Google Puts Aside $200 Mil for SueTube

Eyeball War update:

Google finished its acquisition of YouTube by putting a chunk of change away for the inevitable copyright lawsuits (news story below).

Question: are we now living in the "golden age" of YouTube and MySpace, both of which are still rather Wild Wild West with the bits and the bytes? I wonder what those sites will be like after NewsCorp (which bought MySpace for what, $650 million or so) and Yahoo have had a year or so to deal with legal challenges while getting the word out: there's a new Sheriff in town. I'm guessing the townspeople will likely be rather hostile.

Does the pirated material move overnight to some other site with enough server capacity?

11/15 wire story:

"Google set aside more than $200 million to cover any losses or damages stemming from the acquisition of video-sharing site YouTube.

Google completed the $1.65 billion deal, which called for Google to issue more than 3.66 million shares of its prized stock, the company said Tuesday. But 12.5 percent of the equity will be placed in escrow for one year "to secure certain indemnification obligations," Google said in a statement.

Indemnification is used to protect against losses or damages. The amount set aside means less for YouTube owners and founders Chad Hurley and Steve Chen. Google did not provide a reason for the indemnification, but it's likely related to YouTube's use of copyrighted video uploaded by registered users without permission. YouTube has a policy of removing content at the request of copyright holders, but the fact that protected material can be easily found on the site leaves it open to potential lawsuits, experts said.

To limit the possibility of a crippling suit, YouTube has also signed revenue-sharing deals with major media companies, and has promised to provide online tools that copyright holders can use to find unauthorized content and remove it."