According to BBC News: a US court ruled that Google must release the viewing history of YouTube users to Viacom in order to comply with copyright infringement laws. Google’s legal counsel said: “We will ask Viacom to respect users’ privacy and allow us to anonymise the logs before producing them under the court’s order.”

Apparently, privacy experts find this ruling a tad, uh, frightening:  Read more 

I do love the folks at EFF. Just putting this up as a measure of support. Viacom will lose this one methinks:

MoveOn, Brave New Films Sue Viacom For Illegal Takedown of YouTube Video

San Francisco - The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) asked a federal court today to protect the free speech rights of MoveOn.org Civic Action and Brave New Films after their satirical send-up of “The Colbert Report” was removed from YouTube following a baseless copyright complaint from media giant Viacom.

The video, called “Stop the Falsiness,” was created by MoveOn and Brave New Films as a tongue-in-cheek commentary on Colbert’s portrayal of the right-wing media and parodying MoveOn’s own reputation for earnest political activism. The short film, uploaded to YouTube in August 2006, includes clips from “The Colbert Report” as well as humorous original interviews about show host Stephen Colbert. In March of this year, Viacom — the parent company of Comedy Central — demanded that YouTube take “Stop the Falsiness” down, claiming the video infringed its copyrights.

“Our clients’ video is an act of free speech and a fair use of ’Colbert Report’ clips,” said EFF Staff Attorney Corynne McSherry. “Viacom knows this — it’s the same kind of fair use that ’The Colbert Report’ and ’The Daily Show’ rely upon every night as they parody other channels’ news coverage.”  Read more 

EFF wants to know:

Well, with its 100,000 DMCA takedown notices aimed at YouTube users, now it’s Viacom that is netting its share of dolphins. Among the 100,000 videos targeted for takedowns was a home movie shot in a BBQ joint, a film trailer by a documentarian, and a music video (previously here) about karaoke in Singapore. None of these contained anything owned by Viacom. For its part, Viacom has admitted to “no more than” 60 mistakes, so far. Yet each mistake impacts free speech, both of the author of the video and of the viewing public.

Did Viacom take down your video? Let them know if they did. DRM Current copyright law is one of the worst things to happen to free speech in this country, and if it weren’t for all the other horrors shredding the Constitution, this would be a much bigger issue.

No. Really. This is not safe for work. But you will laugh out loud. Via Best Liberal Blog nominees at Team BIO, comes (ahem, ack, erm) this essential video. Hahahahahahahah.

I can’t wait for the gay sequel. “I’m going to breach your Southern Border.” Hohohoho.  Read more 

John doesn’t need to hits, but still, this one surprised even my cynical ass:

I just got a cease-and-desist letter from YouTube, see below, regarding my CNN footage I posted. The footage, you’ll recall, was from Larry King Live last night in which Bill Maher outed Republican Party chair Ken Mehlman as gay. It seems that CNN has suddenly decided that it no longer wants bloggers, or YouTube, posting any of its video, which is kind of surprising since I always thought we were doing a CNN a favor by constantly touting their network. Apparently I was wrong.  Read more 

So Universal is now herding the sheep toward the gate. In a move that has proved questionable, Universal has signed a deal with YouTube for distribution of content while simultaneously launching an attack against its competitors – oligarchs of the world unite!  Read more 

I know, I know, it’s all about the money. But this doesn’t make me happy:

SAN FRANCISCO - Internet search leader Google is snapping up YouTube for $1.65 billion, brushing aside copyright concerns to seize a starring role in the online video revolution.  Read more 

A record that sells 100,000 copies qualifies as a Gold Record. According to a very interesting story in today’s Richmond VA Times-Dispatch, the video of Sen. George Allen calling a native-born Virginian American a “macaca” has now been viewed on YouTube more than 250,000 times.

Therefore I suggest that this qualifies for 2.5 Gold Macacas, and that this term be used as a ratings service for YouTube links henceforth.

Once it gets to a million hits, which I suspect is a very safe bet before November and absolutely gay-ron-teed to happen if Allen keeps bobbing to the top of the cesspool which constitutes the Republican contenders for President in ’08, it will be refered to as having won a Platinum Macaca.  Read more 

While some of you may have heard that the Blogosphere is controlled by the uberfascist sushi eating rabid Lambmaster Kos, here at Corrente, our first loyalty will be to His Majesty of the Grey Turtleneck, may he rule forever, amen. Who has proven once again why we’ll never be anything more than a bunch of kids in pajamas typing fever induced swampiness from parental basements in flyover land. How will we every get Rahm to take us seriously? Clearly, Atrios, you’re killing the party.  Read more