Some Media Companies Choose to Profit From Pirated YouTube Clips

By BRIAN STELTER

Published: August 15, 2008

After years of regarding pirated video on YouTube as a threat, some major media companies are having a change of heart, treating it instead as an advertising opportunity.

In the last few months, CBS, Universal Music, Lionsgate, Electronic Arts and other companies have stopped prodding YouTube to remove unauthorized clips of their movies, music videos and other content and started selling advertising against them...

“We don’t want to condone people taking our intellectual property and using it without our permission,” said Curt Marvis, the president of digital media at Lionsgate Entertainment, which owns films like “Dirty Dancing” and the “Saw” series of horror movies.

“But we also don’t like the idea of keeping fans of our products from being able to engage with our content.” he said. “For the most part, people who are uploading videos are fans of our movies. They’re not trying to be evil pirates, and they’re not trying to get revenue from it.”

...For example, a user-uploaded video for the music video for “Disturbia” by the artist Rihanna is still online, even though YouTube makes it easy to remove. The Rihanna video page was uploaded by a fan three weeks ago and has attracted 1.2 million views. It now features a prominent ad and a small disclaimer that cites the Universal Music Group as the owner.

Under pressure from media companies, YouTube introduced a technology last fall called Video ID which allowed copyright owners to compare the digital fingerprints of their videos with material on YouTube, then flag infringing material for removal...