The end of video sharing as we know it is officially over.
Following Google’s acquisition of YouTube, several stories have come to light that suggest that the video sharing free for all has come to a close. Two of YouTube’s biggest competitors are being sued by Universal Music. YouTube has escaped this lawsuit. Just before YouTube was acquired by Google, they apparently gave away stock options to the major music labels in exchange for legal protection. These stock options could have netted each of the participating recording labels upto $50m in total. Google YouTube is now acting more responsible and acting responsibly on demands by the Japanese to remove offensive material from the YouTube network. I doubt this would have happened prior to the Google acquisition.
Here are the headlines in summary (all provided by the lovely Mashable):