YouTube in $1bn copyright lawsuit

Over 150,000 unauthorised clips of copyrighted programming have been viewed 1.5 billion times on YouTube, according to a lawsuit brought against the video-sharing website.

The clips, which include programmes such as SpongeBob Square Pants, South Park and Al Gore's documentary An Inconvenient Truth are part of a $1bn (over £500m) lawsuit that Viacom, a US media conglomerate, is bringing against Google, YouTube's owners.

Lawyers for Viacom claim that the internet has led to "an explosion of copyright infringement" by YouTube and others.

Google, however, refutes Viacom's claims and said that YouTube "goes far beyond its legal obligations in assisting content owners to protect their works."

At the heart of the issue is policing content on the net. Google says that by seeking to make carriers and hosting providers, like YouTube, liable for content on the internet, Viacom "threatens the way hundreds of millions of people legitimately exchange information, news, entertainment and political and artistic expression."

For its part, Viacom says that Google and YouTube had done "little or nothing" to stop copyright infringement on the internet.

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