Viacom tells YouTube to remove 100,000 videos

Media giant Viacom has told YouTube to remove more than 100,000 video clips from its site. 

In a written statement provided to vnunet.com, Viacom accused YouTube and its parent company Google of knowingly profiting from stolen material and repeatedly breaking promises to filter out copyrighted video. 

"Virtually every other distributor has acknowledged the fair value of entertainment content and has taken deliberate steps to concluding agreements with content providers," said Viacom.

"YouTube and Google retain all of the revenue generated from this practice, without extending fair compensation to the people who have expended all of the effort and cost to create it."

A Google spokesman told vnunet.com that the company will comply with Viacom's request.

But the search giant added: "It is unfortunate that Viacom will no longer be able to benefit from YouTube's passionate audience which has helped to promote many of Viacom's shows."

Viacom's holdings include Paramount Pictures, MTV Networks, DreamWorks and Comedy Central. The company stated that YouTube had served over 1.2 billion streams of its copyrighted video content. 

YouTube has already run into trouble with Viacom over its content, and was obliged to remove several Comedy Central clips late last year.

YouTube is also under fire from a Japanese copyright group which had previously requested the removal of 30,000 videos. YouTube executives are scheduled to meet with the group next week. 

Viacom said in the statement to Google that it did not oppose the online distribution of its clips and that it would be open to an agreement that allows its clips to remain on YouTube.

But Viacom wants control over the content in what it called "a fair and authorised distribution model".

YouTube said that it has a strict policy of removing any copyrighted material at the request of the owner.

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