Google Must Hand Over Info on YouTube Users

This will cause some puckering. 

Google must divulge the viewing habits of every user who has ever watched any video on YouTube, a US court has ruled.

The ruling comes as part of Google’s legal battle with Viacom over allegations of copyright infringement.

Digital rights group the Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF) called the ruling a “set-back to privacy rights”.

The viewing log, which will be handed to Viacom, contains the log-in ID of users, the computer IP address (online identifier) and video clip details.

While the legal battle between the two firms is being contested in the US, it is thought the ruling will apply to YouTube users and their viewing habits everywhere.

Viacom, which owns MTV and Paramount Pictures, has alleged that YouTube is guilty of massive copyright infringement.

Hopefully Viacom won’t go start suing end users like the RIAA does.

1. Actually,why shouldn’t they sue the end users - the posters of the copyrighted material, in this case?  To me, it makes a lot more sense to actually sue the person who did the infringing, rather than the company that unwittingly provided the distribution channel. 

   If someone were cloning DVD’s for resale, does it make more sense to sue the person doing the cloning, or the company that makes the blank DVD-R’s? 

   I’m one of those rare people who believes that the RIAA lawsuits were justified against those folks who were engaging in wide-scale redistribution of copyrighted music via Napster or Kazaa.

   Posted by on July 03, 2008 at 1420 hrs




2. But note that it’s the “viewing habits” being requested - at first I thought that was a misprint.  There are youtubers that view only & some that post (and most likely view).  I can understand the desire to find out who is posting the copyrighted material, but I’m not so sure that I see the relevance in knowing who has watched what.  According to my “stats”, I have watched 2800 videos & uploaded 2 (original content from my camera, by the way, nothing copyrighted).

   Would be like a business (cafe, bar, etc.) that has the radio on & being asked to provide information on which customers were listening.  Might not be the best analogy, but as far as I am concerned, the internet is like a reverse type of “Free Speech” - if I click on a “public” link, I should be able to do so without fear of recrimination.

   I assume the RIAA lawsuits were about going after users who were downloading music files for their future use?

   Posted by on July 03, 2008 at 1447 hrs