YouTube Fires Back At Viacom

NewYorkCountryLawyer writes "As we say in the legal profession, 'issue has been joined' in Viacom v. YouTube. In its answer to Viacom's complaint (PDF), filed Friday, YouTube says Viacom's lawsuit is intended to 'challenge... the protections of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act ("DMCA") that Congress enacted a decade ago to encourage the development of services like YouTube.' It goes on to say that the suit 'threatens the way hundreds of millions of people legitimately exchange information, news, entertainment, and political and artistic expression.'"

Re:Viacom's case

[Anonymous Coward]

oh look another idiot.

"Defendant YouTube, Inc., is a Delaware corporation with its principal place of business in San Bruno, California.

If you can't even get that right, you may as well just give up!"

Deleware is very pro business. Where your corporation is registered and where you operate are two entirely different things.

Re:Viacom's case

[compro01]

Yes, but they're not a Delaware corporation [wikipedia.org]. they're a limited liability company [wikipedia.org] located in Delaware. Differant things.

Re:The best part was left out...

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

I don't think you should generalize based on ONE trial. Especially one that even the Judge has recognized [blogspot.com] was conducted in a flawed manner.

Re:Too bad

[slarrg]

The TV company web sites are the absolute worst. Often I want to know something simple, like when new episodes of Heroes will start. I go NBC's site and wade through page after page of useless crap and Flash animation that has no use whatsoever and there is not one word about when new episodes start.

Their sites are always Flash-infested design disasters with absolutely no useful content linking to a schedule that has no information. I'm really not sure who goes to these sites.

Re:The best part was left out...

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

I wouldn't say he's generalizing. He said, "Maybe not". I think the point was that a jury will not always decide what we expect they would, or should, decide.

Of course you're right that it's not predictable. But I would say that the close observers of the Capitol v. Thomas [blogspot.com] trial were sure she was going down. So it was predictable to an informed observer.

What I would say about juries is that they usually do the right thing. Which means the RIAA will usually lose.

Note that the RIAA has strictly avoided jury trials, until they had one where everything was in alignment:
a Native American defendant who lived 120 miles away from the courthouse in a different community;
a lawyer who was being held captive in the case;
a few bad facts that could only be explained by a technological expert witness who could talk about zombies, etc.;
defendant having no expert witness;
a judge who was unfamiliar with the controlling copyright law issues.
I could go on and on.

(512(c)(1)(B)), also (512(c)(1)(A)(2))

[Software Geek]

Viacom alleges in their complaint that YouTube receives a financial benefit directly attributable to infringing activity (via add revenue generated from the infringing material)

Also, they allege that infringing activity is apparent, given YouTube's ability to filter out other things (pr0n and the copyrighted material of it's partners.)

Each of these allegations appears to be directed at voiding the safe harbor provision in the law.

Here are the relevant parts of the safe harbor provision (512(c)(1))

(1) In general. - A service provider shall not be liable for monetary relief, or, except as provided in subsection (j), for injunctive or other equitable relief, for infringement of copyright by reason of the storage at the direction of a user of material that resides on a system or network controlled or operated by or for the service provider, if the service provider -
(A)(i) does not have actual knowledge that the material or an activity using the material on the system or network is infringing;
(ii) in the absence of such actual knowledge, is not aware of facts or circumstances from which infringing activity is apparent; or
(B) does not receive a financial benefit directly attributable to the infringing activity, in a case in which the service provider has the right and ability to control such activity; and

Re:Viacom's case

[compro01]

Common English =/= Legal English.

Company and corporation are two different terms legally, even though they're synonyms in usual speech, as you point out with your dictionary quote.

A limited liability company is not incorporated. It's somewhat like a cross between a corporation (Limited liability for the owners, as the name states) and a partnership (usually multiple owners), but there is no juristic person as there is with a corporation.

Re:FP?

[SanityInAnarchy]

Google lost its claim to not being evil quite some time ago. They should have simply refused to do any business in China at all.

That's debatable. Doing business with China, even with PRC rules, provides more information to the Chinese people. That's good.

Google also indexes the entire fucking Internet, so the filtering is bound to slip up somewhere. Things will slip through the cracks, as opposed to not going through at all. That's also good.

Doing business with the PRC does support the PRC, which is bad. And they are actively censoring, which is evil. That's why it's debatable both ways.

Caving to Scientologists is pretty much unarguably bad, with pretty much zero positive side effects.

Re:FP?

[NewYorkCountryLawyer]

I'm sorry I wasn't more clear. When I said that directors and officers are "pretty much required" to choose the corporation's self-interest, I meant legally required. I.e., they are legally considered fiduciaries to the shareholders. Their legal duty is to do what is in the best interests of the shareholders.