User rebellion at Digg.com unearths a can of worms

Digg.com, a website that lets anyone post and rank news stories and blogs, found that out when its members staged a revolt over what they saw as an effort to censor them.

It began this week when Digg started banning members from posting a software code that helps online pirates make bootlegged copies of movies. Digg took action because the entertainment industry had threatened to sue.

The ban set the masses off. Scores of Digg's 1.2 million registered users deluged the site, breaking traffic records and making sure that every one of the top 10 stories on the front page either included the software code, attacked Digg's ethics or both.

Many posted links to videos on YouTube that included the code's 32-character string of numbers and letters, including one song called "Oh Nine Eff Nine" (after the code's first four characters). Others tried to get around Digg's text filters by linking to photographs, drawings and electronic greeting cards containing the code.

One member digitally altered a church sign to spell out the code after the words "Jesus says." Another promised to tattoo it on the back of his neck if 10,000 people joined an online protest group he created.

Digg backed down -- opening it up to a legal battle with Hollywood.

"You'd rather see Digg go down fighting than bow down to a bigger company. We hear you," co-founder Kevin Rose blogged, acknowledging that a lawsuit could wipe out the 3-year-old San Francisco company. "If we lose, then what the hell, at least we died trying."

The handling of the uprising is being closely watched. Digg's method for letting users decide what's important is being mimicked or considered by dozens of other websites, including major news organizations and social-networking giant MySpace.

"They're stuck because their community, which is their biggest asset, is the one putting them in this position," Forrester Research analyst Josh Bernoff said of privately held Digg Inc. "When you hand the keys over to the mob, they'll drive wherever they want to go."

Early this week, a Digg user posted a link to a story that referenced the so-called hex code, which had already been used to circumvent the anti-piracy software that prevents people from watching unauthorized copies of some high-definition DVDs. Dozens of movies in the new HD DVD format have been circulating on peer-to-peer networks.