Youtube Sued

[Mike]

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/6446193.stm

I don't know if it's old news or what, but I heard on the radio that Youtube are getting sued and the link confirms it. I thought it was for $1m but obviously the article says different, a lot different ;)

[MaxS]

Yea, I read that earlier. It's unfortunate but I don't blame Viacom.

What could YouTube do to combat this, though? With the volume of videos posted, it just doesn't seem possible.

[deronsizemore]

They will need to do something cause they are about to cough up a billion on damages.

[KLB]

Mike Google was sued for $1 BILLION (that's with a 'B').

Think of it this way, the DMCA allows for damages of up to $150,000 per infraction. Viacom is alleging that 160,000 videos belonging to them were illegally disseminated via YouTube. That works out to maximum damages of $24,000,000,000. Google could be getting off light.

Heck that copyright violation of my site I complained about in my thread (http://www.websitepublisher.net/forums/showthread.php?t=7326) today could see a maximum penalty under the DMCA of over $100,000,000 due to the number of individual infractions if I were to sue (not that I would recover that much) and I'm just a small content owner compared to Viacom.

Maybe this Viacom vs. Google lawsuit is just what is needed to force SE's to stop being so caviler with other people's intellectual property rights.

[Cutter]

The problem for Viacom is that Youtube is probably using the DMCA safe harbor. However, that certainly doesn't prevent a civil lawsuit. Kazaa and Napster couldn't get away with simply offering software that allowed people to share files, Youtube is basically doing the same thing except actually hosting them.

I suspect they just want to see how far they can push the limits. Everyone with any seniority over at Google is already a millionaire thanks to IPO. News Corp is taking the heat now too with Myspace. It will be interesting to see what ends up happening.

[Mike]

Mike Google was sued for $1 BILLION (that's with a 'B').

And that's why I said the article said different to what I thought I had originally heard.

[rpanella]

It will definitely be interesting to see what happens, it was only a matter of time until someone stepped up to the plate.

I see Google trying to settle outside of court by setting up some sort of licensing deal as they did a while ago with some of the big music labels.
________
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[Cutter]

Finally.. a good article about this from someone who understands the DMCA and its implications:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/03/18/opinion/18lessig.html?ex=1331870400&en=a376e7886d4bcf62&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt&emc=rss