Viacom’s billion-dollar lawsuit lives on
The billion-dollar Viacom lawsuit against YouTube/Google trudges on. After a federal judge sided completely with YouTube in summary judgment, Viacom has now filed its appeal to take the case to the next level.
Judge Louis Stanton’s opinion on the case came out last month. The brief opinion agreed with YouTube that the company had a “safe harbor” against such lawsuits because the infringing video clips in question were uploaded by third parties. In the judge’s view, the DMCA takedown notification system was working just fine, and Viacom had no right to go further and seek money directly from YouTube.