SueTube?
Viacom ratcheted up its battle against YouTube Tuesday, announcing it has sued the video portal and its parent Google for more than $1 billion in damages, citing alleged infringement of the company's copyrights.
The suit, which was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, also seeks an injunction prohibiting YouTube and Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) from further copyright infringement.
Google and YouTube representatives couldn't be immediately reached for comment.
In February, Viacom (nyse: VIA - news - people ) demanded that YouTube take down more than 100,000 unauthorized videoclips from the site, which included footage from Comedy Central, MTV, VH1 and other popular Viacom cable channels. The media conglomerate said at the time that the clips had generated 1.2 billion video streams on YouTube.
In Tuesday's suit, Viacom refined those numbers, saying it had identified more than 150,000 unauthorized clips on YouTube that had been viewed 1.5 billion times.
"Because YouTube directly profits from the availability of popular infringing works on its site, it has decided to shift the burden entirely onto copyright owners to monitor the YouTube site on a daily or hourly basis to detect infringing videos and send notices to YouTube demanding that it 'take down' the infringing works,'' Viacom said in its suit.
Viacom alleged that YouTube only blocks specific clips and that it makes no effort to block slightly altered copies of the same videos--meaning that YouTube may take down a specific clip of The Daily Show With Jon Stewart at Viacom's request but will still leave up almost identical versions of the same clip that have been, say, uploaded there by different users. The company also alleged that YouTube doesn't block users who repeatedly upload copyrighted clips from using the service.
Viacom also alleged that YouTube is "deliberately interfering" copyright owners' ability to hunt down infringing videos by allowing users to designate who can see the videos they upload and by limiting its search function so that it identifies no more than 1,000 videoclips for any given search, even if there are several thousand available.
Viacom's frustrations no doubt reflect those of other media companies as well, even those who remain partners of the video portal, highlighting the urgent need for Google and YouTube to find a way of assuaging the concerns of YouTube's content partners without jeopardizing the freewheeling appeal of its site. Yet Viacom's sister company CBS (nyse: CBS - news - people ) has been close to a deal with Google to showcase its videos on the site, and executives there have taken pains to express their admiration of YouTube (see CBS: "We Like YouTube").
The suit also comes at a time when TV networks are scrambling to figure out how to make money from their online video assets through licensing fees and advertising sales, both of which depend on the amount of traffic that their own Web sites or authorized third-party host sites can generate. Such efforts can be undermined if the same content is widely available at a heavily trafficked site like YouTube.
Shortly after pulling its content from YouTube, Viacom said it had reached a content deal with online video start-up Joost.
In late-morning trading, Google's shares were trading at $449.78, down $4.97, or 1.1%. Viacom's Class A shares were trading at $39.97, up 42 cents, or 1.1%.
http://www.forbes.com/home/digitale...acom-google-tech-media-cx_lh_0313youtube.html
Viacom ratcheted up its battle against YouTube Tuesday, announcing it has sued the video portal and its parent Google for more than $1 billion in damages, citing alleged infringement of the company's copyrights.
The suit, which was filed Tuesday in U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, also seeks an injunction prohibiting YouTube and Google (nasdaq: GOOG - news - people ) from further copyright infringement.
Google and YouTube representatives couldn't be immediately reached for comment.
In February, Viacom (nyse: VIA - news - people ) demanded that YouTube take down more than 100,000 unauthorized videoclips from the site, which included footage from Comedy Central, MTV, VH1 and other popular Viacom cable channels. The media conglomerate said at the time that the clips had generated 1.2 billion video streams on YouTube.
In Tuesday's suit, Viacom refined those numbers, saying it had identified more than 150,000 unauthorized clips on YouTube that had been viewed 1.5 billion times.
"Because YouTube directly profits from the availability of popular infringing works on its site, it has decided to shift the burden entirely onto copyright owners to monitor the YouTube site on a daily or hourly basis to detect infringing videos and send notices to YouTube demanding that it 'take down' the infringing works,'' Viacom said in its suit.
Viacom alleged that YouTube only blocks specific clips and that it makes no effort to block slightly altered copies of the same videos--meaning that YouTube may take down a specific clip of The Daily Show With Jon Stewart at Viacom's request but will still leave up almost identical versions of the same clip that have been, say, uploaded there by different users. The company also alleged that YouTube doesn't block users who repeatedly upload copyrighted clips from using the service.
Viacom also alleged that YouTube is "deliberately interfering" copyright owners' ability to hunt down infringing videos by allowing users to designate who can see the videos they upload and by limiting its search function so that it identifies no more than 1,000 videoclips for any given search, even if there are several thousand available.
Viacom's frustrations no doubt reflect those of other media companies as well, even those who remain partners of the video portal, highlighting the urgent need for Google and YouTube to find a way of assuaging the concerns of YouTube's content partners without jeopardizing the freewheeling appeal of its site. Yet Viacom's sister company CBS (nyse: CBS - news - people ) has been close to a deal with Google to showcase its videos on the site, and executives there have taken pains to express their admiration of YouTube (see CBS: "We Like YouTube").
The suit also comes at a time when TV networks are scrambling to figure out how to make money from their online video assets through licensing fees and advertising sales, both of which depend on the amount of traffic that their own Web sites or authorized third-party host sites can generate. Such efforts can be undermined if the same content is widely available at a heavily trafficked site like YouTube.
Shortly after pulling its content from YouTube, Viacom said it had reached a content deal with online video start-up Joost.
In late-morning trading, Google's shares were trading at $449.78, down $4.97, or 1.1%. Viacom's Class A shares were trading at $39.97, up 42 cents, or 1.1%.
http://www.forbes.com/home/digitale...acom-google-tech-media-cx_lh_0313youtube.html
