Viacom Sues Google with $1B YouTube Lawsuit

[GAMEFINEST]

Google will fart on their faces..

 

[kwok]

I think Viacom has every right to sue YouTube. And I hope they succeed.

The only way YouTube will take a video off the database is if a company claims copyright or whatever. That means that these companies have to waste time and money trying to remove these videos.

Totally agreed.

 

[GoPC]

The suit will likely NOT go anywhere simply due to the fact that the Google council will make out Viacom to be a money hungry opporunitist that had ample time to sue or enact a C&D on YouTube BEFORE it was sold to a multi-Billion Dollar giant like Google.

Like many laws, FRAUD and Infringement has a generalized statute of limitation to be interpreted by the trior of fact... that is based on when the alleged infringement took place or was KNOWN to have taken place in it's original form.

Viacom has known about the alleged infringement for years and has CHOSEN not to do anything about it until AFTER YouTube was the property of a much bigger fish.

It can be argued that Viacom ACCEPTED YouTubes use of their materials during that time and that Viacom BENEFITED from the no-cost distribution of those materials resulting in windfall profits from increased viewship and associated revenues from the resulting increased advertising profits.

If Google does it's job right, the very WORST that will happen is that YouTube will agree to put some method in place to review and potentially remove copywritten materials from its system and take steps to prohibit the infringement from this time forward.

If they were REALLY smart, there would be an announcment behind all this that Viacom and YouTube/Google have reached a new marketing agreement by which both companies will participate in a co-endorsement campaign that will greatly boost their combined viewership and advertising revenues.

PARTNERSHIP, not a law suit, is the better play here.

But only time will tell.

GoPC

 

[gmac17]

GoPC - But what about the argument that Google knowingly profited by placing advertisements on what they obviously knew was copyrighted content?

Can I rent out a gymnasium for a flea market where everyone sells drugs - and where I know everyone sells drugs, and then say "sorry guys, I just rented the gym - those guys sold the drugs". I know the DMCA is a whole different issue, but the fact that they know it is there and make $ from it has to hurt their case.

And if they do go to court and can prove that a significant portion of youtube traffic comes from copyrighted materials (which i bet it does) then things get interesting....

 

[taboo]

Google will fart on their faces..

haha owned.

Also Google and Viacom are not going to partner, as Viacom will be the main content provider for Joost.

 

[EM @MAJ.com]

Viacom will not settle for less and will definitely got this one on their pocket, too bad for google. They should improve their video.google instead of buying youtube, $1.5B budget should be enough to advertise their own video.google service.

 

[GoPC]

GoPC - But what about the argument that Google knowingly profited by placing advertisements on what they obviously knew was copyrighted content?

That's not the argument that Google will make... the "framework" of the website is consistant no matter WHAT the content is. The argument is that YouTube was built in good faith and the customers have chosen to break the TOS. The ad placement and structure of such was in place BEFORE the site was propogated with these violations...

therefore, at best, Google/YouTube may be instructred to take more proactive and reactive actions against TOS violators.

In your gym example, if you owned the Gym and rented it out for a legitimate flea market activity and the participants violated your trust, selling drugs on the premesis, even though you may have had information suggesting that they had done it before.... you're still only liable for corrective action. Because your Gym exists for the purpose of leasing out for events and participants are presented with a TOS that they either choose to violate or not.

If you chose to NOT take action, the authorities would step in a "encourage" you to take the needed action and only after repeated offense might they consider you "part and parcel" to the distribution and profit of the activity itself.

But that's a hard case to prove.

It is a bit different with tangible property with the ability to physically inspect product, vendors and traffic rather than a virtual space occupied by literally BILLIONS of individuals moving around within it.

I'm not saying it's RIGHT, I'm saying that it will most likely be their defense.

GoPC