The Viacom copyright infringement case against Google and YouTube has been a long strange journey since it started, but it looks like the first major chapter is over: the federal court today ruled that Google falls under the "safe harbor" provision of the DMCA which protects service providers from liability for user content. Roughly, that means Google isn't liable for copyright infringement on YouTube in
general: it can only be liable for infringing specific copyrighted works, and since YouTube pulls videos as soon as anyone complains, it can't get in trouble. Of course, Viacom isn't too happy about this decision and has vowed to appeal, but we think it makes sense -- otherwise Viacom could sue and win for things Google didn't even know about, like, say, the music videos Viacom employees
covertly uploaded themselves and then demanded be removed. We'll see what happens -- in the meantime, we'll be celebrating by watching as much YouTube as possible.
posted June 23rd 2010 5:27PM
OWNED IN THE FACE
Google > Viacom
PARTY AT MY HOUSE!!!!
You provide the beer, youtube provides the movies!
@dardub Maybe I meant to say tv shows.
This is huge, I think, and good news. Hopefully the precedent set here will reverberate far and wide.
who watches youtube theres porntube for entertainment purposes LOL
@josemedina1983
Not to mention the fact that adult sites around the web are recoding their sites and videos to work with the iPad. So, everyone with an iPad can enjoy the world wide webs gamut of questionable content in complete privacy.
RESULT !!
Good for them. I for one think that this lawsuit was completely ridiculous.
And that ladies and gentlemen, is what Viacom gets for planting fake user uploads on Youtube just to bitch about them, or just bitching about something they don't have a right to bitch about in general. Props to Google. Please proceed with your world domination.
@kenny goo "Please proceed with your world domination"
+1
The whores at viacom international threatened to sue us if we used his likeness so... we make do.
Strong work court. I guess the judges heard about Viacom employees uploading said videos through YouTube. I guess going off site to use non-company computers isn't sufficient to screw over your enemies in the corporate sabotage any more. What is this world coming to!
Well let's say if all of these types of videos from YouTube get pulled, because some big CEO at viacom gets all pissed about it, you can kiss 90 percent of YouTubes content goodbye. Really, who really watches YouTube for user created content? I sure as hell don't well, maybe the freemans mind and sheppards mind content but, I mainly use the site watch music video content from my favorite artists. Don't be surprised when one day you sign on to watch a taped live performance from your favorite country singer, or your favorite TV show and find it pulled, somebody at a media company will eventually get their way.
@Nilay Patel -- As you have likely had the chance to read the full opinion --- any thoughts as to why a DMCA defense would be applied where it is an infringement claim? As I understood the DMCA, it was a specific and different violation to allow for *access* (like DeCSS cases) and was not itself infringement. Though I have not had a chance to finish reading the full opinion, it appears interesting that a DMCA defense would be applied to a claim of infringement as a violation of the DMCA is not infringement. It seems that a DMCA defense should be applied where there is a claimed violation of *access* -- and that *infringement* would technically fall under a violation of one of the specific section 106 rights, which would be beholden to section 107-122. Also, what did you mean by *general* infringement?
Whose side are you on?
Yesterday saw an interesting coincidence of stories hit the wires: on the European side of the Atlantic, the BPI, Britain’s biggest recording-industry association, announced it had sent a cease-and-desist notice to Google with regard to links to copyright-infringed music files. Meanwhile, in the U.S., the Wall Street Journal reported on (further) rumours that Google was planning on launching a music download store and subscription service to initially run on Android handsets.
http://www.themusicvoid.com/2010/06/google-needs-to-decide-which-side-of-the-music-industry-fence-it-is-on/