Japanese group not pleased with YouTube's copyright plans
A group of Japanese entertainment companies is criticizing Google for not doing enough to keep pirated material off YouTube.
The group also said that it wants Google to disclose more details about the technology it plans to use to protect copyright and said the search company was taking too long in unveiling the technology, according to The Associated Press.
"YouTube has to stop how it runs its site and get rid of the illegal clips. We want them to reset the service," composer Hideki Matsutake is quoted as saying at a press conference in Tokyo on Thursday.
"What's important to us is what YouTube can do immediately," said Mizuo Sugawara of the Japanese Society for Rights of Authors, Composers and Publishers. "We have no guarantee whether the new technology will even work."
The coalition has met with YouTube and Google executives twice on the matter, including earlier in the week, the report said. The viral video site, which Google acquired last year, is hugely popular in Japan. The site removed nearly 30,000 files in October after the Japanese television, music and film companies complained, the AP said.
Viacom sued Google in March, accusing YouTube of "massive intentional copyright infringement."
Last week, a Google lawyer said in a court hearing that Google will launch in September a system designed to keep pirated material off the site.
Google representatives did not immediately respond to an e-mail seeking comment on the criticism from Japan.
Elinor Mills covers Internet security and privacy. She joined CNET News in 2005 after working as a foreign correspondent for Reuters in Portugal and writing for The Industry Standard, the IDG News Service, and the Associated Press. E-mail Elinor. 
It really ticks me off when content is not delivered worldwide, is difficult to import, and then you're expected not to pirate it... and even when it is availible, it's quite expensive ( To buy a 'season's worth of anime, which may be the entire series, costs about $100 oftentimes wheras a US sitcom is maybe $30-40 for the same number of episodes).
hmm.... that logic doesn't seem to work for me.
- $100 is nothing
- by perfectblue97 August 4, 2007 9:52 AM PDT
- Be glad that you live in the US, if you lived in another English speaking country (aside from Canada, that is), you'd be paying much more that $100, and you'd be getting it up to 2 years late.
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(4 Comments)Australia, New Zealand and Britain get a much worse deal. Often Anime shows never even ship there and they have to buy in from America just to see things that were out in Japan maybe 4 years ago.