Can you Digg it?

I enjoyed reading at the weekend about Andrew Keen railing against the "digital narcissism" embodied in Web 2.0 and his nostalgia for the time when there was a "clear distinction between author and audience".  As a comment on modern social trends, he may have a point: we all seem to want to be (blog) writers/(YouTube) movie stars/(reality TV) celebrities without necessarily putting in the graft/possessing the talent to deserve our celebrity - and the possibilities of Web 2.0 must have contributed to this phenomenon.  But as with other ephemeral forms of communication (like conversations), alongside the bulk of throwaway content, there is a body of content that is useful/interesting/relevant to each of us.  It's just a matter of finding it.

Not an original insight, but my guess is that the apparent chaos of Web 2.0 will become even more ordered and comprehensible (useful?) as time goes by, for example through the establishment of new hierarchies of authority or new tools to assist users (as we've seen with Technorati, Google Blog Search etc).  Empowering user-authors will lead to user-readers demanding (or creating) ways to use and manipulate the new content.

Anyway.  This talk of Web 2.0 made me more interested than usual to spot the story about the (user-influenced) decision by Digg to run the risk of legal action by refusing to remove details of how to crack the encryption on HD-DVDs:

"we won’t delete stories or comments containing the code and will deal with whatever the consequences might be" (Kevin Rose, founder of Digg).

The Advanced Access Content System Licensing Administrator ("AACSLA") has threatened action under the US Digital Millennium Copyright Act (the equivalent of our Copyright Directive, implementing the WIPO treaty that, among other things, restricts circumvention of copy protection).

Being backed by a large volume of voluble bloggers may help publicise the issue but it doesn't change the law (at least not in the short term) - just look at the blog-space devoted to criticising the recording industry in relation to P2P before the BPI waded in with action against users.  Time will tell whether the AACSLA decides that the adverse publicity in the blogosphere of pursuing Digg outweighs the benefits removing the DVD cracks - but if the RIAA's approach to digital infringement is anything to go by, I know where my money would be.

Comments

[Francis Irving]

You seem fairly sure that it is illegal for Digg to host a server containing the encryption key. I'm guessing that is because they are in the US, under US law.

What is the legal status under UK law, for a UK based site?

[Peter]

In the UK, the regulations under the Copyright Directive (http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2003/20032498.htm#24) give rights-holders the right to bring an action for infringement against "a person [who] ... knowing or having reason to believe that it will be used to make infringing copies ... publishes information intended to enable or assist persons to remove or circumvent the technical device". However, the UK's e-Commerce Regs (http://www.opsi.gov.uk/si/si2002/20022013.htm) provide that service providers are not liable if they don't know about unlawful activity or act expeditiously to remove unlawful content when given notice.

Digg's decision to retain potentially infringing material having been given notice that it may be unlawful puts them at greater risk than if they simply withdrew the relevant material. Many ISPs operate on the basis of "notice and take-down" to take advantage of exemptions under the e-Commerce Regs or the US's DMCA.

I should add that I'm not qualified to comment on the position in the US, though the DMCA and Copyright Directive both resulted from the same WIPO treaty and there are similarities.

[Jack]

where would your money be?