Within the past day, the popular website Digg.com has come under scrutiny for removing link articles containing the HD DVD encryption key and cracking information. Many users have said this infringes upon the entirely democratic website that Digg.com promised them, however this is covered under the Digg.com Terms of Service when the user registered — meaning Digg.com has the ability to remove these stories at their discretion. However, Digg.com has also removed accounts related toward those stories and comments posted about the HD DVD encryption key being cracked.
As you all know, HD DVD is the format currently competing with BluRay over the next hard media format for your films, games and easily portable storage. Digg, explains their position thusly:
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. Digg’s 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. This helps protect Digg from claims of infringement and being shut down due to the posting of infringing material by others.
Our goal is always to maintain a purely democratic system for the submission and sharing of information – and we want Digg to continue to be a great resource for finding the best content. However, in order for that to happen, we all need to work together to protect Digg from exposure to lawsuits that could very quickly shut us down.
Now, this is all well and good. However, this “fear of lawsuits” card has been played over and over again by companies who now need to make payroll after being all loosey goosey for years during their indie days. Clearly Digg headquarters just bought a Tassimo coffee maker and a new conference table and, as a result, doesn’t want to lose its lease.