The impact of Google's new ownership of YouTube has revealed itself this week in a big way. According to Ars Technica, the video sharing site
removed 29,549 Japanese videos from its database at the request of JSRAC, the Japan Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers, whose members identified the videos as containing unauthorized materials from Japanese movies, TV shows, and music videos. This is the first such large-scale removal of content from YouTube at the request of copyright holders, and is undoubtedly the shape of things to come. JSRAC says that they are considering petitioning YouTube to implement a better screening process for unauthorized uploads, but unless I'm mistaken Google has previously said they're already working on that. For a little perspective, according to a July report,
over 65,000 videos are uploaded to YouTube every day. Still, I'm a little worried what this means for one of my favorite blogs,
TV in Japan, but at the moment they don't seem any worse for wear.
Tags: copyright, google, japan, jsrac, video, youtube
