I don't know, John. Copyrights have their place; if people where selling copies of your book and pocketing the profits would you say, "Ah, that is just the new way of doing business." I think you would throw some shots too, no?

Basically, I think most youtubers want free shit, and cool shit, and they will enjoy whatever is there. IF TW media is not shown, so be it. Will they boycott or make any effort to get back at TW . . . that I think takes too much thought. Why spend your time doing that when there is so much cool shit to watch? I doubt most users will have any beef with TW for a lawsuit. The bloggers will do their thing, but I really do not think most people feel much allegiance to Google or Youtube, particularly while they rake in billions of dollars. How can you feel sorry for 20 and 30 something billionaires who at least so far, do not seem to give much back (though they may some day). If Google/Youtube is somehow different than TW, and feel they deserve more respect and allegiance from users, I do not think they have proven it yet. I do think they are better, but not enough to get people very stirred about a lawsuit in my view.

• Posted by: Soreng
• October 12, 2006 9:33 PM

I have to agree with Soreng. Most youtubers want free s**t.

I just got finished listening to a recent IT Conversations podcast, a session from the 2005 Web 2.0 conference entitled "What Teens Want". In fact, I think you (John) introduced the session. (I wasn't there myself, so apologies to all for whom this is old hat.)

And the takeaway from the interview with these five teenagers was that the two things they wanted from people building next gen services was (1) "more free stuff", and (2) fewer ads. Ads were really starting to piss some of these teens off. And all but one girl (if I remember correctly) had not paid for a single piece of media online. The one girl who had paid had only bought 10 iTunes songs, and had 1490 other copied/downloaded ones. Every other kid either ripped tunes from their friends or used bittorrent.

So YouTube came along and gave them more free stuff. They got half of what they want. But is Google now going to come along and give them fewer ads? I don't think so. And you think that is going to endear Google to these kids? When they see "Ads by Gooooooooogle" at the beginning of each video clip? The kids don't care about the brand. They just want free stuff.

Copyright itself is basically good, but using it to bash people is not. And DRM is particularly, insidiously evil, and it needs to die. But you don't combat DRM and copyright abuses by throwing up massive-scale YouTubian piracy, setting a block on your shoulder, and saying, "so sue me!" Escalation is not the solution.

(Funny thing is, I've spoken with high-ranking insiders at Google over the years about this copyright issue, and what is happening now completely contradicts everything they've told me. I'm really amazed by this complete about-face that we're seeing right now. I really wonder what sort of internal discussions Google has been having lately, if everyone is in agreement or if there is a lot of debate right now about this whole move.)

• Posted by: JG
• October 13, 2006 12:01 AM

This article doesn't deserve a response. This blog should not be included in mtech.

YOU LACK ALL KNOWLEDGE OF BUSINESS AND LAW.

the problem with web 2.0 is that any idiot can put up a blog and pretend they know something. what a waste of 5 minutes of my life.

• Posted by: mtechReader
• October 13, 2006 11:30 AM

>>> for a shot across the bow may bring a broadside from the other side >

I don't really follow you here John. I agree with you and Bob Dylan that "The Times They are a Changin'", and that "The Time Warner's they are NOT a changin'". However I don't see how bringing out the legal beasts will hurt Time Warner. Frankly, I think they just want Google to throw money at them. As the Napster buyout proved all this has little to do with "rights", it's a money grab.

• Posted by: Joe Hunkins
• October 13, 2006 2:33 PM

It will probably never happen, but Google does have the equivalent of a nuclear weapon to fight back with: Time Warner completely drops off the Google Ads and Search radar.
That would hurt.

• Posted by: Anne O'Neimaus
• October 13, 2006 2:36 PM

>>> the problem with web 2.0 is that any idiot can put up a blog and pretend they know something

Problem?! Maybe, but it also might be considered *Revolutionary tipping point of global significance in the history of communication*

Six one way, half a dozen the other I guess.

• Posted by: Joe Hunkins
• October 13, 2006 3:31 PM

John,

Your comments are bang on--just another sign of old media writhing in its death throes, wallowing in its own detritus. Now if the folks at FM can ever respond to emails, perhaps you will have a better model for the future.

• Posted by: TomBomb
• October 13, 2006 3:48 PM

What emails? Sorry if we have been swamped.

• Posted by: John Battelle
• October 13, 2006 3:58 PM

I think the whole YouTube aquisition is questionable for this reason, in addition to the sillyness of the price. I'm surprised Google's lawyers didn't spell this future of lawsuits out for them when the decision to aquire was being made. Companies get big, their bank accounts too, and everyone else, lawyers leading the charge, wants to sue their way to the wealth.

• Posted by: Deep
• October 13, 2006 5:24 PM

Time Warner reminds me of George Steinbrenner. They are always trying to buy a penant. They spend all their money on has-beens or soon-to-be has-beens and then begin crying when one of the other teams picks up a good player. Google will be alright. No worries Mate!

• Posted by: garypool
• October 13, 2006 5:38 PM

The YouTube boys were brilliant to sell the problem to deeper pockets and walk away with Google stock. I'd sell as much as I could.

This is a mess for at least three reasons:
1) There's not yet a business model
2) There are major copyright issues that could eliminate much of the content on YouTube.
3) The rest of the stuff (submitted by copyright owners) is based on volunteer workers who make no money. Now there are places to distribute your content AND get some of the advertising revenue (Revver/Metacafe). The creators will follow the money, the viewers will follow the creators, and the advertising will follow the viewers eyeballs.

• Posted by: nalts
• October 14, 2006 2:54 AM