i watched it. it was definitely red from here! and to me looked similar to previous lunar eclipses that I've seen.
I took some photos (not that that proves anything to anyone else - they're digital so could easily be 'colour manipulated')
I think that the commonly accepted reason for the colour is that the only light which illuminates the moon during a lunar eclipse, is that which has 'skimmed' past the surface of the earth, ie it is the edge around the earth's shadow, and so this light becomes red-tinted in the same way as sunlight near sunrise/sunset, due to atmospheric refraction.
edit: ok, someone already covered that.
the purple or orange variations - I don't know, and I didn't notice that. maybe it is due to relative colour-tint of the lighting conditions near the observer, so that the red of the moon is seen as a different tint relative to that?
btw, thanks aurora, for posting about this. I logged on and read your notice about an hour before the eclipse was due to start, and previously knew nothing about it - so I would have missed it without reading this!