Video site sells to settle lawsuit

Cory Bergman February 12th, 2007

User video site Bolt has agreed to be sold to GoFish to finance a settlement with Universal Music Group, which sued the site over copyright infringement. This is a victory for traditional media in its quest to keep control over its content, and it raises the stakes for user video sites to create better filters. Universal still has an ongoing lawsuit with News Corp’s MySpace and Sony’s Grouper, and MySpace is expected to announce today that it’s starting to test a video filtering technology that would automatically block videos that use Universal songs. Under the DMCA, internet companies are protected if they promptly remove copyrighted content when asked. It’s unclear how fast Bolt removed the content, but Universal is arguing that sites like MySpace and YouTube don’t qualify for DMCA protection. Again, the Bolt case was a settlement, not a court ruling, but still unnerving for user video sites.