Google’s finally responded to the Viacom lawsuit against YouTube exactly as many predicted it would: by taking the common carrier defense provided in the Digital Millennium Copyright Act.
Whether that defense will work is up to the courts. But Google is in a much better position to defend itself against copyright violation changes than peer-to-peer networks were several years ago, when music companies went after the likes of Grokster and the original Napster for similar offenses. For one, Google’s YouTube has always limited the length of video clips that you can upload to its service, making users have to work much harder if they want to share full-length copyrighted material. For another, YouTube has a take-down mechanism in place, and has indicated that it would comply with copyright holders when asked to remove material. Plus it does use tools to try to filter out copyrighted content from being uploaded in the first place–however ineffective Viacom argues them to be–and is working on improving those tools even now.
But more than that, unlike P2Ps, YouTube doesn’t depend on copyrighted material for its success. A recent study by Vidmeter.com said that less than 10 percent of the site’s most popular videos were owned by copyright holders who want them gone, as fellow PC World blogger Cathy Lu pointed out. Even if the study’s numbers are too low, as Viacom and other content owners allege, it seems clear that a significant portion of YouTube’s appeal and success owes nothing to copyrighted content.
In addition, Google Video has content deals in place with some copyright owners and has shared ad revenue with them, a practice that is migrating to YouTube. That makes Google look much more like a partner than a pirate.
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