Viacom Tries to Purge Google’s Money Bank with $1 Billion Lawsuit
Ouch! YouTube is probably feeling the burn with this one. Viacom has decided to slap YouTube with a $1 billion lawsuit over damages for copyright infringement. We knew they weren’t getting along so well after Viacom cracked the whip and demanded YouTube remove 100,000 unauthorized video clips. They mean serious business at this point, and now YouTube and Google will have a battle to fight.
What does this mean for YouTube and Google? Well, it could mean a lot of things. Considering Google paid $1.6 Billion for YouTube in the first place (Viacom is seeking $1 Billion), they may be rethinking the biggest purchase of 2006.
Viacom states that YouTube has ”built a lucrative business out of exploiting the devotion of fans to others’ creative works in order to enrich itself and its corporate parent Google.”And because Viacom’s networks tend to cater to the younger tech savvy crowd who turn to the Internet to get their entertainment, YouTube is/was definitely a threat.
Just for the sake of what if’s – what if Google hadn’t acquired YouTube? It would most certainly mean that YouTube would have had to shut themselves down. Google can afford the legal team to fight this, but is it worth it? People turn to YouTube most often for copyrighted material, not the silly home-videos that are posted.
I’m far from a legal expert, but this is probably one of the largest lawsuits of its’ kind in terms of dollar amount. Google will definitely be feeling the sting from this one!
Source: AP via Yahoo & CyberNet Forum
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Tags: Google
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I agree that YouTube viewers are coming mostly for the pirated videos — and think it’s been given too much credit for being a “user-generated” site. (I consider it a “user-pirated” site.) This lawsuit will, hopefully, clean things up.
To be honest, I enjoy YouTube and its (stolen) content. It’s great to be able to pull up TV sgows and movie clips. But this kind of site is unsustainable. If we want to encourage new content and new services, copyright has to be respected. Once the law is properly protecting content, the door will be opened for a multitude of new, “over the top” (aka cable bypass) services.
I think this lawsuit is going to change a lot of things.
- Krissy
I’m sorry, but I have to strongly disagree here. YouTube is all about the community videos. It is a community video site. People on YouTube use video as a conversation tool. This is what sets it apart from all the other video sites (including Google video).
Not only is this content the reason for YouTube’s success, an amazing amount of original material is quite high in quality and often more entertaining than stale media.
So you really think they could survive with home video content alone? I think the copyrighted material has helped them out more than they will admit which is why it’s time they make a serious effort to compensate the entertainment networks for their content. I’ve definitely seen some great “home” videos on YouTube but I think the copyrighted stuff has helped them out a lot.
I think I have to agree with natmaster, because a large majority of what I watch on YouTube is people doing stupid stuff in videos that they make themselves. I think they could do just fine without having the copyrighted movies on there.
Just look at the YouTube interface, it is designed as a social video site, with features like ‘reply’ to videos! Yes, it also has the usual copyrighted content, but this is true of every other online video site. I’m talking about what makes it UNIQUE and why it is so successful. All the other sites have copyrighted content…probably even more since all the media corps are telling YouTube to pull their stuff off. It’s the community created videos that set it apart - and this is where the vast majority content comes from.
Also, calling them “home videos” gives a negative connotation like they are all low-quality video with shaky cameramen. In fact, creating quality videos is becoming so easy and cheap these days, this is rarely the case. You can purchase an HD digital video camera for only a few thousand dollars. (Not that you’ll need it for YouTube)
I’ve always considered them to be “home videos” myself, but I guess it’s just a generalization that I have always made regarding whether a professional director was involved or not. I’ve seen some pretty amazing home videos in the past so I never really looked at that as a negative thing.
An HD camera just for uploading to YouTube would be like buying a Ferrari just for going to get the mail at the end of your driveway…you can do it but it is just overkill.