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YouTube and the copyright cops: safe... for now? |
 If you've never heard of YouTube, let me introduce you: YouTube is a massively popular video sharing site that has quickly become one of the Internet's most trafficked websites, climbing into the top 50 of all sites online in a year's time (as tracked by Alexa). According to Nielsen NetRatings, the site serves almost 13 million users a month and serves up 50 million videos each day. Maybe you've been by the site to see Jon Stewart's hilarious (yet depressingly accurate) coverage of the "'Net neutrality" debate, or maybe you enjoyed watching Ernesto Hoost and friends in Silent Library. And maybe, just maybe, you've enjoyed some videos that weren't uploaded without the copyright owner's permission, too.
See, YouTube's continued survival is bit of a mystery to some. The site thrives in part on what appears to be copyright infringement, but aside from a few scuffles (most notably with NBC), there's been nothing Napster-ish about its history. TV clips, movie clips, you name it... they all appear on the site regularly, and without authorization. So far, the major lawsuits haven't shown up.
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