There's a lot at stake for YouTube and Viacom and other content owners in Viacom's lawsuit against Google under the Digital Millennium Copyright Act of 1998. If Google can't provide systems that quickly remove copyrighted clips, it would severely damage YouTube's business prospects. On the other hand, content owners have the right to have their copyrights respected.
This case is a reminder that copyrights need to be respected on the Web, as they have been in print, records and other media. Law firms that would never include a copyrighted photo in one of their brochures may not be as careful on the Web, particularly with multimedia. It might add a lot of impact and personality to have music from Celine Dion kicking off a law firm video. But if the video is for marketing, recruiting or other business purposes, the artist must be compensated. Even if monetary damages were small, no law firm wants to be accused of copyright infringement.
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