YouTube Cuts 30,000 Illegal Clips

[TravelSite]

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System: The following message was cut out of thread at: http://www.webmasterworld.com/goog/3127168.htm [webmasterworld.com] by engine - 2:27 pm on Oct. 20, 2006 <small>(utc +1)</small>

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The BBC is reporting that 30,000 vids have been taken down after Japanese companies contacted them over copyright issues.

Video-sharing service YouTube has wiped nearly 30,000 files from its website after Japanese media companies said their copyright was being infringed.
The Japan Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers found 29,549 music video, movie and TV clips had been posted without permission.

[news.bbc.co.uk...]

I wonder if more will follow and whether the equity deal allows them to post lots of vids from those companies or still requires them to remove the offending material.

It will be interesting to see whether it will retain all of its users if its starts to remove lots of clips (especially when they are other less selective sites).

[edited by: engine at 1:27 pm (utc) on Oct. 20, 2006]

[MrSpeed]

Phew! My Wham! videos made the cut.

//I promise no more Wham! comments

[bts111]

I hope that none of those videos were in my favs!

[rohitj]

I can forsee youtube (google) hiring a lot of "interns" to remove a couple hundred thousand more.

[fischermx]

They were music videos? I hope they were.

There are a lot of Japanese hilarious videos of very practical jokes...
I remember one in a sort of snow ski station. The guys were sitting in a supposedly massage chair, then all of the sudden the chair turned up to the wall, the wall opend, the chair turned on a engine or something and the guy got threw the wall to ski several hundred of meters wearing nothing more than a towel!

[Leosghost]

wearing nothing more than a towel!

surely that was a wham video

[fischermx]

wearing nothing more than a towel!
surely that was a wham video

No wait, I remember more now. Due the speed I remember a couple of guys even lost the towel!
So, they were going down the hill at 60mph, at freezing temperture and nude!
And the most strange, must of them were laughing down the road!
Well, I guess you have nothing else to do in that situation ...

[MisterT]

ummm 30,0000 only scratches the surface of bogus videos on there

[BillyS]

This kind of stuff kills the appeal of YouTube. My guess is they've got another 250,000 to go. The only thing that will be left is the soft porn stuff.

I'm still not sure why Google wanted this thing.

[pctec]

I wonder why no one had a problem with the videos BEFORE Google bought them. Seems like free publicity to me...

[nutsandbolts]

I'm still not sure why Google wanted this thing.

Neither do I. The only reason I go there is to watch "pirated" TV shows.

Once they get cut, what's left?

[fischermx]

A 1.6 billion mistake.

[MisterT]

Is it just me, or are they already getting more strict on copywrited stuff? In the "good old days" I could go on YouTube right after a pay per view event (UFC, for example) and watch it for free. There is tons of legit content on there, but how many people are sitting around watching grandma's dog walk around her apartment for 20 minutes?

[hughie]

So long as they don't remove the vic and bob masterchef sketch i don't mind.

[rohitj]

There's a good amount of home videos on there from all over the world, bands that voluntairly put stuff, etc., There's no doubt that their views would decline if they took off the priated stuff, but in the end this is definately a gem that can be made profitable if done right.

[Compworld]

The beginning of the end.. Everything will become censored and all the good stuff will go bye-bye. That is what usually happens when sites become corporate.

[gibbergibber]

-- I wonder why no one had a problem with the videos BEFORE Google bought them.--

Because Google has enough money to be a target for being sued, but YouTube on its own didn't.

Google knows if people did sue them successfully over copyright infringement due to videos on YouTube, and they had to pay out compensation, it would open the floodgates for everyone who has any kind of copyright over a video posted without their permission on YouTube.

[nutsandbolts]

Hugie: Great clip!

Nothing like a slice of - The Weekenders The Meat Festival - as well ;)

[crak_bot]

Everyone is letting the copyright thing sort of slide right now but eventually it's going to have to come to a head. And the old model will win.

If you let Youtube make money off pirated content (that's basically what it is doing), why don't I just take content, edit in a short ad for my company at the end, and post it. Then Youtube and me are making money and the original content maker is making nothing. Sure, people say they are gaining exposure but exposure is "theoretical money" The money me and youtube made off off them is real.

This can't last forever no matter what kind of deals are made. The deals would have to be too complex in the current wild west model of Youtube.

Evetnually each media company will have it's own on-demand video portal and sites like youtube will be forgotten.

[Darkelve]

"Evetnually each media company will have it's own on-demand video portal and sites like youtube will be forgotten. "

IMhO the media companies would do better to cut a deal with Youtube to distribute their content through YouTube and create money for themselves that way.

I'm watching the Full Metal Alchemist episodes now through Youtube, but I'd pay to be able to watch them full-screen, high-quality. For a fair price, of course.