YouTube Attorney Alleges Viacom Set Up

The blog post includes allegations that Viacom hired outside firms to upload content to YouTube and used fake email addresses to open YouTube accounts in order to hide uploading activities, and that Viacom intentionally had video quality manipulated so the videos would appear to have been pirated copies. It is also alleged that Viacom employees used computers at Kinkos in an effort to avoid tracing some of the uploads back to their sources.

Through the entire copyright infringement lawsuit, which began in 2007, YouTube has maintained its innocence by claiming protection under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA). YouTube said that it has honored Viacom's requests to remove content that violates copyright law. Viacom maintains that YouTube disregarded its complaints in myopic pursuit of site traffic.

Levine's blog post makes a good read, but in the end will it accomplish anything? It clearly lays the responsibility for content protection where it belongs, directly in the hands of the content owner.

The sheer speed and volume of content uploading to the Internet makes it nearly impossible for venue operators to readily inspect everything that comes online. Those parties who wish to maintain the integrity or exclusivity of what they own must be ready to do the legwork for themselves.