As we covered earlier in the year, VKontakte, Russia’s largest social network, has been in court defending itself against an order to remove its file-sharing functionality from its site. One of the largest record labels, EMI, led the charge and won the case. VKontakte recently appealed, but have lost the appeal again.
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Viacom Wins Reversal in Landmark YouTube Case (Reuters)
A U.S. appeals court dealt Google Inc a major defeat by reviving lawsuits by Viacom Inc, the English Premier League and various other media companies over the use of copyrighted videos on Google’s YouTube service without permission. Bloomberg Viacom sued in 2007, seeking $1 billion in damages and claiming that YouTube users were illegally uploading thousands of videos of Viacom television programs, such as South Park and The Daily Show With Jon Stewart, and movies from its Paramount Pictures studio. ZDNet The case translates to putting the burden of responsibility back on the website owner, rather than the uploader, which could send massive ripples through the online community from search engines to social networks, like Facebook and Google+. Gizmodo The outcome of the case will hinge entirely on whether YouTube “knew” that all of this copyrighted material was out there and what “knowing” actually means. Read more
As we’ve mentioned in the past, VKontakte, the largest social network in Russia, is a hotbed for all sorts of rebellious activity. From helping to spark protests to file sharing, the site is often the subject of scrutiny and admonishment. A recent study at Paidcontent shows that while labels are trying to improve music sales in the country, it’s been decreasing steadily due to a “culture of copyright infringement.”
If you can put together an iPhone application that enables VKontakte users to view their profiles, exchange messages, watch videos and do all the other things that VKontakters do, the company is ready to reward you with 5m rubles. It’s part of a contest they are launching to have contributors build their official iPhone app and expand their services into the iOS arena.
Vkontakte, one of the largest social networks in Russia, has been asked by a consortium of Russian producers to pull down a bunch of content uploaded by its users. The uploading of illegal content is always a hot topic once a social network comes of age and demands enough attention, and this news can be attributed to the growing pains of the still expanding Vkontakte network.
If it weren’t for the light bulb, groups of people could not gather together at night to work and read. This is one of the examples that Marshall McLuhan uses to explain how the medium — or the technology — is vitally important in creating new experiences for humankind. Is social media such a technology? We’ve had the web forever, but like many pundits pontificate, the web was about pages, now it’s about people, and that’s because of social media. And, like many protests before it, the current set of protests in Russia are using two main services for their revolution: VKontakte and Facebook.
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