1. Digg member posts story about HD-DVD decryption key. 2. Digg gets notice to take story down. 3. Digg does so. 4. Digg community goes into absolute revolt and floods site with copies of decryption story. 5. Digg founders relent. Great story, and big lesson: don’t annoy your most passionate community members. They’ll dig your grave before giving in.
Update with a great blog post from Digg founder Kevin Rose:
“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.”
Update: Digg founder Kevin Rose interviewed on camera by Beet.TV.