Viacom officially sues Youtube for $1 Billion

[aholbert32]

Re: Viacom officially sues Youtube for $1 Billion

Considering that I don't think YouTube meets the defined requirements for "safe harbor," I think they might be in trouble here. Regardless, I expect them to battle this to its bitter end because handing a settlement to Viacom will have all the other content providers lining up for their settlements.

If anyone is interested, here's an explanation of "safe harbor" as it relates to the Online Copyright Infringement Liability Limitation Act. That Act is designed to protect service providers, but only if they adhere to the safe harbor requirements. And I don't think YouTube does, since they have no mechanism by which to filter copyrighted content from appearing on their site.

Its not that straight forward though. Youtube will argue that they have a registered DMCA agent and that once they are notified of infringement, they immediately pull the infringing clip. The only standard that they dont meet is the termination of users who constantly upload infringing material. Still that standard is pretty low on the totem pole when it comes to judges.

Its a waste of time to even discuss this though. The case will settle and Viacom will just sign a revenue sharing agreement like they previously were negotiating.