Concerned about Youtube movies and AdSense ads

Forum Moderators: martinibuster

Message Too Old, No Replies

Concerned about Youtube movies and AdSense ads

greedy player

5:54 am on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

Once upon a time I remember people saying "Youtube" had adsense ads, and we all knew it broke the google rule, no copyright movies, we all know they've been taken to court over copyright material and had to delete much of their content whilst in the past Adsense was being used at the time... We all know this, why didn't google do anything about it, how did Youtube get away with it for so long, is this because Google adsense on Youtube made them great income and since youtube no longer display adsense google bought them out for this exact reason?

I always wonder why YouTube never went ahead with adsense, why Google buy YouTube, why any of it is worth 1.65Billion over, surely theres no profit in YouTube, we all know to serve video traffic will cost something somewhere alot of bandwidth to rent out.

Remember the old days "youtube has copyright ads with adsense why can't we"... now think who owns it now.

jomaxx

6:13 am on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

There's a current article in Slate that analyzes this issue. The upshot seems to be that as long as the content is user-uploaded and YouTube complies with DMCA requests to remove infringing videos, they're more or less in the clear.

hunderdown

2:40 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

Don't forget that Google bought a lot of "dark fiber" a year or two (or three?) ago. No obvious use for it at the time. Now there is...

The TV networks, among others, have VERY mixed feelings about YouTube. You can get exposure for a new series there, for example. Or a share in the advertising income--some deals have already been made. They are going to work with Google on this. YouTube is simply NOT a threat to them in the way that the file-sharing networks were to the music industry.

So I think the costs to Google are lower, and the income possibilities better, than you may be assuming.

mzanzig

2:47 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

I do not think that the ads did very well. I noticed that the ads on Youtube were often off-topic, i.e. not related to the video content. Also a lot of what I think were CPM ads. Nope, these did not do well.

What's interesting though: Google had a very good insight into YouTube, they not only had the outbound traffic indicators (from Google to Youtube), but also the site statistics as well (through Adsense). At least they know what they've acquired. :-)

danimal

6:10 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

one pundit estimated that google paid ~$48 per user for youtube... everyone who has paid that kind of money for traffic, please raise your hand :-)

one big problem with the dmca "protecting" youtube is that it doesn't account for copyright owners who sue google without first filing a dmca complaint to have their content removed... the issue is far from being settled.

jomaxx

6:41 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

Far from settled, sure. But I think the point is that copyright owner's CAN'T sue first because YouTube isn't liable, according to the wording of the law.

danimal

9:25 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

there is nothing in the dmca that makes it mandatory for copyright owners to notify thieves that they are stealing content.

by your logic, people who videotape movies in theaters and sell 'em on street corners would not be guilty of copyright theft if the mpaa told 'em to stop doing it... but we know that they do indeed go to jail, without the mpaa serving 'em a cease and desist first.

remember the reginald denny beating during the l.a. riots? i think that the guy who owns that footage has a lawsuit pending against youtube(?), and afaik, he never notified youtube of their copyright infringment before he filed the lawsuit.

no doubt google will overwhelm his case with their army of lawyers, but that doesn't make it right.

this all ties back into putting up ads on the same page with stolen content... ever notice how google video does not put up adsense with it's videos? when you are obviously profiting from stolen content, the degree of liability is a lot more serious.

jomaxx

10:11 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

It's not MY logic, I don't give a cuss one way or the other. It's the definitions laid out in the wording of the relevant law. YouTube is acting as the equivalent of an ISP and thus has protection against such lawsuits as long as they take reasonable action when notified of infringing material. Just read the article.

Lagamorph

10:32 pm on Oct 27, 2006 (gmt 0)

and since youtube no longer display adsense google bought them out for this exact reason?

I still see AS on you tube.

danimal

2:56 pm on Oct 28, 2006 (gmt 0)

here is another take on the issue: [theregister.co.uk...]

greedy player

6:19 am on Oct 30, 2006 (gmt 0)

read that article and laughed, 1.6billion albatroz... if that was the case google would be known as fools... but we're talking about the big G so why don't they turn youtube into the new google videos or somthing. meh.

hyperkik

5:07 pm on Oct 30, 2006 (gmt 0)

The article's logic seems a bit tortured. If you assume that the service does not induce copyright infringement, the addition of ads (or, more correctly, a better targeting of ads) wouldn't change that fact. The question was never whether or not Grokster's ads were well-targeted.

You don't need to look very hard to find copyright violations on the web, often on pages which are smothered with contextual ads, and often hosted on free services which pay for themselves by posting ads on pages which display the hosted content. The author seems to be suggesting that somehow this is different because it's video (as opposed to text and still photographs) but doesn't support that case.