
    If you're one of the endless little "Slashdot is dead, go to digg" trolls that reply to stories every now & again, I (and the rest of slashdot) would like to say: "Fuck You".

    Your wonderful little Digg isn't looking so wonderful now - is it?

    In comparison to Digg's censorship, slashdot has the hex key as a story tag. [slashdot.org]
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Marcion (876801) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:34PM (#18951091)
      (http://commandline.org.uk/ | Last Journal: Wednesday May 30, @05:49AM)
      All credit to the song, its quite good actually, I am gonna set it as my ringtone I think.

      Who'd have thought, they would use all that Web 2.0 wisdom of the crowds stuff to hide the fact they censor everything.

      kdawson, and the old Taco himself, we salute you.
      [ Parent ]
      • P.S. Digg This by Marcion (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:36PM
        • Re:P.S. Digg This (Score:5, Funny)

          by alex4u2nv (869827) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:05PM (#18951455)
          (http://www.alex4u2nv.net/)
          In order to get Dugg, you must first title your article with "Coolest ... you'll ever see!!!"
          [ Parent ]
          • Re:P.S. Digg This (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Marcion (876801) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:07PM (#18951473)
            (http://commandline.org.uk/ | Last Journal: Wednesday May 30, @05:49AM)
            "The founders of Digg.com - which has been rocked by an unprecedented user revolt over the release of an HD-DVD decryption code - accepted sponsorship from the organization behind HD-DVD last year." hmmm
            [ Parent ]
            • Digg decides to stand up to the MPAA! (Score:4, Informative)

              by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:52AM (#18952649)
              Digg is currently down. This was the top of the page right before it went down.

              http://blog.digg.com/?p=74 [digg.com] [digg.com]?

              Digg This: 09-f9-11-02-9d-74-e3-5b-d8-41-56-c5-63-56-88-c0
              by Kevin Rose at 9pm, May 1st, 2007 in Digg Website

              Today was an insane day. And as the founder of Digg, I just wanted to post my thoughts...

              In building and shaping the site I've always tried to stay as hands on as possible. We've always given site moderation (digging/burying) power to the community. Occasionally we step in to remove stories that violate our terms of use (eg. linking to pornography, illegal downloads, racial hate sites, etc.). So today was a difficult day for us. We had to decide whether to remove stories containing a single code based on a cease and desist declaration. We had to make a call, and in our desire to avoid a scenario where Digg would be interrupted or shut down, we decided to comply and remove the stories with the code.

              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.

              If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying.

              Digg on,

              Kevin
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:P.S. Digg This by EonBlueTooL (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:52AM
              • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
            • Re:P.S. Digg This (Score:5, Interesting)

              "Update: 05/02 05:44 GMT by J : New blog post from Kevin Rose of Digg to its users: "We hear you.""

              From the post:
              "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.

              If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying."

              fuckin 'ey, Kevin!
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:P.S. Digg This by Bastard of Subhumani (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:11AM
            • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
          • Re:P.S. Digg This by norminator (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @11:10AM
          • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
      • 2 replies beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:I'd like to say... by The Woodworker (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:50PM
      • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

        by chebucto (992517) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:00AM (#18952059)
        Yes, but:

        Slashdot is better than digg post-popularity. The only two clear incidents of censorship on slashdot that I remember - the scientology posts that were deleted, and the thread about story moderation - are both quite exceptional; the scientology censorship was done with as much publicity and openeness as could be expected, and the story-moderation censorship was (presumably) done by a now-disbanded and dishonoured editor (Michael Sims, 'Nazi Editor').

        The point being: Slashdot has retained much or all of its independence; it survived the surge of popularity only to be bought up by a - as far as I can tell - benign corporate overlord, losing none of its independence and none of its verve (as much as the latter may seem to be lacking).

        Digg, meanwhile, seems to be a short-lived exercise in user-defined content that has devolved into a juvenile comment squad and an editorship that is apparently willing to practice censorship for the basest of reasons.

        [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Score Whore (32328) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:17AM (#18952253)
          Nope, sorry, the results tantrum over the troll post is still in place. I know because I don't get mod points.
          [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... by bhima (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:56AM
            • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Informative)

              by Opportunist (166417) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:59AM (#18953795)
              I think one has to shut up for a while, I usually get them after a vacation. Never got any mod points, then suddenly after a week of absence, there they were. Maybe as a lure to come back for those that used to post a lot and got fed up with never getting any mod points. :)

              It's been that way since then. Whenever I return from working double shifts to hit a milestone for a week, some mod points were waiting for me.

              (And no, that's no attempt to get you silenced, that's just how it "works" for me)
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:I'd like to say... by KDR_11k (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @07:18AM
            • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
          • Re:I'd like to say... by asninn (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:25AM
          • me, too by Artifex (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:20AM
            • Re:me, too by ConceptJunkie (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:58AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... by pipingguy (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:26AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Interesting)

          by wordsthatendinq (971620) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:02AM (#18952759)
          it's late and i might be saying something really obvious... but i've convinced myself that slashdot is better because it has been around for so long. the user base has mostly been around for very long and is familiar with the system as well as what possibilities exist to exploit and troll it. ie, it is stable and i always know what i'm getting.

          i don't think digg will forever be a forum for immature posts, but it is still young and what we see now may not be its equilibrium state. though, i sure wouldn't mind if its homepage were always as hilarious as it is right now.
          [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Insightful)

            All you have to do is read the tech articles. Back when ZFS was rumored into Mac OS X the comments at slashdot were insightful, intelligent, and informative.

            On the Digg site there was armchair geeks who couldn't find the format command in DOS commenting about it, t'was moronic.

            Digg may be entertaining and 'power to the people' but all it takes is a decent sized group of 'people' and next thing you know you have 911 'truthers' with front page articles.

            Sure they get buried, but then they just submit another one. It's like whack a mole, and there is no real content on Digg.

            What really drives me nuts is the 'make me famous' posts where someone posts a blog entry with 15 words about something huge, and they all go to this blog site first before watching some dumb youtube clip.

            It's a waste of space, but it attracts the yahoos leaving the more intelligent sites alone.
            [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Interesting)

            by Mr. Underbridge (666784) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:46AM (#18955957)

            it's late and i might be saying something really obvious... but i've convinced myself that slashdot is better because it has been around for so long. the user base has mostly been around for very long and is familiar with the system as well as what possibilities exist to exploit and troll it. ie, it is stable and i always know what i'm getting.

            i don't think digg will forever be a forum for immature posts, but it is still young and what we see now may not be its equilibrium state. though, i sure wouldn't mind if its homepage were always as hilarious as it is right now.

            Slashdot was great before the idiot hordes of brainless 15 year olds found it (as opposed to the intelligent 15 year old geeks who belong here). Then it sucked while the morons were around. Now it's great again since they've left for digg.

            I think your premise is correct, that slashdot established enough of a culture and history of people who know what they're talking about that there was something to revert to after it was (thankfully) no longer the flavor of the month. I don't think digg has that. I think once the kiddies roll over to the next big thing, digg doesn't have enough of an essence to sustain it. What is digg without the kiddies? Just the ability to vote on stories? Idol worship of that Kevin guy? Doesn't seem enough to sustain it. Digg was headed down, but it really jumped the shark when it opened itself to non-tech stories.

            I think slashdot owes digg a substantial debt, in that digg took a large number of the morons and made it more than likely that highly moderated posts on slashdot are actually insightful as opposed to insipid.

            [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... by recharged95 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @11:33AM
        • done by a now-disbanded and dishonoured editor (Michael Sims, 'Nazi Editor')
          I'm glad this has finally been brought up, because it's been bugging me -- I never saw an announcement on /. about his departure. I just noticed one day that he hadn't posted any stories in a while. I wondered about whether the Censorware stuff caught up with him finally.

          Google turns up nothing except for obvious fake explanations of what happened involving multiple acts of sodomy and a few members of the Free Software Foundation :/

          Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] doesn't have anything either. Can someone just tell me what the heck happened?
          [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Informative)

            If this is the same editor I'm thinking of, he had a tendancy to add his own malicious commentary, or edit the user submitted part of the article to swing the conversation away from the original intent. This finally caught up with him when he finally crossed the line and he was removed once and for all. This only occured for 2-3 weeks before his termination, so it sounds like there was some stuff going on behind the scenes we'll never know about, and his commentary was just the issue bleeding through on to the front page.
            [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:19AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Funny)

          by thanksforthecrabs (1037698) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:24AM (#18952997)
          A Scientology article was censored? What did the person say -- that Scientology is a looney, brain-washing cult that sucks people of their money? And that the cult's highest-profile member/actor recently married a beard again in an attempt to resurrect his career? I'm not saying that stuff is fact...just asking if it was said. Big diff.
          [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Interesting)

          by shaitand (626655) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:30AM (#18953045)
          (http://www.ganjablogger.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday January 05 2006, @05:36PM)
          Slashdot has better overall content but that is largely because it has been taken over by a different class of trolls. Anyone who reads through Slashdot comments can tell you that there are no if's about it, there are definitely corporate paid propaganda posters from large tech companies.

          Anytime you have negative PR coming to a large tech company (particularly software companies and the larger the more prevelent the problem) there are dozens of posts defending the company in the comments here that could have come right off an official press release.

          If you have ever attended the sales seminars and meetings from these companies you will recognize their material being used both defensively and offensively all over Slashdot. The biggest companies respond to highly moderated negative posts about them even if the story isn't about them. It's pretty clear these companies have full time Slashdotters.

          I once put an intentional grammar error in my sig to catch grammar trolls and forced them into ACdom. Maybe now I should do a similar hunt for corporate shills and list the ones I've found in my journal.

          [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:02AM (#18953267)
            Be careful that you're not simply writing off other people's opinions as propoganda because you don't agree with them. That could make you... eek... a republican.
            [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... by JordanL (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:04AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by TheGreatHegemon (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:21AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Photo_Nut (676334) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:34AM (#18953677)
            There's an obvious explanation for the "corporate trolling" -- my generation which was in college when /. became popular, and we graduated from High School and College. Lots of us got recruited at places like Apple, IBM, MS, etc. It's kinda like, you might be able to tell in general when or how someone got broadband by if they use Friendster vs MSN Spaces vs MySpace vs... Or if they use AOL or Hotmail or GMail or MSN or Yahoo.

            Computer nerds grow up to become corporate shills. Would you rather spend years at an unknown startup or game company, slaving away 24-7 on a product which may not succeed, or would you like an 8+ hour flexible time job with a nice $80K paycheck + benefits? If you had the latter, you might take a little pride in the company paying you, and you might know something that is being misconstrued and want to correct the /. public's interpretation of the FUD that others are spreading. Of course, you might just have the stupid my-company-can-do-no-evil blinders on, too.

            I have friends at places including Adobe, Apple, Amazon, IBM, Google, Microsoft, etc. They all read /., although many have also moved on. In time, the new popular places for geeks to hang out will be overrun with the next generation of corporate shills and OSS zealots. I've been called both by my friends at different points in time. :)
            [ Parent ]
            • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Interesting)

              I more or less agree with you. I don't like being called a corporate shill though. It is more of a fact that people grow up, and gain experience, when they realize when they are working at Adobe, Apple, Amazon, IBM, Google, Microsoft, etc. The realize they are not going to meeting after meeting on how to kill Linux. At best they will go we are competing with Linux they say their strong points are this our week points are this how can we fix that. I myself work for a small firm who does work for a lot of large corporations, but still after working there for 5 years I have learned to tolerate Windows, Embrace Apple, See Problems in Linux, and find OSS isn't all the it is cracked up to be. It happens to most people unless they stay in somewhat isolated sectors such as Government, Education, or Non-Profit (GEN) . But otherwise we can usually tell the kids from the pros by just listening to them, They can still be democrats or liberal, but their views are not as sharp and one sided as it use to be is become more of a normal curve vs. a Uniform block. They in time learn to pick their battles, and over time the slow subtile approach usually wins.

              Over time people realize that the Republican/Consertive view does have merit too, but by working with people with these different views and understanding that they are not the devil and their views are quite rational. Right now GEN are mostly populated with people with the same views so it serves to reinforce their beliefs so you don't get the other side from people you can trust and thus you stay on your side. I actually grew up in a conservative family and over time I have become more liberal, on many things, Computer Liberalism did peak in college but sense calmed down. But in general I am more of a liberal person then I use to be.

              Microsoft doesn't need to me me or anyone to post on a board that their product isn't really that bad anymore, or hey they actually did that part correctly now. or to say I think RMS is too radical for OSS, and disconnected from reality. These are my views from me, I have made them with information I have gained over time, Linking with the values that were taught to me then moderated and manipulated over years of experience, and combining them with Logic to help predict possible. Nor corporate money all the time.
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Funny)

              by Jonny_eh (765306) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:58AM (#18954693)
              He's a shill!! Get him!!!!
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Insightful)

              by Jeff DeMaagd (2015) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:11AM (#18955435)
              (http://www.demaagd.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday October 27 2002, @06:53PM)
              geeks to hang out will be overrun with the next generation of corporate shills and OSS zealots. I've been called both by my friends at different points in time. :)

              That's unfortunate. It is and has been an atmosphere where you get accused of being what you are not, I think it's sad that replies resort to that rather than actually respond properly to a statement.

              I've found that I can't breathe a word against Linux without some sort of venom spat at me, and the same went for saying anything against Apple as a corporation. At times, the same goes with saying Microsoft actually does something right on occasion, in my opinion.

              It's not a good argument, I think it's more an argument based on a tech religion, ideology or insecurity than anything resembling a good argument.
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:I'd like to say... by typicallyterrific (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @11:44AM
            • To each one his own. by jotaeleemeese (Score:2) Thursday May 03 2007, @09:02AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Funny)

            by iogan (943605) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:04AM (#18954061)
            (http://annonsbevakaren.com/)
            If any of you (corporate shills) are reading, let me know if there's a job opening sometime... since all I do is read slashdot all day I might as well get paid.
            [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

            by Ed Avis (5917) <ed@membled.com> on Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:26AM (#18954125)
            (http://membled.com/)

            Anyone who reads through Slashdot comments can tell you that there are no if's about it, there are definitely corporate paid propaganda posters from large tech companies.
            Care to give some examples?
            [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... by Dan East (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:16AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by kjart (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:30AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by snero3 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:40AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by WhatAmIDoingHere (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @07:02AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by toleraen (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:48AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by elrous0 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:48AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by Blakey Rat (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:45AM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by shaitand (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:27PM
          • Re:I'd like to say... by My name is Bucket (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:46PM
          • 3 replies beneath your current threshold.
        • Re:I'd like to say... by StrahdVZ (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:31AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:56AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:05AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by Tim C (15259) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:40AM (#18954197)
          and the story-moderation censorship was (presumably) done by a now-disbanded and dishonoured editor (Michael Sims, 'Nazi Editor').

          And yet, some of us still appear to be banned from moderation, presumably because of that thread. I don't remember modding it, and I don't remember commenting on it (although I may have), but I certainly read it.

          I've not been able to moderate since. It was a good couple of years before I could even meta-mod; going to metamod.pl directly (I didn't get the link on the front page) gave me a curt "you're not allowed to do this" message.

          It may just be a coincidence, but with a 5-digit UID account that hit the karma cap back when karma was a number rather than a textual description and stayed there I can't see what other crime I could have committed.

          (And no, I've never bothered to ask; to be honest, I don't really care. I just thought I'd point out that while the editor responsible may well have been let go, the fallout still exists)
          [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... by RyuuzakiTetsuya (Score:2) Monday May 07 2007, @08:15AM
        • 2 replies beneath your current threshold.
      • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Informative)

        by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:17AM (#18952251)

        I also gave Digg a try when it first came out, and what ruined it for me was the obvious lack of maturity. For example, right now the front page of Digg is completely full of "OMFGZ!!111! DIGG PWNED" articles.

        The lack of maturity also lets a lot of articles that aren't really interesting get to the front page. What's "new" or interesting for a 13 year old isn't usually new or interesting for everyone else.

        To make it worse, when I tried it again a few months ago they had modified the comment moderation system a bit, and people who went against the group-think were heavily modded down, regardless of if they were correct. On Digg you can say "The sky is blue", link to pictures, and have a dozen references, and still get modded down if the "group" says the sky is green.

        It's like all the bad of Slashdot, but an order of magnitude worse. All for the slight possibility of seeing a rare interesting article before it reaches Slashdot. No thanks.

        [ Parent ]
      • Re:I'd like to say... by werdnapk (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:59AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by EcoLovingGuy (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:59AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by barl0w2 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:49AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by lowrydr310 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:01AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by drix (4602) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:13AM (#18952889)
        (http://slashdot.org/)
        You know, this is not the first time I have heard someone say something to the effect of, "do whatever you want in your bedroom, but you'd better not suck someone's cock on my lawn/porch/dinner table/cul-de-sac." Who are these gay suburban exhibitionists you people are so afraid of? The only time I ever saw open air fellatio was at the Folsom Street Fair, and that's, well, not a typical setting. I have a bunch of gay friends, and they are all a lot more conservative than, say, the 200 sorority whores I dormed with freshmen year. So just come off it.

        As for the pot thing, maybe it's because I lot of people like to smoke pot? (I do.) Consider yourself in the boring, prudish minority on this one, bro. "Do dope and cook your brain" sounds like something my grandfather would say. Not the one who's still alive. The one who died 20 years ago. When he was 90. What is your hangup? It's not as if the smoke is coming through the monitor screen or something.
        [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... by DamonHD (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:44AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Funny)

          by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:23AM (#18953639)
          i for one am sick of these heterosexuals pushing their lifestyle in everyone's face. Pictures of their "husband" or "wife" on their desk at work where everyone has to see it, constantly mentioning mentioning them to co-workers when talking during lunch breaks, even bringing in not just photos but the actual CHILDREN that are the consequence of their heterosexual activities.

          Look, it's your business if for some reason you have no self-control and find it necessary to put your private parts into the private parts of a member of the opposite sex... it's none of my business if for some strange reason you find it necessaary to do that... but keep it and the infant results of your "lifestyle choice" hidden at home and stop being so blatant about it.

          [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... by Aceticon (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:31AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... by nutshell42 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:58AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... by Acer500 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:45PM
        • Sorry to rain in your pot induced parade. by jotaeleemeese (Score:2) Thursday May 03 2007, @09:11AM
        • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
      • Re:I'd like to say... by monkease (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:21AM
      • by Ralph Spoilsport (673134) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:33AM (#18953067)
        (Last Journal: Monday July 12 2004, @09:38PM)
        how the parent achieved +5 insightful is beyond me.

        Don't like gay PDA? Well, imagine how some gays feel about hetero PDA. (I'm straight, for the record). Don't like Pro-420 articles? Well, simple fact is pot never killed anyone - you pass out before you can overdose. But every years thousands of people die from ingesting perfectly legal liquor. Don't like people tweaking the corporate plutocracy by posting crypto keys? Well, then just roll over and let the corporations tel you what to think. Lord knows it's easier than doing it yourself. You're a Troll. A Class A Troll, and I am appalled that you've been modded so well. And when you get your knickers all bunched up, please think twice before posting like that - although, once would be a grand improvement.

        RS

        [ Parent ]
      • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:57AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:00AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:10AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by iminplaya (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:20AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by iminplaya (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:24AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by fyngyrz (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:35PM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Sancho (17056) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:10PM (#18951505)
      (http://127.0.0.1/)
      It's pretty crappy, because according to the DMCA, they only have to take down content which they are specifically notified of. There's no way that the MPAA is keeping up with the storm on Digg, so it's got to be the admins being proactive. When you start censoring, you start losing some of the protections that the DMCA affords you. I doubt this will be the end of Digg, but if the MPAA got ballsy enough, they might try to shut the site down, since it's clearly impossible to keep all that user-submitted content off of the front page.
      [ Parent ]
    • by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:10PM (#18951507)
      I'll agree the Digg community took a hit today, but only because it shows the mentality of its users. These are the same people that believe internet petitions actually do something.
      [ Parent ]
      • SLASHDOT RULEZZ! (Score:4, Funny)

        by PeterHammer (612517) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:23AM (#18952295)
        Long Live /.
        [ Parent ]
      • If I was 12yo right now ... by weighn (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:40AM
      • Re:Five thousand 12-year-olds throw a temper tantr by Irish_Samurai (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:42AM
      • by Nogami_Saeko (466595) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:55AM (#18952687)
        Well, Kevin Rose just pulled the plug on Digg (at least in a temporary sense).

        Today was an insane day. And as the founder of Digg, I just wanted to post my thoughts...

        In building and shaping the site I've always tried to stay as hands on as possible. We've always given site moderation (digging/burying) power to the community. Occasionally we step in to remove stories that violate our terms of use (eg. linking to pornography, illegal downloads, racial hate sites, etc.). So today was a difficult day for us. We had to decide whether to remove stories containing a single code based on a cease and desist declaration. We had to make a call, and in our desire to avoid a scenario where Digg would be interrupted or shut down, we decided to comply and remove the stories with the code.

        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.

        If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying.

        Digg on,

        Kevin


        I feel bad for Kevin - I don't believe that anyone legitimately upset by this whole situation wants Digg to die. Unfortunately the moderators made a number of bad decisions that only made things worse. Perhaps they should've allowed one story on the topic and had everyone comment there. Keep that page up until they have a legitimate, hand delivered paper DMCA takedown request. Then users' anger would be focused where it really belongs (read MPAA).

        With the moderators banning accounts and deleting posts, they took entirely the wrong approach, and are now suffering the consequences. Sadly, this may be a very, very hard lesson for Kevin / Digg.

        When you create a social networking/commenting site, knowingly or not, you put yourself at the mercy of a large number of people who can be extremely volatile. Not a whole lot of difference between that and a good, old-fashioned mob of real people.

        Here's hoping some good can come out of this whole unfortunate situation...

        N.
        [ Parent ]
      • And Digg capitulates to diggers' pressure by Sir Codelot (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:59AM
      • Re:Five thousand 12-year-olds throw a temper tantr by Fengpost (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:05AM
    • Fark's response... (Score:4, Interesting)

      Fark is actively censoring as well... recent headlines on redlit discussions: Don't bother submitting the HD-DVD passcode. It's against the FarQ, isn't going to be greenlit, and is against the law. Don't like it? Vote and OMG Admins just DELETED a post on Fark that contained a blatent violation of the FarQ and could have legal ramifications for a privately owned website. CENSORSHIP NDIT LGT GIS for "Whiny biatch"
      [ Parent ]
    • Re:I'd like to say... by absinthminded64 (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:24PM
    • Well, this is just great! Thanks a lot guys! We thought we'd give this a fair run, see how things went, etc. I think we've been fair, very patient, but after the stunts pulled today I'm afraid we've spoken to our lawyers and we have to pull the plug. You only have yourselves to blame. Thanks for helping us test the system. So long.

      - Al Gore

      +++AH*$*&*^!NA(*$&!(HDSF....[ NO CARRIER ]
      [ Parent ]
    • comments and everything locked by ganjadude (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:27PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Cylix (55374) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:45PM (#18951899)
      (http://www.notacult.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday March 07 2002, @11:05AM)
      In the spirit of a new fad...

      Where is your digg now?

      [ Parent ]
    • Re:I'd like to say... by OniAnubis (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:47PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by endersshadow7 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:48PM
    • Being a part of something... by aerojad (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:01AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by symbolic (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:09AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Ilgaz (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:15AM
    • by Sloppy (14984) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:16AM (#18952237)
      (http://www.biglumber.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday September 18, @12:25PM)
      One of the things I like about Slashdot is how they handled the Cult of Scientology thing. Slashdot complied with style. [slashdot.org] Cowards [digg.com], by contrast, have no style.
      [ Parent ]
    • Re:I'd like to say... by .Chndru (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:37AM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Serveert (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:41AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by reybrujo (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:43AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by bgog (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:43AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Mr. Flibble (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:45AM
    • This just in... by RyanFenton (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:48AM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • It seems Digg has had a meltdown... by zeekiorage (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:48AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Kuvter (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:56AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by bonehead (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:02AM
    • Slashdot Republic by keyrat rafa (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:03AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Seumas (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:04AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by vertigoCiel (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:14AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by thecapuch1n (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:25AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by espamo (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:57AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by 91degrees (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:59AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by jerkface.us (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:11AM
    • DRUDGEREPORT! by Seumas (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:23AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Frozen Void (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:25AM
    • Such indiggnation !!!!!!!!! by ptr2004 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:05AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by mosch (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @09:16AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Overly Critical Guy (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:43AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Monsuco (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @11:16AM
    • So he tries to obey the law and gets this? by Banner (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:06PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Funny)

      by Marcion (876801) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:52PM (#18951319)
      (http://commandline.org.uk/ | Last Journal: Wednesday May 30, @05:49AM)
      Hello, I can fix it for you. At the back of the computer, there is a socket called the Ethernet socket, pull the wire out and go sit it a dark room. Everything will be fine.
      [ Parent ]
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Checkmait (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:26PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:29PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by bjd145 (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:31PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:35PM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by geminidomino (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:27AM
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

          by geminidomino (614729) * on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:52AM (#18952639)
          (http://www.mangaschool.com/ | Last Journal: Tuesday January 03 2006, @07:51AM)
          No, "cyber-terrorism" is not terrorism. It's a politico-speak term coined as part of a power-grab to rationalize more invasive methods of investigating internet-based crimes.

          In fact, calling it a DDOS is disingenuous at best. Digg's entire concept is centered around user-posted content. The problem they have now is that their users are at odds with thier corporate overlords, and they picked thier side. It's not a DDOS. At worst, it's teenage "information wants to be free" mob-wankery. Digg invited this conflict with thier business model. Hardly an "innocent bystander."

          Just about the only thing you got right is that they are accomplishing nothing, but the rest of your mealy-mouthed double-speak is pure bullshit.
          [ Parent ]
        • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Insightful)

          by IgnoramusMaximus (692000) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:04AM (#18952787)

          Digg is an innocent, law abiding bystander, and the attackers are the twits. They are accomplishing nothing.

          Actually, in this case, the breakdown is more like: 1) the "Intellectual Property" laws are certifiably and demonstrably insane, 2) greedmongering abusers of the said laws demand that digg becomes their henchman-by-proxy, 3) digg complies, 4) users revolt, 5) now digg capitulates and suddenly is about to fight its would be master.

          So digg was not an "innocent, law abiding bystander" anymore then some guards at Abu Ghraib were "just following lawful orders" (an extreme case of the same principle). Furthermore the "attackers" managed to beat digg into growing a pair and fighting against some of the "intellectual property" scam, thus standing up for what its owners were posturing to be all about, ergo the "twit attackers" accomplished quite a bit, it would seem to me.

          [ Parent ]
          • Re:I'd like to say... by catmistake (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:14AM
            • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

              by IgnoramusMaximus (692000) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:33AM (#18953061)

              Wow, you must really be pissed at Digg.

              Hypocritical stances do piss me off.

              Digg has no power. Its possible they could have "grown" some and legally fought against the litigation when it comes... but... they're a business, not some moral heroes or some cult religion. They are a business. They want to make money, not lose it in $500/hr increments.

              The problem is that digg tried to be a business based on certain ethos. You can't have it both ways, to project "radical", "anti-estabilishment" etc image to create your business and then fold like a cheap suit as soon as your revenue is threatened by one of the very members of the "estabilishment" and then expect that your audience wont notice.

              So this pathetic "But we only tried to make moneeeeey! Waaah! We said all those things to make money! We meant none of it! Mommy! They are trying to take away my moneeeey! Waaah!" excuse is likely to achieve the flight properties of a ton of bricks with their audience.

              [ Parent ]
        • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:I'd like to say... by timmarhy (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:38PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:39PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by CokoBWare (584686) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:40PM (#18951841)
      (http://www.siteofchampions.com/)
      I can't stand it when people throw the "terrorist" label around. No matter what the cause, IMHO it's irresponsible. Period. When bombs start going off, then we can start looking at terrorism as a possible motive. Otherwise, forget it.

      Let's all refrain from over hyping this more than it needs to be...
      [ Parent ]
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Werkhaus (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:55PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:5, Insightful)

      by thegnu (557446) <thegnu@gmail. c o m> on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:00AM (#18952053)
      (Last Journal: Friday December 05 2003, @03:51PM)
      I'm the last one to defend the MPAA, but the only reason for sharing this number is so that cheapskates can get free movies. Right?

      Not quite. The issue is wrapped up in the temper tantrum the RIAA and MPAA have been throwing for several years now that their distribution model is getting messed up. They have always used strong-arm tactics to manufacture a monopoly in a genre that is replete with passion and creativity--I'm talking about art. Of course, the MPAA and the RIAA don't protect the artist, or protect the consumer. They protect the BUSINESS MODEL. Their argument that if people copy media, it makes it harder to get media, has collapsed in the past few years, and they've started randomly suing people.

      In fact, look into how much music we would never get to hear but for the industrious hobbyists and fanatics keeping the original vinyls of their favorite music in pristine condition. There are tons of classic recordings that record labels are sitting on, and if I were any one of those dead artists, I would rise up from my grave and unleash my motherfucking zombie face on those cocksuckers. It's unfair.

      So, to the conclusion. The encryption keeps people from making backups of their movies. HD-DVDs are not archival quality, I'm betting, and I WILL NOT replace my fucking media at a "reasonable price" (retail, according to the MPAA and RIAA). When you share information that has a fair use, and you get threatened with legal action by a corporate behemoth, sometimes people rise up and defend you. If reason, logic, pleading, conscience, legal action, and appealing to their better nature have failed, why not try the million flies in the ointment method?

      Oh, but if you copy an album, the artist doesn't get his 80 cents.

      PS: It still fucks me off that the RIAA is trying to claim ownership of the fucking royalties to my music. Really.
      [ Parent ]
      • Re:I'd like to say... by 280Z28 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:47AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Interesting)

        by Technician (215283) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:21AM (#18955607)
        The encryption keeps people from making backups of their movies.

        HD movies are a replacement for DVD movies. There is a propoganda site explaining copy protection on movies. They claim there is no need for back-up copies as with reasonable care DVD's will last forever.

        www.copyprotected.com

        Reasonable care and children never mixed.
        In both sofware and movies, it's the high usage childrens content that is either broken, missing, or otherwise unplayable. The industry in all their wisdom do not have an exchange program for maltreated shiny discs. With kids, backups and working copies are essential.

        Other than the dream of perfectly locked down content with HD, the industry on the other side of their face are admiting that users want to put their purchased movies on their cell phone, media server, PDA, iPod, Zen Vision, etc. just like they want to do with their music.

        The major fear of course is the nth copy of the first copy is exactly the same down to the last bit. With video tape and analog cassette copies, each generation of a copy of a copy degrades adding all the defects of noise, dropouts, loss of fideliety, AGC compression, etc so they tolorated LP's copied onto tape to use in your walkman and car stereo.

        With the advent of perfect copies of copies, they are desprate to lock down the ability to make the first copyable digital copy. This of course is anti-consumer who is used to making back-up copies of valuable data to prevent loss. To get back-up copies, working copies are naturaly shared.

        Notice how nobody bothers making a tape to tape copy of a $5.00 VHS movie? (disregarding Macrovision) When the same moves were $65 and blank VHS tapes were $20 each, piracy was a big problem. (admiting my age, these were a large part of my library) Video stabelizers were the norm to bypass Magnaguard and early Macrovision. The industry needs to get a clue. Nobody takes the time to photocopy a 35 cent daily newspaper to back it up. A $30 movie on the other hand is considered worth backing up.

        SONY recently adding more copy protection to their recent DVD's has put me on the ex-consumer list. Until they permanently change their ways, they have lost me.

        To their credit, they are sending me a replacement for my DRM'ed copy of Open Season. Hopefully I will be able to install it on my media server for the kids. Acidrip wouldn't even recognise the disk.

        If all HD moves were released with retail prices under $6 each, piracy wouldn't be much of a problem. It's less hasle to just go out and pick up a copy.

        Here is a clue to increase sales;
        1 DROP DRM
        2 DROP PRICES
        3 RAISE VALUE
        4 Enjoy increased volume.

        Since they have all of the first 3 wrong, 4 is going the wrong way. Raising quality is only part of raising value. Making it unplayable on many of my systems including media server is a reduction in value. They are walking a tightrope. The RIAA is keeping volume down by dropping DRM and offsetting the potential to raise volume by raising prices. Just how stupid is that? Are they trying to keep volume down?

        Hint Cluestick time. Want to increase volume at current prices? DROP DRM, raise quality. Leave the price alone or lower it.

        I think the RIAA has enough money. If they didn't, they would do someting that made economic sense instead of trying to game the system.
        [ Parent ]
      • Re:I'd like to say... by just_another_sean (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @09:09AM
      • Re:I'd like to say... by Frank T. Lofaro Jr. (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @11:07AM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:I'd like to say... (Score:4, Informative)

      by JudasBlue (409332) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:02AM (#18952079)

      I'm the last one to defend the MPAA, but the only reason for sharing this number is so that cheapskates can get free movies. Right?
      Or use your legally purchased DVD's on your homebrew video server maybe? Or back them up?

      idjit.

      [ Parent ]
    • Re:I'd like to say... by cheater512 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:18AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by DarkVader (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:46AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Fordiman (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:22AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Thexare Blademoon (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:41AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by inode_buddha (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:50AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by VON-MAN (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:06AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by iainl (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:12AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Frodrick (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:55AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by Blakey Rat (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:30AM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by WilliamSChips (Score:2) Thursday May 03 2007, @02:58PM
    • Re:I'd like to say... by WilliamSChips (Score:2) Thursday May 03 2007, @03:10PM
    • 15 replies beneath your current threshold.
  • Was this duped on purpose? by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:27PM
    • Re:Was this duped on purpose? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by leonbev (111395) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:37PM (#18951131)
      It's only a partial dupe... The first story was about the HD DVD key getting censored on certain sites, and the second story was about Digg's front page getting trashed because they were one of the sites who was censoring it.

      Slashdot deserves a big thumbs-up from the tech community for NOT being one of those sites!
      [ Parent ]
    • Regarding Kevin Rose's response (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Xiroth (917768) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:13AM (#18952901)
      From Rose's most recent blog post:

      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.

      To be honest, I'd say he's missed the point. The primary reason that his readers aren't unhappy isn't because of his team's moderating of the HD DVD code; at least, not directly. They're unhappy because the stories were taken down without explanation, users were apparently banned for simply doing what one is supposed to do on the site, and generally gave the impression that he had sided with them over us, which is never going to go down well.

      If he'd just been more up-front and honest about what was going on, things would have gone much more smoothly. Sure, there would have been grumbling and a few irrepressible rebels would have posted the stuff anyway, but I seriously doubt that the reader base would have caught fire like it did. The biggest issue, IMO, was that it gave the impression (if not the reality) of a breach of trust, and trust is possibly the key thing to have in any sort of community.
      [ Parent ]
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • So..... by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:28PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Credibility (Score:5, Insightful)

    Digg took a big hit to their credibility today. They underestimated the outrage caused by the banning of users and removal of stories. Perhaps they'll learn that the site is made by the users. Without diggers, there is no digg.
    • Re:Credibility by dunezone (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:42PM
    • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Insightful)

      by Marcion (876801) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:43PM (#18951201)
      (http://commandline.org.uk/ | Last Journal: Wednesday May 30, @05:49AM)
      "Our goal is always to maintain a purely democratic system for the submission and sharing of information" ... " the posting of the encryption key infringes their intellectual property rights. In order to respect these rights" ... "we have removed postings of the key that have been brought to our attention." - Digg

      '"intellectual property" - The distorting and confusing term did not arise by accident. Companies that gain from the confusion promoted it... eject the narrow perspectives and simplistic picture the term "intellectual property" suggests. Consider each of these issues separately, in its fullness, and you have a chance of considering them well.' -- RMS

      [ Parent ]
      • Re:Credibility by at_slashdot (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:46PM
        • Re:Credibility by Marcion (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:58PM
          • Re:Credibility by at_slashdot (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:08PM
            • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Informative)

              by cpt kangarooski (3773) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:26AM (#18952309)
              (http://slashdot.org/)
              Also, if MPAA claims a circumvention of a protection measure what does have to do with people posting a number on any site they didn't circumvent anything and that number is not copyrighted (and probably can't be copyrighted) what do I infringe if I post the number here?

              You infringe nothing, and the copyrightability of the key is irrelevant. Frankly, a discussion about circumvention has nearly nothing to do with copyright; ignore copyrights, and infringements, exceptions and defenses that go with copyrights. Circumvention is basically sui generis.

              17 USC 1201(a)(2)-(3) says this:

              (2) No person shall manufacture, import, offer to the public, provide, or otherwise traffic in any technology, product, service, device, component, or part thereof, that--
              (A) is primarily designed or produced for the purpose of circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title;
              (B) has only limited commercially significant purpose or use other than to circumvent a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title; or
              (C) is marketed by that person or another acting in concert with that person with that person's knowledge for use in circumventing a technological measure that effectively controls access to a work protected under this title.

              (3) As used in this subsection--
              (A) to "circumvent a technological measure" means to descramble a scrambled work, to decrypt an encrypted work, or otherwise to avoid, bypass, remove, deactivate, or impair a technological measure, without the authority of the copyright owner; and
              (B) a technological measure "effectively controls access to a work" if the measure, in the ordinary course of its operation, requires the application of information, or a process or a treatment, with the authority of the copyright owner, to gain access to the work.


              The key, in this context, is a part of a device which likely falls under 1201(a)(2)(C) if not (A) and (B) as well. Disseminating the key is unlawful, apart from its use. It's not an infringement, but it's still illegal. The particular offense would be called trafficking.
              [ Parent ]
            • Re:Credibility by jlarocco (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:40AM
            • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
          • Re:Credibility by Eivind (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:46AM
        • Re:Credibility by omeomi (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:00PM
      • Re:Credibility by BlackEmperor (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:34AM
      • Re:Credibility by drgonzo59 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:15AM
    • Re:Credibility by AoT (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:43PM
      • Re:Credibility by syrinx (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:21PM
        • Re:Credibility by Vaticus (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:05AM
        • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
      • Re:Credibility by AoT (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:29PM
        • Re:Credibility by Blakey Rat (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:40PM
        • I think the answer is staring you in the face: as a nation, the U.S. imports a lot of physical goods, but exports a lot of intellectual property. Therefore, we reward companies who chisel their foreign suppliers into squeezing their employees, because this results in cheap imports here in the States. Likewise, we punish IP 'theft,' because IP is one of the last things that we seem to be able to produce and sell.

          Now, I'm no fan of the DMCA, because I think it causes more damage and economic loss, here in the U.S., than it can or will ever possibly create in new IP-export revenue. But the logic driving it, when you separate it from the implementation, isn't that hard to understand, at least from a certain point of view. Allow me to illustrate how I think many people see the problem:

          When we set aside irrational feelings of American exceptionalism -- those warm feelings that politicians always play to, when they talk about the "American worker" being the "best in the world" as if it was self-evident -- it is not immediately clear exactly how our previous success over the past century [1], necessarily translates into continued success in the future. In short, although everyone likes to say reassuring things like "Americans have always been at the forefront of innovation!", those words ring pretty hollow -- it's not clear why we would continue to be. We're not smarter than everyone else, our education system basically sucks, and we have a culture that's increasingly anti-intellectual and in some cases bordering on non-secular.

          What this boils down to is: in a fully globalized economy, it's not clear what areas the U.S. will have a comparative advantage in. We'll probably always be able to export some agricultural products, but agricultural products do not a first-world civilization pay for. Same with natural resources like coal and timber but we'll need them here eventually, so we'd just be selling ourselves down the river. So what do you have left, when you've outsourced everything that can be outsourced to lower-cost second- and third-world areas? I think Neal Stephenson was onto something: music, movies, microcode, and pizza delivery.

          'Pizza delivery' is the remaining service-sector crap that can't be outsourced. Music and movies are 'cultural exports,' things that for whatever reason, have a certain cachet in the rest of the world, and so don't really fall victim to direct price competition with foreign competitors. And microcode [1A] -- even if we're not the best at that, either, we'll use our monopoly to milk the rest of the world pretty good for as long as we can. But we can only do that if we can get them to buy into the legal framework which lets you sell IP as if it were physical goods. Hence, the DMCA and other 'strong IP' laws.

          All of this is just my rather long-winded way of trying to explain why so many people (people in government in particular) are hooked on strong IP law (including the DMCA, DRM, and anti-circumvention), and proprietary software: they see it as a way to ensure that the U.S. can still make money doing the only thing that we seem to be good at. It may not seem at first glance to make a whole lot of sense, particularly to non-Americans, but I've met a lot of fairly powerful people who are very, very nervous about where the New/Global Economy is headed, and how the U.S. is going to maintain its standard of living [2] in the future. If you're looking for a near-magic solution, which you are if you're a politician, grabbing onto intellectual property as the salvation of high-cost Western society probably isn't the stupidest thing you'll do all day.

          [1] Much of which is attributable to having had the good luck not to get involved in any home-turf land wars (like Europe, which got flattened, some of it twice) and getting on board the capitalism bus early (unlike Asia, which is just coming around to this whole market-economy business).

          [1A] I'm using "microcode" here to represent basically all IP-derived exports, which includes most pharmaceuti
          [ Parent ]
      • Re:Credibility by geekoid (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:52PM
      • Re:Credibility by Mr2001 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:58PM
      • Re:Credibility by Frying Ferret (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:02AM
      • Re:Credibility by IgnoramusMaximus (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:07AM
      • Re:Credibility by dsanfte (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:10AM
      • Re:Credibility by McFadden (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:29AM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:Credibility by ralphthemagician (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:45PM
    • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Funny)

      Raise your hand if you are surprised.

      Digg is a website that is only as good as the users that contribute to it. Its user base is a bunch of people that... well... lets face it, watch Diggnation.

      I rest my case.
      [ Parent ]
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Insightful)

      by ZachPruckowski (918562) <zachary.pruckowski@gmail.com> on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:49PM (#18951273)
      This just proves that the journey is as important as the destination. Both digg and slashdot will ultimately have to remove most of the instances of the number eventually, but digg is doing it in secret. Ultimately, slashdot will get a DMCA notice, and can chose whether or not to fight it. If they do what they did last time [slashdot.org], then they'll come out as heroes. If the comments disappear in the dead of night and people notice, they'll get attacked.
      [ Parent ]
      • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Informative)

        by russotto (537200) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:59PM (#18951395)
        If Slashdot gets a DMCA section 512 notice, they can probably safely trash it. The number isn't copyrightable; it's not a creative work. More likely they'll get a C&D accusing them of violating DMCA 1201 (17 USC 1201(a)(2) and 17 USC 1201(b)(1) ). Then it's the 2600 case all over again -- and DVDCCA won that one.
        [ Parent ]
        • Re:Credibility by ZachPruckowski (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:09PM
        • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Interesting)

          by Breakfast Pants (323698) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:30PM (#18951729)
          (Last Journal: Wednesday October 16 2002, @01:31AM)
          Informative? You are mistakenly thinking the DMCA can only be used to send takedowns for copyrighted material--most people at the time of the DeCSS hubub had no problem with that provision. The problem most people had, and have, with it is that the DMCA also says that notices may also be sent to take down things whose primary purpose is to circumvent digital copyright protection schemes (the DeCSS program was the first high profile thing to be taken down-- *it* wasn't copyrighted by the people taking it down, just like this number isn't). The argument under the law will not be whether this key is copyrighted, it will be whether posting it is posting a circumventing device.
          [ Parent ]
          • Re:Credibility by cpt kangarooski (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:19AM
          • Re:Credibility by eclectro (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:06AM
            • Re:Credibility by Breakfast Pants (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:37PM
          • 2 replies beneath your current threshold.
        • Re:Credibility by cpt kangarooski (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:14AM
        • Re:Credibility by underwhelm (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:16AM
      • Re:Credibility by aichpvee (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:20PM
      • Re:Credibility by DarthSabbath (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:09AM
    • Re:Credibility by MrLint (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:24PM
    • Re:Credibility by sik0fewl (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:51AM
    • Re:Credibility by iminplaya (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:54AM
    • Re:Credibility by at_slashdot (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:44PM
    • Re:Credibility by cbreaker (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:45PM
      • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Insightful)

        by vanyel (28049) * on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:01PM (#18951423)
        (Last Journal: Thursday August 28 2003, @02:54PM)
        Does Digg have corporate deep pockets willing to take the chance? They're in a no-win situation: risk being destroyed legally and/or financially, or be destroyed by idiots who don't have to make essentially life or death decisions about their creation. Idiots who would rather destroy and vandalize than do something productive like spread the number around in the less conspicuous nooks and crannies of the internet where it has a chance to get embedded in the depths of search engine caches and archives before it can be discovered and taken down. Or for that matter, on remote web sites out of reach of US et al lawyers.

        As though the number actually mattered anyhow. The only people who will use it don't need it posted.
        [ Parent ]
        • Digg killing Digg by SuperKendall (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:41PM
        • Re:Credibility (Score:5, Insightful)

          by klingens (147173) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:02AM (#18952077)

          They're in a no-win situation: risk being destroyed legally and/or financially, or be destroyed by idiots who don't have to make essentially life or death decisions about their creation.


          That's wrong. when the first key appeared they could have simply let it stand. Then if/when the CCA comes with a C&D, they do what other websites in such trouble before them have done: they take the offending postings down, notify the users who wrote the postings directly. And most importantly put a big article on the frontpage "The evil MPAA censored us!". They look out as persecuted heroes to their community while complying with the law.

          This is not rocket science: slashdot did it, google did it. Lots of well publicized cases for this approach. No court case, no lawyer fees.

          Instead, to salvage their business relationship with the HDDVD consortium, they did the worst possible thing and silently deleted the posting and even the user!

          Only THEN the backlash started with tons of submissions with the forbidden number to point out digg's shameful behaviour in dealing with the problem.
          [ Parent ]
        • Re:Credibility by cheater512 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:46AM
        • Re:Credibility by exiquio (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:11AM
        • Re:Credibility by jdavidb (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:47AM
        • Re:Credibility by Tweekster (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @11:48PM
    • 3 replies beneath your current threshold.
  • Ah, how timely (Score:5, Insightful)

    The fortune cookie at the bottom of the page reads -

    "Anyone attempting to generate random numbers by deterministic means is, of course, living in a state of sin." -- John Von Neumann

    Indeed.
  • Overreaction by elysiuan (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:33PM
  • Toothpaste.. (Score:5, Funny)

    by craznar (710808) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:33PM (#18951071)
    (http://www.craznar.com/)
    The harder you sqeeze, the more comes out.

    MPAA Lesson of the day.

    00110000001110010100011000111001001100010011000100 11000000110010001110010100010000110111001101000100 01010011001100110101010000100100010000111000001101 00001100010011010100110110010000110011010100110110 00110011001101010011011000111000001110000100001100 11000000100000
  • It's funny by gcnaddict (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:33PM
  • Just so you know (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:34PM (#18951087)
    09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
  • Poor Digg by had3l (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:34PM
    • Re:Poor Digg by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:14PM
  • Frickin' Hilarious by Lije Baley (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:35PM
  • by cioxx (456323) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:35PM (#18951103)
    (http://www.microsoft.com/)
    Since its inception Digg had a community-driven submission and voting process which did not supress free speech. I've seen endless stories and links to torrent sites like piratebay, demonoid, bitme, et al. and Digg management turned a blind eye on directing users to places of "copyright infringement"

    Today it's different for some reason. One of the managers posted a justification on the official blog [digg.com]:

    Whether you agree or disagree with the policies of the intellectual property holders and consortiums, in order for Digg to survive, it must abide by the law. Diggs Terms of Use, and the terms of use of most popular sites, are required by law to include policies against the infringement of intellectual property.


    Funny stuff.
  • This saddens me by 00squirrel (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:35PM
  • You can't ban a number. Period. (Score:5, Insightful)

    by at_slashdot (674436) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:36PM (#18951115)
    Title says all ;-)
  • Digg is a piece of shit (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:36PM (#18951119)
    Notwithstanding the fact that most articles are either innacurate or stupid, they will IP ban anyone who says anything bad about their site. Digg is one step up from "myspace"

    Also, you can get a perm ban from digg if you use the star of david as your "digg icon"... no kidding!
  • Honestly curious... (Score:5, Interesting)

    by ParadoxDruid (602583) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:37PM (#18951127)
    (http://www.paradoxdruid.com/)

    Digg actually posted a reply to the community on their blog here [digg.com].

    What I'm honestly curious about is this: Is this numeric string code copyrighted? Where is the copyright filed, if so? Or is it a trade secret? Do trade secrets need to be filed or declared somehow? Is a trade secret intellectual property that must be removed when a theatening (maybe DMCA) notice is sent?

    I'm nowhere near understanding the complexities of the current intellectual property legal codes in the USA, let alone how they actually apply in this situation. All I see is hysteria.

    • Re:Honestly curious... by endx7 (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:54PM
      • Re:Honestly curious... (Score:4, Insightful)

        by Sam Ritchie (842532) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:25PM (#18951651)

        What GP was referring to was this quote:

        owners of this intellectual property ... believe the posting of the encryption key infringes their intellectual property rights."

        I think it's a valid question - are the HD-DVD group claiming that they own copyright on this number, or is the number somehow registered as a trade secret? Certainly I can understand how linking to a code listing of a program designed to circumvent copy protection is illegal in some jurisdictions (though I would still question whether it constitutes IP infringement), but posting the number? It's akin to me issuing takedown notices for sites containing the word 'boobies'*, because that's what I use as a password to protect my files against unauthorised copying.

        * Not my real password.

        [ Parent ]
      • It's a number, not "technology" (Score:4, Interesting)

        by whoever57 (658626) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:39PM (#18951827)
        (Last Journal: Thursday September 30 2004, @01:33AM)
        It may come down to how much /. wants to challenge any possible action by the HD-DVD association. Clearly, it's not copyrightable, so the only question is whether a pure number can fall under the anti-circumvention clauses of the the DMCA. Using your quote above, it's not "technology", it's not a device. Does it qualify? Probably it will take a trial to determine that.
        [ Parent ]
    • Re:Honestly curious... by SPYvSPY (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:55PM
    • Re:Honestly curious... by NeutronCowboy (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:58PM
    • Re:Honestly curious... by Dun Malg (Score:3) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:05PM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:Honestly curious... (Score:5, Informative)

      by SpectreHiro (961765) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:06PM (#18951463)

      What I'm honestly curious about is this: Is this numeric string code copyrighted? Where is the copyright filed, if so?

      Standard Disclaimer: IANAL -- By United States Copyright law, and I believe the laws of all signees of the Berne Convention (163 nations), a work is "copyrighted" the instant it is recorded in some tangible form. There is no need for it to be registered with any legal body. The United States Copyright Office does offer a registration service, but it's more a matter of convenience than of necessity.

      Now, a sixteen digit hexidecimal number almost certainly fails to meet the minimum requirements for novelty and authorship (whatever the hell such qualities are referred to legally) and thus is not under the protection of copyright. However, the distribution of encryption codes undoubtedly falls afoul of the draconion terms of the DMCA, which has basically nothing to do with copyright.

      The US Copyright Office runs a fairly informative website that's well worth the 10 or so minutes it takes to skim --> http://www.copyright.gov/ [copyright.gov]

      [ Parent ]
    • Re:Honestly curious... by hcmtnbiker (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:15PM
    • Re:Honestly curious... by Anon-Admin (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:23PM
    • Digg Backs Down by BlackEmperor (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:49AM
    • Re:Honestly curious... by lgbr (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:25AM
    • 2 replies beneath your current threshold.
  • Wikipedia (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:37PM (#18951129)
    Wikipedia [wikipedia.org] has chosen to speedy-delete the article and all similarly titled articles based on the hexadecimal number. I found the deletion review [wikipedia.org] at this link. It seems like the only way left to get the article undeleted is to present good arguments there. I, for my part, have been blocked by another admin for posting my undelete comment. It looks like censorship is in season.
    • Re:Wikipedia (Score:5, Funny)

      by micksam7 (1026240) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:51PM (#18951301)
      (http://micksam7.com/)
      The key has also snuck into other places [wikipedia.org] on wikipedia as well. :)
      [ Parent ]
      • Re:Wikipedia by slashdotmsiriv (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:06AM
      • Re:Wikipedia by ozphx (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:14AM
      • Re:Wikipedia by SoyFeo408 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:10AM
      • Re:Wikipedia by weighn (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:15AM
    • Re:Wikipedia (Score:5, Insightful)

      by bky1701 (979071) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:12PM (#18951529)
      (http://68.48.55.94:27015/)
      I know, it's sad, but it's not like anyone didn't see it coming. Wikipedia sold out long ago, now the only thing they care about is easy funding (overall) and keeping themselves admins (just about every admin...). None of them are going to speak out because it hurts #1, and hurting #1 hurts #2. The emperor has no clothes, ad nauseum.

      So what's the next wiki that's going to take over? Cowboynealpedia?
      [ Parent ]
      • Re:Wikipedia by fotbr (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:20PM
      • Re:Wikipedia (Score:5, Insightful)

        by asninn (1071320) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:53AM (#18954011)
        Wikipedia has a clear purpose/goal, though - namely, to create an encyclopaedia. It's not a democracy, an experiment in free speech, an effort to resist censorship, the EFF, Wikileaks, or anything like that.

        There certainly are a bunch of problems with the way the community is being run (and I say that as someone who is an admin on en.wp and has been for a couple of years already), but the fact remains that Wikipedia's goal is to write an encyclopaedia - and NOTHING else.
        [ Parent ]
      • Re:Wikipedia by David Gerard (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:37AM
    • Re:Wikipedia by JNighthawk (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:59PM
    • Re:Wikipedia by complete loony (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:26AM
    • Re:Wikipedia by jafuser (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:54AM
    • Stop it, you idiots. by David Gerard (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:34AM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Quick to rise.... (Score:5, Funny)

    by nobodyman (90587) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:38PM (#18951147)
    And quick to fall. I cannot believe how swift and concerted this response is. I bet the digg admins are kinda wishing they had, oh I dunno.... EDITORS?
  • Digg meltdown (Score:5, Insightful)

    by ISurfTooMuch (1010305) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:39PM (#18951151)
    I've been watching this develop tonight, and Digg has gone into meltdown, not so much in the technical sense but in the sense that the user base is in open revolt, posting stories containing the code and commenting on events over...and...over...and over. As quickly as one article is removed, two more appear, and the tone of them is getting angrier and angrier by the hour.

    Just my opinion, but I don't see how Digg can come out of this with any credibility left. Was this ever about the DMCA? Perhaps in the beginning, but it's turned into a battle of wills between the Digg admins and its user base, and, even if the admins could somehow manage to magically obliterate every article on this subject, they're going to have a hard time explaining themselves to the user base, who are, by and large, mad as hell.

    And to those who are, indeed, mad as hell, consider what you will do after this incident is over. Kevin and the other admins may indeed fear a lawsuit if they don't take these articles down. Is that wrong, or is the law that allows this possibility the thing that is wrong? It's easy to sit there and paste line after line of numbers, but what would you do in the face of a lawsuit, even if it it's a ridiculous lawsuit supported by a law crafted just for this kind of abuse? You're taking action now, but will you get organized to push for real change tomorrow, the day after, and the day after that?
  • Free Speech Flag (Score:4, Interesting)

    by at_slashdot (674436) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:39PM (#18951153)
    Somebody created a free speech flag: http://www.badmouth.net/free-speech-flag/ [badmouth.net]
    • SVG by Anonymous Coward (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:22PM
    • Free Speech Icon by Spy der Mann (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:03AM
  • When will people realise... (Score:3, Insightful)

    by smegged (1067080) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:40PM (#18951173)
    ... Oppression of an idea, thought or belief is the best way to get the news spread (see religion). It is the overcommercialisation of an idea which causes it to fade from popularity (see modern day rock music). The best thing that the music industry, or indeed the movie industry could do to stamp out piracy is to ignore it and release a superior product (I am more than willing to pay for a high quality product, provided I can do with it whatever I wish). Currently DRMed digital music and video is an inferior product at a higher price than what "the pirates" are producing, which is why the MAFIAA continue to lose market share to the Coallition of Regular Annonymous Pirates (CRAP).
  • Free Speech "Snowcrash" by Foktip (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:41PM
  • Beyond the hex (Score:5, Interesting)

    by loconet (415875) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:41PM (#18951191)
    (http://www.loconet.ca/)
    As I said numerous times,

    People don't seem to understand that this goes beyond a silly little hex key. The key has been out for months. A new one will come and it will also be broken. This is not about that. This is about consumers finally standing up against the bullshit being fed to them by media giants. They crossed the line today when they forced digg to censor user generated content, not only articles but also comments and somewhat related content.

    As a consumer i am sick and tired of getting fabricated excuses as to why i can't play what I've bought wherever the hell i want. NO, i don't care if you keep making up the story that DRM is to protect yourself from piracy. I don't buy it. DRM will be broken no matter what. DRM is there to ensure your revenue stream by controlling where I can play the content. Now you go and censor my news source giving a bullshit excuse that a randomly generated hex number is some how your IP? You install rootkits in my computer, You stop me from using my content I bought the way I want? pretend to own _MY_ hardware? Enough of that bullshit.

    This is a revolt [facebook.com] against the greediness and blatant disrespect for the consumer that comes from the mpaa/riaa.

    SAVE THE NUMBERS, SAVE THE WORLD. REMEMBER The 1st of MAY.

    • Re:Beyond the hex by slapout (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:53PM
    • Re:Beyond the hex (Score:5, Insightful)

      by JFMulder (59706) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:02PM (#18951431)
      This is about consumers finally standing up against the bullshit being fed to them by media giants.
      No. Those are nerds in their basement who feel safe in the anonymousity of the web who would shit their pants if they tried to stand up for the same issue in real life.

      If anything, online petitions are such furor have proven time after time that most (but not all, see Sony rootkin fiasco) of the time, when people complain on the web, nothing happens.
      [ Parent ]
    • Re:Beyond the hex by McFortner (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:14PM
    • Re:Beyond the hex by krelian (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:03AM
    • actually it's Feb 11th by jmarkantes (Score:3) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:12AM
    • Re:Beyond the hex by voisine (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:23AM
  • Screw digg! (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Cervantes (612861) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:44PM (#18951213)
    (Last Journal: Wednesday November 06 2002, @05:15PM)
    Yeah, screw Digg! Those bastards, censoring shit, trying to hide things, giving in to "The Man" and the fear of legal battles. Fuck them! Slashdot rules!

    Hey, on a completely unrelated note, can anyone point me to that copy of book 3 of Scientology that was posted here a few years back?
    kthnx.
    • Re:Screw digg! (Score:5, Insightful)

      The thing is, Slashdot took off the Scientology crap because they were served a legal notice.

      Also, Slashdot also provided a detailed writeup on what had happened, why they were taking down the said comments (which happened to paste entire texts) and gave some pointers on finding the said information.

      Which is completely different from Digg removing the story and not telling anyone about it (until of course the users discovered it). And their response was an after-the-fact event, made worse by the fact that Digg receives sponsorship for Diggnation from the very folks this thing seems to piss off.

      The two are completely different, and Slashdot did it right. Digg did not do it right and the users are revolting. More power to them.
      [ Parent ]
    • Re:Screw digg! by VendettaMF (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:01PM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
    • Re:Screw digg! by catmistake (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:12AM
      • Re:Screw digg! by WilliamSChips (Score:2) Thursday May 03 2007, @04:48PM
  • With Apologies To Allan Sherman (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Tackhead (54550) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:46PM (#18951251)
    Ahem. You know it's gonna be one of those weird filks when I post with "With Apologies To" in the Subject: line. Not sure how this got here. Probably the same twisted place that Natalie's Restaurant came from.

    At any rate, this is a parody of Allan Sherman's tirade against all-digit dialing, "The Let's All Call Up AT&T And Protest To The President March". By staggering coincidence, the original was inspired by someone posting it in on USENET in the .mp3.comedy group. Weren't me, although my parents turned me onto Mr. Sherman's parodies by giving me their vinyl original that they'd owned since before I was born.

    By even more coincidence, you can sing it as either: "Let's all post the Processing Key and fuck AACSLA" March, for rather obvious reasons, or the "Let's all post To D-I-G-G and say 'fark you' to Kevin Rose" March, (on account of every single story on digg.com's front page, as the original poster already linked to in TFA)

    By utterly unsurprising coincidence, and like every filk I write here, this parody is in the public domain, and you can sing it however you like, although in this case it'll probably be funnier if you keep the numbers the way they was written.

    AACS VERSION:

    It's the "Let's all post the processing key and fuck AACSLA!" march!
    Watch their lawyers worry and fidget,
    Cease and DE-sisting sixteen hex digits!

    So let's all post the processing key and fuck AACSLA, march!
    So protest! (so protest!)
    Do your best! (do your best!)
    Let us show them that we post in unity.
    If they won't (if they won't!),
    Change the rules (change the rules!),
    Let's buy our movies from another monopoly!

    Let's all post the processing key and fuck AACSLA march.
    Let us wake their landsharks from slumber,
    Get a pencil, I'll give you their number.

    It's Nine, Eff-nine, One-one, Two, Nine-D,
    SevenTY-four, Eee-three, Five-B... (dash!)
    Dee-eight, four-one, five-six, Cee-five,
    Sixty-three, fifty-six, eight-eight... (hyphen!)
    And now that you're on the right road,
    Don't forget to end with Cee-0h!

    Here's to freedom and fair use! 09F9! 1102s!
    Watch your HD-DVD! 9D74! E35B!
    Let's keep that 16-byte key alive!
    D841! 56C5! AACS is totally broke! 6356! 88C0! Hooray!

    To arnezami's mental fiber,
    We'll erect a triumphal arch!
    For the "let's all post the processing key and fuck AACSLA!" march.

    And since we're long (about 2 and a half months!) past the point that a parody of the AACS key wouldn't be complete without the
    DIGG VERSION [digg.com]:

    It's the "Let's all post To D-I-G-G and say 'fark you' to Kevin Rose" march!
    Watch him worry, watch as he fidgets,
    As his users post sixteen hex digits!
    So let's all post to D-I-G-G and say 'fuck you' to Kevin Rose march.
    So protest! (so protest!)
    Do your best! (do your best!)
    Let us show him that we digg in unity.
    If he won't (if he won't!),
    Change the rules (change the rules!),
    Let's take our pageviews to Slashdot's company!

    Let's all post to D-I-G-G and say 'fuck you' to Kevin Rose march.
    Let us wake him up in his slumber.
    Get a pencil, I'll give you his number.

    It's Nine, Eff-nine, One-one, Two, Nine-D,
    SevenTY-four, Eee-three, Five-B... (dash!)
    Dee-eight, four-one, five-six, Cee-five,
    Sixty-three, fifty-six, eight-eight... (hyphen!)
    And now that you're on the right road,
    Don't forget to end with Cee-0h!

    Here's to freedom and fair use! 09F9! 1102s!
    Watch your HD-DVD! 9D74! E35B!
    Let's keep that 16-byte key alive! D841! 56C5!
    AACS is totally broke! 6356! 88C0! Hooray!

    To arnezami's mental fiber,
    We'll erect a triumphal arch!
    For the let's all post to D-I-G-G and say 'fuck you' to Kevin Rose march.

    And don't make me deal with this "Your comment has too few characters per line (currently 35.7)", because it's a long pair of

  • Hah by buffer-overflowed (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:46PM
  • Heh by TiCL (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:51PM
    • Re:Heh by Typoboy (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:19PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • On-topic comment (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Old Wolf (56093) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:52PM (#18951307)
    (http://wolf.project-w.com)
    Something that nobody's explained, since this story broke:

    Whose bright idea was it to use the same 128-bit symmetric key for every DVD ??

    NB. Please don't mod this off-topic just because I said it wasn't.
    • Re:On-topic comment by Tibor the Hun (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:37PM
    • Re:On-topic comment (Score:5, Informative)

      by shird (566377) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:47PM (#18951925)
      (http://www.myplugins.info/ | Last Journal: Tuesday January 13 2004, @08:30AM)
      Something needs to be common between every DVD, otherwise you couldn't make players that can play every DVD.

      The keys are actually different for each DVD, but they are derived from a common secret, and hashed and mixed about etc. The system is actually quite clever, and not a single symmetric key by any means. But no matter how you slice it, there will always need to be a common shared secret which is used to derive the means to unlock the media. That shared secret isn't the key itself, but the "processing key" which is in part used to derive the real key for each disc (to put it in very simple terms).
      [ Parent ]
      • Re:On-topic comment (Score:4, Informative)

        by pjrc (134994) <paul@pjrc.com> on Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:09AM (#18952859)
        (http://www.pjrc.com/ | Last Journal: Thursday June 27 2002, @04:31PM)
        On the doom9 discussion forum where this all happened, everyone was very surprised to learn all existing discs have the same processing key. Those who seem to really know the details all say the AACSLA can use a different processing key on each disc, or small groups of discs. There is a lot of guessing as to how long it'll take them to change how they issue keys for new discs, but it seems certain they will improve soon.

        Regarding this statement:

        Something needs to be common between every DVD, otherwise you couldn't make players that can play every DVD.

        That common element is a "title key" that is unique to that particular disc, and it is encrypted by a "device key" that is embedded inside the player (not on the disc). There are several intermediate decryption steps, where keys and other data are combined in complex ways. But ultimately, there is not some common thing among all DVDs.

        The "processing key" is at one of these intermediate steps, shortly after the device key is used. The AACSLA could and should have used a different processing key on every disc or small groups of discs. The term "very lazy" was used on the doom9 forum. The AACSLA almost certainly will start changing the processing key for new discs. How soon, nobody knows.

        Nobody has yet discovered (and made public) any "device key". It is rumored that someone may have one and is waiting to release it. The first step in the process involves 512 copies of a key, each encrypted with a different device key, so that any particular player will use one of the 512. The AACSLA can cause new discs to not work with existing device keys, which is what seems to have happened with the recent upgrades to the software players. If anyone ever captures the device key from a major brand hardware player (that is installed in millions of homes and not upgradeable), the AACSLA will have very difficult decision to make!

        [ Parent ]
  • Let's hope... by denelson83 (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:52PM
  • I'm with Digg by astrashe (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:52PM
  • it's called the "Streisand effect" (Score:5, Informative)

    by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:53PM (#18951327)
  • this is a story as old as time by circletimessquare (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:54PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Cunning Plan? by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:54PM
  • Take It To The Streets by MrNonchalant (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:56PM
  • My goodness... by denelson83 (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:59PM
  • Fun, but too bad it's just for pir...backing up by Zemrec (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:04PM
  • This isn't about the number anymore (Score:5, Insightful)

    by Trollificus (253741) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:05PM (#18951451)
    (Last Journal: Friday February 28 2003, @05:49PM)

    While they can do what they want on their own site, it is more a matter of credibility than anything else right now. The whole revolt isn't even about the HD-DVD key. What has people feeling burnt is the fact that Digg purports to be about free and open user-driven content in a democratic setting, and what we're seeing here is a cabal of admins who are subverting the entire process of the system to suit their own whims.

    Now as I said, it's not even about the 128-bit key anymore. And it's not about the DMCA or its merits(or lack thereof). The problem goes much deeper than that, and the encryption key debacle was more of a catalyst for what the more perceptive Diggers knew was going on all along but never really had any proof of. See, it's not just any posts containing the number they're removing. The Digg admins are removing and banning any discussion on the topic, even legitimate discussions on the ramifications of censorship in the user-driven internet era. Quite a few legitimate and thought-provoking discussions got clobbered when the admins got ban-happy today.

    They have unwittingly set themselves up as a prime example of what can go wrong when marketing dollars(it is being reported that the HD-DVD guys throw ad dollars at Diggnation) meet the voice of the people. It is now being said that the Digg admins are stepping in and removing "objectionable" content when it conflicts with the will of their advertisers or displays any anti-Digg sentiment. While I'm sure this is good business sense, it's a very ugly way of being outed as a shill and a fraud to your readers. Digg is supposed to be the underdog who fought the status-quo and beat overwhelming odds against "the system". Now people are finding out that Digg has become the system, and they're a bit disillusioned that their hero Mr. Rose is just like any other business man who is out to make a buck. But like I said, the admins of Digg are obviously free to do with their site as they see fit. But Digg is only as good as the people who contribute to it. Kiss them good-bye and you kiss Digg good-bye.

  • Speaking of overreaction... by Nova Express (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:07PM
  • The Elephant In The Room (Score:4, Insightful)

    by DeadBugs (546475) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:16PM (#18951555)
    (http://projects.digitalwreckage.com/)
    Digg is trying to suppress information that is painted across the internet and can be found by a 3 year old with a simple Google search. I really have no idea what they hope to gain by this. Even if this is because they have HD-DVD ads on their site or they were contacted by a legal entity trying to remove the links all they have done is drawn more attention to it. So Digg has ruined their credibility and further publicized the key..... wow. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elephant_in_the_room [wikipedia.org]
  • Brainwashing was THAT easy? by X.25 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:16PM
  • The 0h nine haiku by Spy der Mann (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:18PM
  • Digg users: The ultimate irony by DigitAl56K (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:18PM
  • by Brett Johnson (649584) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:19PM (#18951589)
    I've been observing the revolt at digg throughout the day. The editors can no longer keep up with the posts. The entire digg front page (and most of the "Upcoming stories") is flooded with posts about the HD-DVD key.

    Someone tried to create a Wikipedia page documenting the revolt [wikipedia.org], but that too was taken down.

    Since AACS was broken 6 weeks ago, the MPAA and AACS LA have been sending out a flurry of DMCA takedown notices. However, as this example [chillingeffects.org] shows, the takedown notices seem to be delivered via USPS Express Mail. As mentioned, the current explosion has more than 300,000 pages mentioning the key (I don't know how many link to the Doom9 page). IIRC, Express Mail costs about USD $8 [usps.com seems to be off-line at the moment]. Sending out 300,000 notices at $8 a pop would inject $2.4M into the coffers of the United States Postal Service. Perhaps they would even roll back the rate increase that went into effect today [yeah, right].

    Of course, delivering that many notices by physical mail would be prohibitively expensive, not to mention an ecological nightmare. The $2.4M would probably be better of spent combating the real pirates [dvdforum.org], rather than bloggers and video consumers.
  • 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0? by Wicked Zen (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:22PM
  • From the article: (Score:3, Funny)

    by dominious (1077089) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:23PM (#18951627)

    An astonishing number of stories related to HD-DVD encryption keys have gone missing in action from digg.com

    The number you are looking for is 09f911029d74e35bd84156c5635688c0
  • T-Shirt by radarsat1 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:23PM
    • Re:T-Shirt by radarsat1 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:26PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • In related private information HDDVD.ORG Password: by craznar (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:25PM
  • Suggested methods of sticking it to the MAFIAA:

    1. Write the number and short-short-version on chalkboards around campus (I plan to do this tomorrow).
    2. Set an image of it as the background on public computers you use.
    3. Start mass-mailings.
    4. Post the number anywhere you can in creative ways.
  • Haiku by nickv111 (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:27PM
  • An ode to modern times. by leoc (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:28PM
  • I'd say... by luckymutt (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:28PM
  • May Day irony? by Caboosian (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:29PM
  • I'm proud of the Internet by RichPowers (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:29PM
  • Editors censoring content on a website? by Guppy06 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:31PM
  • by zappepcs (820751) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:35PM (#18951775)
    (Last Journal: Friday May 18, @11:07AM)
    because what the Digg users did to put the number on various posts on the Digg front page is exactly why government monitoring of communications of citizens will never net them the "terr'ists" messages. There are so many low tech ways to encode a message that can be broadcast in broad view of the public and still be coded that the government could spend billions or more man years trying to find them, never mind decode them. Some of those today included:

    A song, a t-shirt, a commercial, blog title, html color coding scheme, a bad poem, street directions, website name, and many others...

    This is EXACTLY why monitoring private communications will never stop covert communications. This is exactly why the DRM won't work, why the relative Patriot Act efforts will fail and why monitoring doesn't work. The fact that the bad guys know there is monitoring will ensure that they use something so covert that all of us will see it and not know it, which is BTW very LOW tech, so won't be caught by hitech monitoring systems.

    Whatever you think of Digg users, they have demonstrated an important thing. When someone needs to communicate, censorship will not work, the DMCA will fail to stop it, the Patriot Act cannot prevent the damage done and no new laws will fix this basic failure of preventative control.

    Any message that wants to get out will get out, be it a key, a program, or just a rebellious thought. Censorship does not work.

    Sure, there are those who pedantically will tell me it seems to be working in countries like China, but even there I think all they have done is slow down the information flow rather than cut it off. If writers in China want to post to blogs, they can get someone in Sweeden to write / host a dtmf translation program that takes a phone call, translates the DTMF and posts the information to the appropriate blog site/account. This would bypass all the censorship efforts to date.

    The plus side of this is that along the way, someone somewhere is going to find innovative ways to do things. My bet is that it will always be those that want to be uncensored that innovate most.
    • SPAM! by Tony (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:48AM
  • this is why by jameseyjamesey (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:36PM
  • Clever and inventive? by mrseigen (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:36PM
  • colorful! by jamonterrell (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:37PM
    • Re:colorful! by jamonterrell (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:04AM
  • BuryDigg.com by kcornwell (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:39PM
  • Didn't last too long by Wingnut64 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:39PM
  • Screams by CriminalNerd (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:40PM
    • Re:Screams by Sloppy (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:53AM
  • Wikipedia Vandalism by freyyr890 (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:46PM
  • digg is shit anyway by timmarhy (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:46PM
  • My poem to the digg editors (Score:5, Funny)

    by JFMulder (59706) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:47PM (#18951923)
    Roses are #FF0000
    Violets are #0000FF
    All my encryptions
    Are belong to 09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • The exorcisism of (Jack Valenti from) Kevin Rose by Bushido Hacks (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:52PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Digg is a losers' "community" by liftphreaker (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:54PM
  • This just in by Tokerat (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:54PM
  • by kinglink (195330) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:55PM (#18952005)
    Because the losers here are digg's devs.

    First off Digg is a site for user content, but just as a note even a user content site can't allow just anything on their site. there's laws in the country and the best way to avoid crippling yourself is simple complying with them.

    Essentially the fans in this case are killing digg because now the MPAA will either get pissed off and sue digg, or digg will get pissed off and close the site. Either way the only people the fans will hurt is digg, the site they frequent.

    Btw the people telling Digg to stand up to the MPAA, shut the fuck up unless you got the money for their defense. Oh wait you arn't willing to pay millions for their legal fee? Digg is a site that's run for the fans, there's no huge cash pile of money hidden in the backroom. They arn't getting rich off Digg, they are just people who are creating a fan created news "blog" or link site. Asking them to stand up and fight for the right here is a joke as it will only cause them to close.

    And don't think slashdot will stand up to the MPAA if it comes to it. I'd like to believe they would but I doubt it. I respect this site but I also understand the simple fact, the MPAA can bankrupt pretty much any site like this, and while we should fight against this, unless you have the money for the legal fund don't demand anyone fight it.
  • HDDVD = the devil by king-manic (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:58PM
  • Hmm... Imagine, for a moment... by Zekasu (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:01AM
  • HD-DVD Key kept public by copyright... by dowlingw (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:03AM
  • 386(TM) by The MAZZTer (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:09AM
    • Re:386(TM) by Ghostalker474 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:02AM
  • A great pic by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:14AM
  • by flyingfsck (986395) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:16AM (#18952245)
    must be 09,F9,11,02,9D,74,E3,5B,D8,41,56,C5,63,56,88,C0

    Future data archaeologists will be dumbfounded by this number and will no doubt ascribe great religious significance to it.
  • Now, Ladies and Gentlemen... (Score:4, Interesting)

    by GFree (853379) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:22AM (#18952281)
    Merchandise!

    http://www.cafepress.com/09f9 [cafepress.com]
  • The Day After by Piedramente (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:23AM
  • Reminds me of the DeCSS fiasco a few years ago by bbitmaster (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:24AM
  • Trade Secret! by sam0737 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:34AM
  • Am I the only one that understands why digg.com... by ChrisGilliard (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:34AM
  • Digg changes their mind! by CeramicNuts (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:36AM
  • A Diabolic Plan by The Atog Lord (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:36AM
  • Response from Kevin by loconet (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:37AM
  • Kevin Rose Surrenders by mgh02114 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:38AM
  • Test post by HDDVD09F911029D74E35 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:38AM
  • Looks like Digg may actually listen to its users by Frying Ferret (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:39AM
  • Anyone notice the competition on digg? by cLive ;-) (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:39AM
  • RIP Digg by (chubbstar) (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:42AM
  • Dugg and buried by dtfinch (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:43AM
  • Kevin Rose responds himself. by mknawabi (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:43AM
  • by Bueller_007 (535588) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:43AM (#18952499)
    http://blog.digg.com/?p=74 [digg.com]

    Digg This: 09-f9-11-02-9d-74-e3-5b-d8-41-56-c5-63-56-88-c0
    by Kevin Rose at 9pm, May 1st, 2007 in Digg Website

    Today was an insane day. And as the founder of Digg, I just wanted to post my thoughts...

    In building and shaping the site I've always tried to stay as hands on as possible. We've always given site moderation (digging/burying) power to the community. Occasionally we step in to remove stories that violate our terms of use (eg. linking to pornography, illegal downloads, racial hate sites, etc.). So today was a difficult day for us. We had to decide whether to remove stories containing a single code based on a cease and desist declaration. We had to make a call, and in our desire to avoid a scenario where Digg would be interrupted or shut down, we decided to comply and remove the stories with the code.

    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.

    If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying.

    Digg on,

    Kevin
  • I for one welcome our Hex Key overlords! by lateralus_1024 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:44AM
  • Digg is offline (Score:5, Interesting)

    by xaviel (1015137) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:44AM (#18952507)
    Digg is officialy offline, the revolt suceeded!!
  • Herd mentality or just scripts? by Browzer (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:45AM
  • Digg Has Been Taken Down by kcornwell (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:46AM
  • parent by lateralus_1024 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:46AM
  • Did Digg just go down by Tama00 (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:46AM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • As a 16x8 image by Ironix (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:47AM
  • All Your Key Are Belong To Us by photomonkey (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:47AM
  • too little too late (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tedivm (942879) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:48AM (#18952569)
    From the offical Digg blog [digg.com], "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.

    If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying."

    At this point it looks like look much like a PR move. In an attempt to make themselves look good, they're acting like they're decided to take a stand against The Man, when in fact they're just bowing to pressure. Besides the fact that they just literally couldn't continue enforcing the censorship without turning off the site, they seem to ignore the fact that they didn't just remove articles containing the hex code, but articles containing the story of their censorship!

    Slashdot isn't making a big deal out of their lack of censorship, and they aren't issuing a war cry- but I can write F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0 without having to worry about my account being deleted, and that means more to me than some half-assed excuse.

    Digg is attempting to shift the blame and rally a cause away from it, when it should be admitting that they all made a mistake and apologizing. Now its too late for them to gain the respect of their user base without a lot of long, hard work (if even that will be enough).
  • Digg Reverses Its Decision! by SirBruce (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:48AM
  • Looks like Digg is down for maitenance by richardellisjr (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:48AM
  • Holy God they did it! by n33kos (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:49AM
  • As a Digg User* by Worthless_Comments (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:49AM
  • Digg is down for repairs. by caferace (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:49AM
  • Anyone seen the Digg homepage recently? by Tetris Ling (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:49AM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • And we thought... by smegged (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:50AM
  • Change of Heart by Piedramente (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:52AM
  • OOS by gblznxre (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:54AM
  • digg.com (Out of Service); check the RSS for why by bkoehler (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:55AM
  • I wonder how long.. by pile0nades (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:59AM
  • It is not the code... by Barkmullz (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:02AM
  • Washing Machine by LaTechTech (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:03AM
  • Digg is down by KalElOfJorEl (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:04AM
  • Whoops! by Rebelgecko (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:05AM
  • Re: Kevin's Reply by thegamerformelyknown (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:07AM
  • Digg is changing its tune... by Barkmullz (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:07AM
  • Slashdot Lied by yangsta (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:12AM
  • Matter of preference by Kuvter (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:14AM
  • Digg Down by Siker (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:15AM
  • Waste of time / efforts by lantastik (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:19AM
  • test by jidar (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:27AM
  • 11:22PM PST... by jtwronski (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:36AM
  • Jammed? by DarkAxi0m (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:38AM
  • The reality of the situation by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:39AM
  • Hits Mainstream Media by craznar (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:43AM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Wikipedia is blocking this number also, by joetainment (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:59AM
  • Anti-censorship ribbons for your site (Score:5, Interesting)

    by Anthony Boyd (242971) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:43AM (#18953457)
    (http://www.outshine.com/)

    I started a page for this, here [outshine.com]. It contains ribbons that use 5 colors. The 5 colors are comprised of the "secret" hex code that is being suppressed. Interested parties are free to use these ribbons on their own sites. If you would like to link your ribbon to an explanatory page, I provide one here [outshine.com].

  • wtf by Heembo (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:59AM
  • Let's hear it for... by nilbog (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:00AM
  • You are all criminals by Orig_Club_Soda (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:18AM
  • Tomorrow's Powerball jackpot is... by britneys 9th husband (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:47AM
  • Pre-teen behavior. by StephanTual (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:50AM
  • pwnd by joe 155 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @04:11AM
  • Somewhere in the infinite digits of pi ... by yusing (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:04AM
  • I'll take....... by cowcabobism (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:10AM
  • Spilled Milk Cannot Be Unspilled by CheeseburgerBrown (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:28AM
  • On Gizmodo.com by pilsner.urquell (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @05:43AM
  • LOL@Digg by Tuoqui (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:13AM
  • How very clever.... by EmagGeek (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:22AM
  • on the BBC by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:33AM
  • confusing digg quote by bl8n8r (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:38AM
  • Spinal Tap by laejoh (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:44AM
  • Copyrighting other numbers by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @07:09AM
    • blah. by SharpFang (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @07:25AM
  • ANANDTECH also deletes posts with this code. by Shivetya (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:14AM
  • Google results... by iFrated (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:18AM
  • Googlefight! by dotHectate (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:19AM
  • What if it were a CC #? by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @09:36AM
  • Gotta side with Kevin by Anonymous Coward (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:08AM
  • history by Easy2RememberNick (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:24AM
  • The code shall forever be preserved.. in Sonic 1! by QJimbo (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:30AM
  • I lost it for digg a while ago by DeanFox (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @10:57AM
  • Dear MPAA: Is this copyrighted too? by ProteusQ (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:28PM
  • Fark chimes in by merreborn (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:16PM
  • Beats the Reddit "sponsorship" by synthespian (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:19PM
  • Hex code cannot be copyrighted by jonfr (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:39PM
  • Digg users are revolting! by xPsi (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:46PM
  • Digg? What is digg.com? Never heard of it... by Jason Buchanan (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @02:48PM
  • Nice gesture, but... by devnull17 (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @03:04PM
  • dig -t TXT `hostname --fqdn` by IchBinEinPenguin (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @07:15PM
  • Missing Option by trianglman (Score:2) Sunday May 06 2007, @09:48AM
  • Excuse me.

    The MPAA (or whoever) is telling Digg to take down those stories.

    They have the authority to do this thanks to the DMCA.

    The DMCA is a law enacted by who? That's right, the government of the United States of America.

    So who is threatening the people who run Digg with jail time? That's right, the United States of America.

    How is that not censorship?
    [ Parent ]
  • Re:Before this gets out of hand again... by SishGupta (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:45PM
  • This is NOT censorship.

    Incorrect. Censorship is when someone censors [reference.com] you.

    Censorship is a government telling someone what they cannot read, hear, see, or think.

    Wrong. I can censor what my kids watch on TV, my work can censor my internet access, etc.

    What you're thinking of is the first amendment.
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:WRONG! by cazbar (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:19PM
    • Intriguing. (Score:5, Interesting)

      by jd (1658) <imipakNO@SPAMyahoo.com> on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:25PM (#18951653)
      (http://slashdot.org/ | Last Journal: Saturday November 03, @04:58AM)
      In a day and age when Big Brother is all but day-to-day reality, the government is prohibited from censoring but corporations are actively encouraged. Corporate censorship is probably worse than Government censorship, in that corporations produce things - and sometimes those things have turned out to be harmful in some way, or sometimes quite lethal to the user. Said Vioxx. Other times, there have been very very narrow escapes - aspartamine was never clinically tested and this information was actively suppressed for some time. Turns out it does impair brain functioning, mildly. Sony did everything in its power to limit knowledge of the rootkit it released and the potential damage it could cause, on a less hazardous - but potentially expensive - note.

      Yet as the grandparent post shows, there are those determined to believe only governments can censor, and there have been many cases where people have attempted to sue companies over first amendment rights. Censorship can happen between any two or more individuals, and you ONLY have rights when it comes to the Government.

      [ Parent ]
      • Re:Intriguing. by novus ordo (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @06:34AM
      • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Re:Before this gets out of hand again... by fabs64 (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:49PM
  • by Nasarius (593729) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:52PM (#18951309)
    Must we go through this every single time? From M-W:

    censor
    to examine in order to suppress or delete anything considered objectionable <censor the news>; also : to suppress or delete as objectionable <censor out indecent passages>
    If you can find me a single definition of "censor" as a verb that refers exclusively to the government, I'd be shocked. By virtue of the US Constitution, such acts are typically only illegal when done by the government. It is no less "censorship".
    [ Parent ]
  • I believe it all started with Google... by cyclocommuter (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:54PM
  • by NorthwestWolf (941862) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:54PM (#18951341)
    "Censorship is a government telling someone what they cannot read, hear, see, or think."

    You might want to try that one again chief, the act of censorship isn't only carried out by governments. By your logic media private outlets couldn't censor information.

    See the following to get a fucking clue:

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Censorship [wikipedia.org]

    n. censor 1. A person authorized to examine books, films, or other material and to remove or suppress what is considered morally, politically, or otherwise objectionable.

    tr.v. censored, censoring, censors
    To examine and expurgate.

    [ Parent ]
  • Re:Before this gets out of hand again... by Tibor the Hun (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @10:55PM
  • Re:Before this gets out of hand again... by Brian Cohen (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:02PM
  • Re:Before this gets out of hand again... by 1310nm (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:19PM
  • Re: Are you for real? by craznar (Score:2) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:31PM
    • Re: Are you for real? (Score:5, Insightful)

      by craznar (710808) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:46PM (#18951915)
      (http://www.craznar.com/)
      They did no such thing, they used their own computer, own time, own disk.... at no time did they break into anyone's house, computer....

      I buy a DVD, I own the disk, the holes, the metal - the bits. The only bit I don't own is the actual art content.

      To put it in the context of a book ... I own the paper AND the ink, just not the story.

      I can choose to read the book backwards, skip every second letter - and even read the boring publication bits at the front - all legally.

      So don't give me this crap that reading the bytes off a DVD I own is illegal.

      [ Parent ]
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Re:Wow...just wow by HanoverFist (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:32PM
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Re:Wow...just wow by joshuapurcell (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:33PM
  • It's not about this password, it's about not being able to do perfectly legal thing with the media we purchased.
    It's about the fact that the DMCA only hurts the consumers, and is wrong.
    It's about the fact that the Industry is using a cheesy, SOB method to avoid copyright expiration.
    It is about the facts that the MPAA is abusing a privildge we the people, through congress, give them.

    It is NOT about being able to distribute the content, it is not about copyright infringement at all.
    The people who are the big violators are not hurt by this because they just make a press, or bit by bit copy of the media.

    The MPAA needs to stop this and use the resourses to go after the big pirates. They guys the press 10,000 copies and then sell them. The nees to stop using extortion instead of the proper leag methods for dealing with pirates.

    I am FOR limited copyright, but how they go about it is apalling, inulting, and spits on our legal system. At this point I hope they go out of business....hell, I wouldn't even mourn if piracy drove them completly out of business.
    Another model will appear, and it will send a message the citizens can only be pushed so far.

    It may be their media, but it's out culture. Historically, these things go very bad for the leaders at the time.

    "This is why we elect individuals to lead. Because people behave like retarded sheep on crack."

    Who elected the MPAA? Who said it was alright for them to call upon our police men whenever they want to to storm through peoples houses? Who voted for letting the MPAA search any computers they want for no reason?

    People behave this way when there is an injustice, and it's a good thing.

    [ Parent ]
  • Re:Wow...just wow (Score:5, Insightful)

    by tekrat (242117) on Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:39PM (#18951831)
    (http://www.obsolyte.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday January 02 2005, @06:59AM)
    Excuse me, but there are companies out there that buy and sell information about you, me and everyone else. Can I go out and have all that information suppressed? That's *my* information, and yet, every supermarket, potential employer, car dealership, hospital, etc., gets to profit and make use about information about ME, and yet, I don't see a dime of that money.

    Tell ya what. I'll agree not to pass around that NUMBER if every company agrees never to pass around my NAME, particularly to junk mail vendors and telephone marketeers.

    Why can't *you* see that it's exactly the same thing?
    [ Parent ]
    • Re:Wow...just wow by HanoverFist (Score:1) Tuesday May 01 2007, @11:51PM
      • Re:Wow...just wow (Score:4, Interesting)

        by tekrat (242117) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:53AM (#18952657)
        (http://www.obsolyte.com/ | Last Journal: Sunday January 02 2005, @06:59AM)
        Did they put hard work and intellectual value into a randomly generated hexadecimal string? I don't think so either.

        I think the point I'm making is valid -- if they want to claim copyright on a NUMBER, I should be able to claim copyright on my NAME (and trust me, my name is pretty unique). I'm tired of other people buying and selling my NAME. My NAME is my property. And since my parents are dead, that property is mine by proxy.

        Either that, or I'll run out right now and copyright the number 12. And then issue DMCA takedown notices to every website, piece of software, TV show, and building elevator that uses the number which is my property.

        [ Parent ]
      • Re:Wow...just wow by timmarhy (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @01:01AM
  • Re:Wow by Pikoro (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:21AM
    • Re:Wow by king-manic (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:26AM
      • Re:Wow by Pikoro (Score:1) Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:32AM
  • Re:Wow...just wow (Score:3, Informative)

    by Sam Ritchie (842532) on Wednesday May 02 2007, @12:29AM (#18952349)

    I don't think people are "passing it around with the intent to circumvent a patented product'", they're passing it round because they've been told not to, and they feel that's unreasonable. Call it a campaign of civil disobedience. I wouldn't be surprised if the number of times it's been posted far exceeds the number of HD-DVD movies that have actually been sold.

    Also, I'm not an IP expert, but I'm fairly sure you can't patent a password, and I would question the assertion that distributing one is illegal.

    [ Parent ]
    • 1 reply beneath your current threshold.
  • Re:Wow...just wow by SharpFang (Score:2) Wednesday May 02 2007, @08:21AM
  • 48 replies beneath your current threshold.
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