There are many of us who are guilty of the following scenario - miss Al Gore on The Daily Show? Or need just one more shot of Justin Timberlake bringing sexy back to the Video Music Awards? Hop on over to YouTube, and you will most certainly find satisfaction. Today, Viacom (NYSE:VIA), the parent of MTV, Comedy Central, Nickelodeon, and other major networks, is tired of this pattern. The conglomerate has sued Google (NASDAQ:GOOG) and its YouTube unit for more than $1 billion, citing unauthorized use of copyrighted material.
In addition to more than $1 billion in damages, the suit, filed with the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York, seeks an injunction against further violations. VIA alleges that almost 160,000 unauthorized clips of company-owned programming has been uploaded onto YouTube and viewed more than 1.5 billion times.
GOOG representatives have so far failed to comment. The stock has dropped nearly one percent in trading so far today; VIA shares have gained nearly one percent.
Beth Gaston Moon is an analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research.
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
3-13-2007 @ 11:49AM
Icheb said...
How again is this not covered under the DMCA?
3-13-2007 @ 11:56AM
BigD said...
Good luck Viacom. How wise is it to pick one of the biggest companies to start a battle with? Why only a billion, why not a trillion? Taking out your anger on google for taking a bite out of whats the hippest thing next to Reebok pumps?
3-13-2007 @ 12:26PM
chaserb said...
Wake Up Call...
You have to wonder about the wisdom of alienating the youtube demographic that also happens to be the youngest demographic of stock traders and purchasers. Read some of the overwhelming comments on youtubes site regarding Viacom boycotts. Sometimes the bean-counters have their heads so far into their spreadsheets they can't see the train headed right at them. Rather than using youtube as an advertising goldmine... Viacom would rather hammer in their first nail...
3-13-2007 @ 12:27PM
John said...
An act of desperation by Viacom. Sumner is starting to swing wild.
3-13-2007 @ 1:06PM
Chris said...
Viacom said in a statement. "Their business model, which is based on building traffic and selling advertising off of unlicensed content, is clearly illegal and is in obvious conflict with copyright laws."
Viacom -- a video clip usually if you're lucky only lasts 1 min. ... YOU R getting ready to give this to charity right!? Yeah, whatever...
3-13-2007 @ 2:56PM
ron said...
viacom get over it.
3-13-2007 @ 11:42PM
hiqutipie said...
Do I hear Boycott ? It's time for surfers to be heard Loud & Clear and what better place to get it started. These big & small corporations are infringing on surfers rights. 1st perfect 10 sues Google over what is out there and all the big wigs have been pounding youtube over copyrights and judges just rule in favor of them. Who is representing the consumer and their right to share, the right to be creative. When you see what kids and people of all ages and cultures are sharing and being able to do because of the net, its quite amazing and in no-way should it be stifled because
of the Greed of big corporations. People use to copy everything to vhs or tapes now they do it to their pc's what is the difference? Life is only getting better everyday on the net and the big corporations would only like to take that away.
So get your friends and start e-mailing viacom, start a boycott and let your congressmen know how you feel. This is OUR Free World not theirs....
BOB, Lauderdale, Mississippi
3-14-2007 @ 10:30PM
Hazim Gaber said...
It's obviously about the money. No Google=No lawsuit. I don't think that Viacom can win.
But television on the internet is here to stay. Look at www.watchtvsitcoms.com, they have deals to post television shows for free, so the elements are there for a successful relationship.