Content Owners sue Viacom

Great day in the morning; Content owners who were knocked off-line by Viacom's indiscriminate shotgun approach to using the DMCA have taken a strike in return. When you fire off a DMCA "takedown" notice -- as you might remember from the Michael Crook incident -- you're making a claim that the content you want removed actually belongs to you. The content owners affected by Viacom's less than precision attack on YouTube are suing Viacom for claiming rights to content it doesn't own.

This is a pretty clear cut battle of corporate rights versus citizen rights. Viacom is playing the gotta break eggs to make an omlet defense, downplaying the chilling effect its indiscriminate use of the DMCA had on other legitimate copyright holders. What's flawed about that logic is this; If Viacom's copyrights are important, so are yours. We must seek to defend independent producers just as vigilantly as we aim to protect the Viacoms of the world.

[via Techdirt]

See Also:
Viacom files copyright suit against Google for $1 billion
EFF looking for victims of Viacom
Viacom becomes DMCA bully

Tags: copyfight, copyright, DMCA, google, takedown notices, TakedownNotices, viacom, youtube