I fully support the court ruling that YouTube didn’t infringe Viacom’s copyrights. My thoughts:
In an extremely important court decision, a New York federal judge ruled in favor of Google’s YouTube in a defense against Viacom’s $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit on Wednesday. Viacom claimed that YouTube knowingly ignored the tens of thousands of videos uploaded to the site that included copyrighted materials owned by the music and entertainment company. However, Judge Stanton upheld the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA), which provides “safe harbor” to any website against liability for copyrighted material uploaded by its users, as long as the publisher removes the content when it is notified that the upload was unauthorized.
I have watched this case very closely since it was filed in 2007, as this issue has immense implications on the entertainment industry, the evolving definitions of ethics and best practices in the digital age, and multi-platform publishing. While I agree with Michael Fricklas, Viacom’s general counsel, that “Copyright protection is essential to the survival of creative industry,” I believe that the industry’s survival also depends greatly on its ability to adapt to audience behaviors and desires. We now live in a world where people demand access to content they want, instantly, and enjoy paying homage in active ways through mash-ups, compilations, spoofs and other incorporations and interpretations of the copyrighted material that they love. Smart companies, in my opinion, have accepted this and are finding ways to leverage this enthusiasm for their content into sales, PR, and otherwise positive brand affinity.
It’s worth noting that YouTube has created Video Identification, a filtering technology that helps to identify copyrighted material when it is uploaded to the site. Also, YouTube itself has become a powerful platform in increasing entertainment industry revenues, allowing record labels to sell song downloads directly from videos on their platform. Here’s an example from my favorite case study, the “JK Wedding Entrance Dance” to Chris Brown’s “Forever”.
Some might argue that YouTube would not have created the filter or the song buying functionality if not for the complaints from the copyright holders, but I don’t agree at all. Google’s main source of revenue is advertising; more specifically, collecting money based on encouraging their users to click links, buy stuff, engage with other products and brands than their own. I don’t believe for a second that, with its immense wealth of content that people regularly pay for, YouTube would not have tried to get a piece of that by becoming, essentially, an affiliate content sales platform.
Kent Walker, Google’s general counsel, said in a phone interview: “This is a victory for the Internet and for the people who use it. The decision will let a whole new generation of creators and artists share their work online.” He went on to say that the decision “was an affirmation of the emerging legal framework and ratifies the rules we have all been living under.”
This last statement is one of the key points here - the world, and the way that people consume content, has already changed. No amount of lawsuits, scare tactics or walled off content areas is going to change this. Large entertainment companies will only further alienate their audiences and appear archaic if they do not find new ways to act as partners, rather than adversaries to the very enjoyment that they are in the business of creating.
Entertainment companies will continue to lose control over some of their content. They will continue to lose revenue in certain areas that used to be extremely lucrative for them. However, they also have enormous opportunities, such as the ability to:
- provide instant access to content that audiences are actively seeking
- drive sales through impulse purchases off of relevant content
- create brand evangelists that will help marketing and PR efforts organically
- allow content to be distributed far and wide on myriad platforms with very little distribution marketing or expense
The enviornment is certainly still a bit chaotic, and will be for a while, but with an increasing amount of high quality content emerging constantly, the moguls have to experiment and innovate immediately, or they will quickly be left behind. I’m quite confident that no company, regardless of its size, is immune at this point.
Hopefully, this decision will be upheld in the face of the appeals that Viacom will surely file, setting a vital precedent for the content business in the digital age. It also solidifies the rights and viability of entrepreneurial start-ups, who are so vital to the content ecosystem and the mechanisms of true innovation. As the NY Times reported:
Michael S. Kwun, a lawyer at Keker & Van Nest who previously worked at Google, said the decision would ensure that Internet companies were not legally required to develop such a system and could expect legal protection as long as they took down content when copyright holders complained. “I have no idea how much money YouTube spent on developing its content ID system, but if that was required for any new start-up, you wouldn’t see any,” Mr. Kwun said.
For me, this is very exciting. I expect this decision to compel the large entertainment companies, once and for all, to embrace digital content platforms as a permanent part of their business. Those that succeed will respect their audiences and will develop mutually beneficial solutions that not only sustain, but grow their operations. Perhaps I’m idealistic, but I believe that, if they don’t, little startups like YouTube and Facebook will continue to become gigantic, multi-national powerhouses and they will become as irrelevant as Friendster. Or Google will just buy them all…that’s a distinct possibility too, especially if they keep avoiding billion dollar lawsuits.
More reading:
- NY Times: Judge Sides with Google in Viacom Video Suit
- BusinessWeek: Google’s YouTube Didn’t Infringe Viacom’s Copyrights, Judge Says
- Wikipedia: Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA)
- The DMCA Copyright Law
