You Tube/Google, Viacom and the Ascension of Al Gore. [krakatoa]

I've never understood how You Tube has survived as long as it has, much less why Google thought it was a good investment. Nevertheless, they continue to fight.

A $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit challenging YouTube's ability to keep copyrighted material off its popular video-sharing site threatens how hundreds of millions of people exchange all kinds of information on the Internet, YouTube owner Google Inc. said.

It seems like a really clear case of copyright infringement to me.

But I'm no lawyer, so I'll leave it to the experts. I do find one statement by Viacom to be just absolutely incredible:

Viacom said it had identified more than 150,000 unauthorized clips of copyrighted programming — including "SpongeBob SquarePants," "South Park" and "MTV Unplugged" episodes and the documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" — that had been viewed "an astounding 1.5 billion times."

1.5 Billion. With a "B".

Damned if L. Ron Hubbard hasn't just started spinning in his cryogenic chamber.

Update and correction:

John J and sandy burger tag-team to tighten up my loose shit. (Does that sound as queer as it looks? Stupid grammar-nazi's get what they deserve I sez.)

John J: It doesn't say that An Inconvenient Truth has been viewed 1.5 billion times. It says that the 150,000 "illegal" clips have been viewed a total of 1.5 billion times.

sandy b: As I read it, this does not mean that Al Gore's movie has been viewed 1.5 billion times. This means that these copyrighted clips have been viewed 10,000 times each, on average.

So I guess L. Ron's reaction is more of a bored yawn. I'm pretty certain Tom Cruise is still a manic couch hopper though.

posted by xgenghisx at 11:31 PM

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