Today, MTV's parent company Viacom filed a lawsuit against YouTube and its parent company Google. Viacom is seeking more than one billion dollars in damages, for thousands of alleged copyright infringements. A complaint filed by Viacom claims that almost 160,000 clips of its programming have been made availiable on YouTube without authorization, and those clips have been viewed 1.5 billion times. A spokesperson for Viacom was quoted to say, "There is no question that YouTube and Google are continuing to take the fruit of our efforts without permission, and destroying enomorous value in the process." Google's plans to combat piracy on YouTube might be too little too late, if Viacom were to get its way. If the lawsuit swings in Viacom's favor, Google's momentum with YouTube will definitely be slowed, as competitors such as AOL Video and iFilm try and steal the show.
As many of you already know, YouTube is a great revenue, marketing, and publicity tool when used legally and appopriately. It seems that Google, in the beginning, did not take proactive steps to curtail infringement ontheir YouTube site. My guess is that they were concerned at first, just with generating site traffic and revenue. Maybe Google wasn't expecting YouTube to endure so much success and popularity. Unfortunately, for Google it looks like they might have to pay the price for their failure to follow infringement laws. If Viacom is to win this massive lawsuit, YouTube's future could be in limbo. I am not saying that Viacom's winning of this lawsuit is going to jeopardize Google, as a company, but it will definitely turn some heads and change the makeup of YouTube as we view it today. Will just have to wait and see!
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
I think that Viacom is making a smart move here. While BBC has made an agreement to distribute content on Youtube, Viacom has no such agreement. BBC's shows will be clearly identified as BBC material. On the other hand Viacom's shows are being distributed without being identified as copyrighted material. Youtube was probably undermining Viacom's attempts to distribute material through conventional channels and by forcing Youtube to get rid of Viacom material they are essentially taking back control of their material.
I see how this correlates with the Napster issue a couple of years ago. The point that Viacom will have to prove is that it is not YouTube who posts or stores the the content. Because, YouTube may be set-up similarly to Kazaa, where it could be seen as a peer-to-peer network. If YouTube claims that it is simply a peer-to-peer network, then it should be in the safety zone, unless the courts want to look more progressively at peer-to-peers or how to regulate them. This is definitely an interesting lawsuit and Viacom has every right to push the issue. It will be interesting to watch how this develops as it will affect the future for interactive website, user-generated content, and copyright regulations.
The "Team" comment was from Alex and Michael.
I think that any company that tries to take on YouTube is making a mistake. While YouTube may be sucking up profits that Viacom should be making it is too big, I believe, to be taken down. And, if Viacom does win this lawsuit and YouTube is shut down, the users are just going to find somewhere else to do the same thing. I would suggest maybe coming up with some way to charge users that are looking at copyrighted materials. Like maybe when setting up an account, YouTube should have some kind of monthly charge or some lump payment at the initial signing up time. Then use those profits to give to companys that are not receiving profits from the sharing of copyrighted materials. Just an idea.
I don't believe Viacom is taking the right course of action here. First, they must somehow prove that YouTube has damaged Viacom. YouTube has set up one of the largest audiences in the world, and Viacom should be happy that users post its networks' programming. Is Viacom losing direct revenues from programming on YouTube? Maybe, but they are discounting the buzz factor that goes along with YouTube. Instead of fighting YouTube, Viacom should embrace internet video sites and do what it can to promote its own networks' programming through the use of this effective internet tool.
Post a Comment