Internet
Pact on Copyrights
Viacom, the Walt Disney Company, Microsoft and other media companies have agreed to a set of guidelines to protect copyrights online but Google, owner of the Web’s biggest video site, was notably absent from the pact.
The companies agreed to eliminate copyright-infringing content uploaded by Web users and to block any pirated material before it is publicly accessible.
“These principles offer a road map for unlocking the enormous potential of online video and user-generated content,” Disney’s chief executive, Robert A. Iger, said yesterday in a statement issued by the participating companies.
Interest in online video has boomed over the last two years, putting media content owners at odds with video-host Web sites when their users upload copyrighted material without permission.
(Published by Times Online, October 19, 2007)
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