This is the sort of thing I would get yelled at for suggesting in elementary school.
Instead of acting like a small child, I think Google should just stall this in a higher court, or just not give it up at all. Nobody is going to go to jail, and Google has more than enough money to buy whoever they need.
Viacom lost a long time ago. Nobody is interested in traditional television anymore. We want it on-demand online, with comments and minimal advertising. You can sue whoever you want, it's not going to make anyone change the way they think. They can either slowly die, or they can embrace reality.
Have you watched traditional television lately? I made the mistake of doing so; there is about 25 minutes per hour of pure advertising. They play it several dB louder than the program, so you have to constantly play with the volume (I just muted it). Then, you pay $60/month to get it into your house! Why are they surprised that people are going elsewhere for the content? Who want to pay $25/month to watch advertisements!?
Anyway, this lawsuit shows that they are slowly dying. Google's data won't help them with anything other than "hey, people like our content, but yet they won't watch the ads!" They should already know that by now... so I don't see what anyone will gain.
I just discovered that the average number of hours spent in front of a TV (per person, nation-wide) has increased again, and not just among adults, but among teens and even pre-teens.
Apparently people like that junk. Perhaps proliferation of HD picture contributes to this, because let's face it, internet-powered video looks like crap, even iTunes' $2.99 multi-gigabyte downloads aren't as crisp as TimeWarner's HD programming.
P.S. Apologies for being unable to provide a source, there were a few links here on HN, actually, confirming this.
It's a nice thought, but it'd be a waste of trees and I doubt Google would do that. If they did only, say, a couple trucks' worth that way, that'd leave enough digital that Viacom could ignore the paper. Nice thought, though.
Instead of acting like a small child, I think Google should just stall this in a higher court, or just not give it up at all. Nobody is going to go to jail, and Google has more than enough money to buy whoever they need.
Viacom lost a long time ago. Nobody is interested in traditional television anymore. We want it on-demand online, with comments and minimal advertising. You can sue whoever you want, it's not going to make anyone change the way they think. They can either slowly die, or they can embrace reality.
Have you watched traditional television lately? I made the mistake of doing so; there is about 25 minutes per hour of pure advertising. They play it several dB louder than the program, so you have to constantly play with the volume (I just muted it). Then, you pay $60/month to get it into your house! Why are they surprised that people are going elsewhere for the content? Who want to pay $25/month to watch advertisements!?
Anyway, this lawsuit shows that they are slowly dying. Google's data won't help them with anything other than "hey, people like our content, but yet they won't watch the ads!" They should already know that by now... so I don't see what anyone will gain.