You’d have to also censor virtually all the RAP music from the last 25 years! quarter century

None of the options you provide is the answer. It’s not a question of “Have the Digg commenter’s gone too far and should Digg censor the thread? or is this political correctness gone mad and the thread should be left as is?”, the real question here is, now that the visibility of anonymity has reached a point where a person can say something to a million people without bearing any responsibility, is it time to rethink it all and revoke that possibility?

The point being, in a cynically satirical sense your article was so ill-thought I think it gave me cancer. Going even further, will this post be here in an hour now? Should it be? It’s not a question of Digg…it’s much bigger, and I dare-say a large factor behind Wikipedia’s upcoming changes.

Where are all the African American Internet entrepreneurs? At the many events attended in Silicon Valley, Boston or NYC. There are very FEW!

Why is that?

Slow news day, huh Duncan?

in poor taste BUT I say Digg should let commenter’s speak their mind.

I understand the logic of the name considering the country from where the bones were found. The science community follows logic, and every immature idiot with get their jollies… remember the way Uranus used to be pronounced?

either you censor nothing, or you have to censor every little thing that is offensive to people, and since we live in a society where people with too much time on their hands always bitch, eventually you end up censoring everything.

I think digg will just censor it and delete the post(have done it for a lot of other touchy subjects.

Personally I disagree with that, there are plenty of idiots on the internet, but if someone wants to act like an idiot and a racist, they’ll just expose themselves for the idiots that they are to all the normal people. + last time I checked digg has that + - system, so posts like that would probably get dugg down.

Science and Digg together is a bit of a joke. It’s long been a joke in the scientific community that what Diggers consider science and what we consider science are not exactly the same thing.

As for the specific issue, who cares? Paul Sereno could care less, and Nigersaurus is long gone to take any insults personally. Unless someone is doing something illegal, censorship is not going to solve everything. Sensible people don’t read Digg comments anyway. We just like the traffic, if any.

Who raised eyebrows that Digg comments can have a bunch of immature racist idiots? New around here, hmm?

Couldn’t you have found better link-bait? Isn’t there some argument about Wikipedia and its coverage of porn stars that would at least have made more appealing reading?

Musta been no new news to post this garbage.

So Duncan, tell us a bit about the weather today.

On a side note… do you realize you always use ITS instead of IT’S.
Here’s something for you: http://www.theprobabilist.com/.....-in-blogs/ [found through digg]

You can thank me later.

An AIDs in Africa joke is not racist. There is an AIDs epidemic in Africa. Also, dinosaurs don’t come in human races.

The joke is in bad taste, but not discriminatory.

Duncan… most of what digg users comment on could be taken down due to content. tons of racism, tons of cursing, and megatons of political incorrectness.. but that’s what digg is. It’s a group of popular sites that gain attention. Do they trigger racist comments.. yes and no…

When you open comments up to the public, this is one of the consequences of that. Freedom of speech and its prolific use on the internet is whats driven the internet to where it is today.

Digg isn’t PC nor will it ever be PC. I personally wouldn’t drop the “N” word to anyone but that’s me. Others would.

If you visit enough forums on the net, you’ll wander into a lot of this type of stuff.

I think the point that is being missed is that yes, there ARE a lot of people in this world with sub-par intellect and social skills. The net brings out the sordid truth’s that are often hidden behind closed doors, prejudices that many won’t utter in their normal social interactions. We must all remember that the fact that these viewpoints are normally hidden and only come out under the guise of anonymity, which the net fosters, doesn’t mean that they don’t exist.

To take off on an old Dennis Miller quip - maybe we need a lot more weeding of the herd? IQ tests before parents are allowed to procreate anyone?

What is the diet of the Nigersaurus — fried chicken and watermelon?

“IQ tests before parents are allowed to procreate anyone?“ ….. what were you suggesting as the pass mark Jones?

The thing is: ANY publicity is Good publicity.

How come you don’t mention when digg commenters go on a rampage against religion {which is far more racist than making fun of a dinosaurs name}, but suddenly you seem to be concerned about the political correctness of a dinosaur’s name? I’m surprised you didn’t mention Jihad in this article.

Besides it was found in Niger, which is a country in Africa.

You know when there’s nothing to blog about, how about not blog at all?

This is not a big deal. Digg has a comment moderation for this very thing. Yes as you say, comments are a click away but really how else could Digg have it?

Also do you think YouTube should go and ban comments for every video? Because I guarantee YouTube comments are 10x worse. So bad of course that Xkcd had to have a go http://xkcd.com/202/

# * MISS UNIVERSE

November 17th, 2007 at 11:14 pm

You’d have to also censor virtually all the RAP music from the last 25 years! quarter century

MISS all the Rap Music from the past 25 yrs didn’t sound anything like it does in 2007, I know because I was around, singing the very first Rap song at 10 yrs old and it was about teenage pranks and basketball u know.

Sensor that!!!

It just seems that Racism is far from over in AmeriKKKa and nobody, I mean nobody should be at all upset when young black Americans mistrust most of White America and the Government.

Not like they gave us a good reason to trust them anyway.

I’m African American and when I saw the Word Nigersaurus , I just assumed a Fossil was found in Niger. But I had to see a post on Digg to make me think why why why…..

I assumed wrong? or should I be upset about the word? It’s a name of a Country.

As for Digg allowing this piece to drag on with Biggots replying and they not do anything about it is just like Digg, because the ADM there are some of the Biggest Cheaters and Hater online in the Blogshpere.

I’m sure they love the Digg about the Dino, but instead of allowing the site to be controlled by Diggers and not their handpicking Topics to keep on the front page their, they will never hear stories about Africa and the good and bad about it, because there is good and bad in everything and place, only crap like this.

I say Digg can kiss my A** and the Bigots who post Racists comments on that particular thread.

We in the Blogsphere have more power than you may think. Stop allowing Digg and sites like it to control us.

This is stupid. The encryption key was illegal, people expressing their opinions (no matter how stupid, and ill-informed they are) is not. I think there’d be a bigger outcry if Digg “censored”* peoples opinions.

Either way, the comments are being buried.

* The term censorship is thrown around on the web way too much. If people own a site, they have every right to take down whatever they so choose. TC “censors” spam, and trouble-making comments, etc. - but it hardly seems the right word to use, does it?

That’s not “opinions” that’s hatred, and yea people have a right to express it. I hope they can deal with repercussions of their opinions of Africans and Africans everywhere.

This is the worst article I’ve seen on here, to the point that I won’t even justify you a response on the topic.

@Hyder “How come you don’t mention when digg commenters go on a rampage against religion {which is far more racist than making fun of a dinosaurs name}, but suddenly you seem to be concerned about the political correctness of a dinosaur’s name? I’m surprised you didn’t mention Jihad in this article.”

First off hating religion is by definition not racist. It is also not intolerant, bigoted, or prejudiced (necessarily). You need to look up the definitions for these terms. Second, there is simply no genetic, intelligent, or in any way legitimate rational basis for racism other than ignorance. Contrarily, there are very many reasons for hatred of religion. I will refer you to http://www.iidb.org - we would always like a new member

In any case, as usual techcrunch continues its slide into irrelevant posts. I wonder if you do any research or put any effort into your jobs at all. It seems posts keep getting less interesting and more poorly written. As for censorship, nothing should be censored, ever. I mean that. All opinions should be openly discussed and debated, thus exposing racists and others to open ridicule and mocking. You have a right to say as you like, no matter what…and you also have a right to be called an idiot when you open your mouth. The HD-DVD encryption code should not have been censored either. Nothing should be censored at any time, it is embarrassing that the idea is even suggested in enlightened times.

one reason I don’t use digg anymore is the commentors. I like to join and discuss stuff but its the wild west over there. They need moderators just for the comments. Lets face it you can say what you want over there with no consequence. If you got banned for it then I would think it would stop instantly. Ok you are always going to get one idiot but I think if it was policed then it would improve and get the first set of users back.

It must be a very slow news day.

It also looks like Techcrunch is becoming the next online social gossip rag.

Digg only banned the HDDVD Decryption key briefly. They changed their minds and allowed it. And there have been racial jokes on Digg for quite a while. Look up the comments on Digg under the South Park “Naggers” episode.

WTF… I cant believe I am reading techcrunch?

What happening to techcrunch??

Am I really surprised at this? This is the same site that is overrun by Ron Paul Spammers…the same guy who has ties to Neo Nazis.

Because of them and other thing, Digg has became totally unreadable. Even Slashdot in its heyday was more calmer.

I moved to newsvine. They are mature over there.

I think these stories should be run past Arrington to approve or reject before going live.. This is ridiculous..

I like digg, but it is stuff like this that will stop me from going there… And I feel that is all that matters.

Can you lend a nigga a dinosaur? It’s Nigersaurus, not Niggersaurus. Niger is not pronounced as “nigger.”

First, I doubt that many of the comments left here have been by an African American. I am an African American who works in the tech industry, and I can understand the sensitivity of the use of the word nigger and the thinking behind its use. I wrote about this on my blog a couple of weeks ago when ”
Dog” Chapman was caught using the word, and the historical hurtfulness of this word is something white people have a hard time understanding. I think the especially true in the overwhelmingly white male tech industry.

I think this is a slow-news day.

I’ve got another idea on what to blog about.
“Could Duncan Riley Get TechCrunch Into Trouble?”

Yes, digg is becoming a racist and sexist place. Finally Yahoo removed their news message board because basically every comment became racist. If digg is not careful, it might go in that direction.

Also, what are they waiting for? Sell the site and cash out.

Voltaire once said “I disagree with what you have to say but will fight to the death to protect your right to say it.”

I like Digg just the way it is, let the community ( or as economists would say, the market) decide what is and what isn’t appropriate.

I think if you read Digg for any more than a few minutes you would find many more explicit comments than this

#28 Dave is correct, your article needs to be corrected.

Of course, that would dilute the reason for it and the question posed: “should Digg censor the thread?”

“Digg only banned the HDDVD Decryption key briefly. They changed their minds and allowed it.”

Racist jokes are funny. Thats why we laugh at the “Love you long time” gag. Thats why we laugh at a black persons love of popeyes. It’s all just jokes.

Digg comments primarily satirize the nature of an article. If a comment isn’t funny, it’s buried, if it’s offensive it’s buried, either way, people should have the freedom to say what they want no matter how offensive it may be because that is a projection of human thought. Why try and censor the physical manifestation of a humans thoughts? Successful or not, those thoughts will still exist.

Ignorance isn’t bliss, it’s just ignorance.

“they banned the key for decrypting HDDVD but let this shit on here? Bad form.”

Such filthy language. I dunno if I can continue to patron this website in light of this discovery.

Folks still read Digg? When it first came out, Digg was pretty good at distilling the good stories, but it seems like its more useful feature these days is to syphon away useless commenters from other sites like Slashdot (which has almost become readable again).

I am a strong supporter of free speech, even if it does means that bigots and other idiots get to express their idiotic and in this case racist views and “jokes”. After all, free speech isn’t really needed for nice and politically correct and accepted speech, is it?

But on the other hand, private organizations and individuals have and should have the right to use whatever policy for censoring they want on their websites: It is just as obvious as me not being “anti free speech” despite not allowing any old idiot into my house to say anything they want.

The problem here is consistency: if Digg set out a clear policy of what is accepted and what is not accepted this question wouldn’t be asked in the first place.
If you’re going to censor, you need to be consistent and clear about what and why you do it.

I was fortunate to live and work in Hawaii during the heyday of the Portuguese comedians who used to make fun of every race. They played this stuff on the radio, but most of it took place in the nightclubs. Funny, funny, funny stuff, and they could do it there, because there was no majority race to take the heat for such sins. The truth is there are funny things about differences between people, but in America, it’s ALWAYS perceived as a put-down by the majority. Over there, it was just observatory and based on years of vacationers from every walk of life. In Hawaii, the unwritten rules of island people govern: we are all island people; we need each other. At least that’s the way it was when I was there 20 years ago.

I don’t think that particular joke was racist, just terrible.

Does TechCrunch have some kind of quota to meet up here or something? Why is this news on a bleeding edge site?

They commenters should be allowed to say what they want and the comments approval system should filter out most of the useless, offensive and plain stupid comments. There’s tonnes of stupid stuff said on the internet, I think the technical challenge of a free speech world is to hide them from obvious view - Digg’s comments system does a satisfactory job of that. They could take it a step further and add reasons for “thumbs downs”, offensive, stupid, etc.

Digg has been getting “dumber” for a while, I wish they’d find better ways of ranking posts by academic/social/intellectual value instead of just popularity…. insert brijit.com plug…

I guess if you’re an adult internet user, you should expect to encounter offensive material on the web (free ultra XXX anyone?). But, should the internet ubiquitously cater for the sensitive (particularly children)? I don’t have a good answer for that, and it seems very few people do… “Won’t someone please think of the children?!” Seems like that is a big challenge for the webs future.

Censor them? Are you kidding me? What are you trying to keep people from? If it is absolute hate speech, and has legal consequences, that is one thing…but who are you Duncan, or anyone else for that matter…that you can decide what I should be able to see and not see.

Don’t censor or scold. The concept of citizen journalism includes the input of citizen’s views and commentary. Are there inappropriate comments on Digg? Sure, but there are inappropriate people out in the real world. Just look at some of the comments in NSFW posts.

The whole concept of Digg is for the people to have a collective voice. If there is a collective push to have a racist story, then the problem isn’t with Digg - it’s with men.

I do agree with #47 though, Digg is getting dumber. The site becomming mainstream means that the mainstream idiots have taken over. I’m going back to Slashdot soon.

Is there so dearth of news that TC is now posting whether threads in Digg should be removed or not.I thought IT industry was flourishing !!

I stopped reading Digg months ago. The same articles are posted over and over and the comments are full of trolls. I imagine most of the people that make racist comments there are no more racist than most people, they are simply trying to draw attention to themselves and incite arguments and flame wars.