Google to Divulge user data.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/technology/7488009.stm

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

What happened to privacy?

Now they can find out how many videos you watch containing David Hasselhof!

What happened to copy-right protection?

Yep! And don't forget Rick Astley. :)

It isn't an issue of privacy.

It comes down to companies trying to protect their intellectual property. What Viacom is quite correctly getting at, is that Youtube are allowing masses of Copyrighted material to remain for free download.

Viacom isn't interested in what any one individual has watched. They are trying to prove the point that many users of Youtube and consequently Youtube itself, are guilty of Copyright infringement.

Once they have that proof they're in a strong position to take Youtube to the cleaners.

I'd like to see the same happen to Rapidshare and other filehosting sites since the majority of their content is also illegal.

No they are not!, If you owned a field and a load of people forced their way on and decided to hold an illegal festival, with drugs, illegal booze, and nudity (sounds great:) and to top it all someone was murdered on your land, would you be to blame?, is it all your fault simply because you own the field?

If they had any sense they would be going after those that infringe. You cant blame anyone for watching stuff if its on there anyway, and certainly not those that own a legit service. (with a warning/eula NOT to post any dodgy stuff when users join up).

See, you've deliberately quoted me out of context.

No, but you can blame A) The users for putting it there, and B) Youtube for allowing it to stay.

Face facts - Youtube is a flawed system. It isn't feasible to monitor everything that gets uploaded. But that doesn't mean it should be allowed to continue regardless.

No argument there. :)

Thats like asking one cop to police the entire metropolitan area of london

Either way, the viewers are not to blame and have a right to privacy

Again, you've quoted me out of context. I also said that the system is flawed because Youtube cannot possibly enforce their own rules.

Yes, sorry about that :)

Still, i dont think its youtubes fault anymore than its your fault you did not have an electric fence and machine gun turrets around 'the field'. Theres enough disclaimers and warnings on there and they DO actively remove vids that are objected to. In the case of 'the field', you have put up 'no trespassing' notices and yet still they come, can you enforce your own rules? should your field be taken off you because you cannot manage the fact that people abuse it regardless?

I would say the majority of vids on it is well 'within bounds' (ie, snippets) or not stolen goods. It is a valuable resource for hobbyists, businesses and and all kinds of perfectly legitimate use. Why should they loose out because of a few f-wits who think positing an entire episode of lost is a good idea. If anything go after the posters, not the viewers or the hosters.

Thats a bit extreme for crowd control. Promise me you'll never co-organise Glastonbury with Michael Eavis? o.O

I'm not saying that they should.

I understand the cause of the problem, and I understand its effect. I don't know what the solution is, though, other than charging a nominal subscription to weed out the.... erm, weeds.

It'll be the users who uploaded the content who are in trouble. However, this is a lawsuit solely to get a chunk of Google's billions. Do they have a point ... yes but mostly they are getting burned by old-school business models.

Lol, "if ya aint got no ticket ('shuck-schik') ya -AINT- comin in!" ;D

> Why should they loose out because of a few f-wits who think positing an entire episode of lost is a good idea.

One good reason, you are liable for what you knowingly and continually allow people to do on your property. long rambling post made short, even if the only option available to them (for removing illegal content) is shutting down youtube, then that is what the are required to do.

So YouTube employs a few more people to actively monitor and filter their content - and the movie companies do the same. Cost of doing business.

This legislation is another piece in the ring-fencing of the internet.

> So YouTube employs a few more people to actively monitor and filter their content

A LOT more people, and don't allow any video to be shown till after it is reviewed. That is the standard that non-internet companies are basically held to (the exception being small swap shops that fly under the radar so to speak), and (at least here in the US) is most likely how it will end up on the internet as well.

It wouldn't be complete coverage - just better policing than what it is now.

Else, are you ok with Google handing over this info to the government? And if they can do this with Google, then who/what next?

They could probably mitigate the work involved in reviewing videos by using a trust rating system combined with semi-random manual reviews.

In this system, people who have uploaded a relatively higher number of videos with no copyright violation issues, would have a relatively higher trust rating. Their videos would have less chance of being flagged to be manually reviewed. As soon as any copyright violations were detected, their trust rating would go back to zero.

Videos which were flagged to be manually reviewed would go in a review que and would take significantly longer before they were released for public viewing as a result. This would give people a reason to aspire to a higher trust rating.

Basically, a sandboxing system similar to the one that Google are reputed to use with their search engine.

That freedom was already taken away in the U.S. from the government a while ago, any new and surprising news hanging around?

@dynaman, so youre basically saying youtube should be shut down right? As it is impossible to police themselves all the time.

The statement "you knowingly and continually allow people to do" is not the case with youtube. They do not allow people to post copyrighted content and there is messages/wanings not to. The fact that people ignore the rules doesnt mean they allow it and they do try to police it as actively as they can(as does the community).
Using GFKs example of glastonbury, people are not supposed to take drugs, there are warnings and a police presence..... but almost half the crowd (and performers) are on 'em. Should they close down glastonbury too? Its hardly the organisers fault, especially if they can be seen to at least trying to acomplish an impossible task.

> @dynaman, so youre basically saying youtube should be shut down right? As it is impossible to police themselves all the time.


After showing a sustained and fragrant violation of copyright law, that is the usual solution.

> They do not allow people to post copyrighted content and there is messages/wanings not to

If a newspaper did what Youtube did they would be shutdown, if a TV station did what youtube did, they would be shutdown, if a book publisher did what youtube did, they would be shutdown.

And to be clear, what youtube is doing is putting up a notice saying not to post copyrighted material, while taking no effective steps to keep it from happening. It will be up to the courts to decide if youtube is doing enough to stop copyright violations - and if they are then what measures they must comply with in order to stop the violations.

Glastonbury does not count as a direct comparison, that is criminal law, this is corporate/copyright law and the standards are very different.

ok then. How on earth are you meant to control this. It's all very well saying youtube should employ people to inspect videos before allowing them to be published, but that would cost too much money and put them out of business.

The whole point of youtube is for people to post what ever they like for a world audience to see. If people do post copyrighted material, then it's up to the copyright holder to sue that person and have the content removed.

This comment is just so inaccurate and unfounded, I don't know where to begin ripping it apart.

Why, its exactly the same principle. (as for half, i wasnt being literal :P but you gotta admit a lot of people are not on asprin).

Only because its possible for them to edit/choose the content. Take (proper) live TV, you cannot hold the TV network responsible if someone commits copyright violation or performs an obscene act or an act of extreme violence before 9am, simply because its beyond their power to do anything about it (as it is for youtube). Sure they can cut the broadcast but in many cases the gawping shocked crew are quite slow to hit the red button. (and by then the damage is done anyway)

At least you have a service which is trying to cooperate and stop it as best they can. If it gets closed down then im sute theres many up and comming companies in s.america, russia, latvia or somewhere that would LOVE to take up the slack (and they wouldnt give a toss about copyrights, nor would they need to)

Anyone remember napster? Yep, closing that down really helped. :/

I don't see why people with limited legal knowledge of the case argue about it. Clearly the person in the best situation to give a rational and logical ruling on it is the Judge. And he/she has ruled that viacom should have this information.

Why people then think they have more knowledge or legal authority than him/her to argue about it on a forum, using some really bizarre and abstract analogies, is really quite a waste of time.

So is pointing this out....I should be working.

Actually DanMan a TV company is responsible for what happens on live TV.

http://uk.reuters.com/article/entertainmentNews/idUKL0951007220080409

http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2006/nov/27/broadcasting.channel4

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/05/24/ofcom_cbb_ruling/

So if you could back up you assumed facts with evidence, then that would be a better way to make your opinion valid.

No i dont know much about the technical workings of the law. So what?, are laws always fair and just? - No (i think weve had that one before)
I also know that in some countries this kind of law has no hope of any effect.

I can however see common sense and its a service what people want. If the industry cant handle it then mabe its time for a new business approach to the way they get their ridiculous profits. If not then get out of the way for those who can rather than halt progress. (other music, media and film producers are managing to adapt so why can these big corps? -because theres less of an insane profit to be made?)

Collecting data on people posting vids is perhaps fair enough but not everyone, thats just stupid and blaming youtube wont help. (the pirates would just find/create another system anyway in a non-compliant country)

@boomboom, why do i need facts? im not trying to say "this is the way it is" im saying "this is the way it should be IMO". Anyway, if you read your own links, you will find the BBC were let off as "the breaches were not deliberate or reckless" (as they have MANY times before) and the big brother one was in trouble simply because it was not truly live anyway.

they should just start putting advertisements on it, that would solve everything. If they start controlling it, it will just become like pay tv
and there won't be as many people watching it as there are now.

some shows have legal clips posted on an official youtube channel
i was searching for "family guy cowboy gay sex" after my brother said he was learning it for an accoustic night at his local
one was a camcorder of the tv ?!?
and another was some website that has alot of whole episodes for online viewing (allegedly licenced to do so) and clips that are no more than a minute or two which would also work as streaming mobile ... id rather have family guy than adult swim scooby doo and something else that three offer me ... i still watch the odd lenore when its not one ive already seen and highly dubious news

Just have a way for users to flag videos that infringe, or have special accounts for people from the companies who can fast-track report, then you tube takes action on the videos they are pointed out to.

I'm bowing out, another discussion of intellectual property rights is a waste of my time.

You're wrong. YouTube deletes several thousands of video clips every day, that do not comply with the rules. How are they to know whether say a clip from The IT Crowd was uploaded by a copyright holder or not? Even though you have to create an account to upload stuff, it's still fairly anonymous. Just because someone is called "UniversalMusicGroup" doesn't nessecarilly mean they represent the company.

Really? So who was held responsible for Christine Chubbuck's suicide?

i had to google her
youtube had a hit in the 2nd or 3rd link but it wasnt the footage just 5 seconds of any show she could have been on

funny how there are alot of 'suicide' video's on youtube
isnt 'snuff' illigal around the world, or atleast those that seem to have rules about broadcasts etc

out of morbid curiosity i clicked a few links
one had a teenage boy allegedly blow his brains out
looked uber fake the only difference from him using his fingers shaped like a gun and the footage was the gun (toy bb or other wise) in his hands, i know movies over dramatise for effect but im pretty damn sure that more of his tiny brain would have come out, in fact nothing came out the other side

yet youtube lets this stuff stay online anyway

They do, and like flameduck stated, they remove loads every day.

Youtube should be allowed to 'remove' copyrighted content, and if required divulge the user who posted it.

They are. The problem is that a large part of the copyrighted material on YouTube, was put there by copyright holders (trailers from videogames, music videos, movie trailers, etc.) because YouTube is one of the more popular websites in the world, the copyright holders would be stupid not to have their content, available there in one form or another. It's free advertising. The problem is they want to have their cake and eat it.

maybe they need a 'public domain' clause in thier submissions forum so that they dont get this problem ever time.

have a nuke plan
tell universalmusicgroup fox and all the others that have their own content online that anything not 'user' gernerated will be trashed
so if universalmusicgroup wants its videos online it should pay for its own bandwidth and not leech off youtubes

that way if a starwars clip appears by any random persion and is not a fan altered clip it gets nuked
if its fan altered then flag it to lucas' legal dept if they say die it dies

but if you take off all the real tv/dvd/music video content all your left with is public access and sometimes they suck big time
their are a few worth watching
the vacationeers (sp)
some austrailian lego show bout video games
college humour

perhaps though there should be a section on old adverts, i got into a convo about some and although i might find one or two on line its highly unlikely id find every advert ever made online ... so a dedicated advert section would be ace as some were so good i remember the advert and not what it was selling :)

"market research is in"
"and?"
"everyone loved the advert"
"thats great"
"there is a problem"
"which is?"
"no one remembered what it was selling"

We're all going to jail. I just hope they give Mark a laptop...

That doesn't work. They already have a clause stating that you're not allowed to upload something you do not own copyright over. Apparently, regular folks don't read (or understand) legal notices.