You Don't Own Us, Digg, We Pwn You

Via Aaron over the cube wall,

It's the classic story of boy hacks HD-DVD encryption, community spreads hack,  community owners get cease and desist letter, try to shut down the story, the community revolts together and community owners give up and take credit for the bold defiance.

Hmm.. I wonder who 'owns' the community?

Apparently there's another slant to the story as well, it looks like the Digg team actually gets some funding for their Diggnation show from the HD-DVD fellows... legal compliance, really..

Maybe this is the first real act of community we've seen online -- Digg is a very specific community tool, and I would argue it's more of a work group than social community -- but here we see the community coming together in a way that is both larger and in defiance of the community's creators.This is also an argument against all the silly tools community creators keep at their disposal -- the ability to ban users and kill stories is really no ability at all, think of it as a night-lite to ward off fears not monsters.

Put up a wall and your users are just going to walk around it over to a competitor. Give them power and watch the community grow -- just don't assume its 'your' community or that it will do your bidding.