I hate you Viacom.

Stupidass Viacom. Go sit in the corner with the RIAA.

At first glance, that statement looks a bit incongruent. Viacom is suing a company, not 16 year-old music lovers like the RIAA. But, YouTube is a community, full of protective members looking to hold together a good thing, a place where they're comfortable and happy. And Viacom doesn't give a shit about them.

I get why they do it. The lawyers come in, blind to the free advertising, and want what YouTube already has. They look at it as if it were a series of x's and o's or 1's and 0's, and think they can offer us the same. Instead, they rush a shit product, and think sueing is a sufficient way to stuff it down our throats.

Maybe my view of what we need is a bit utopian, but I really just want to go to one place for all my video watching needs. Viacom can fuck off.

One of the great parts of Digg is the comment section. It'll always give you a quick overview of community reaction. Here's some comments:

From retroduds. "Boycott Viacom."

From the captainjs. "Man... is it just me or are companies turning into big greedy babies."

From moocat. "Viacom had all the time in the world (and still does) to make a simple video site where you can go and watch their shows with small advertisements but they chose not to. Instead they load up a page with crappy graphics, slow loading times and a bad player and then complain that they tried to do the same thing but YouTube stole all their traffic. It's a total setup of moronic proportions. This is a problem with most of american "competition", people don't fight at the product and quality level anymore, they quibble over legalese and faux marketing tactics."

From Stonewaljackson. "how can we collectively tell viacom to suck our balls?"

From Yez70. "I have parental blocked their channels on my cable box and cancelled Showtime and The Movie Channel. My Blockbuster Online membership is also being cancelled. The greedy SOBs can forget about winning me back this time.

I really liked Viacom when they had started playing nice with Google."

From DCgamer. "Here are the Viacom channels to Boycott...someone else can work out the advertisers.

  Atom Entertainment, Inc.
  BET
  College Publisher
  Comedy Central
  CMT: Country Music Television
  GameTrailers.com
  Harmonix Music Systems, Inc.
  IFILM
  LOGO
  MTV: Music Television
  MTV2
  mtvU
  MTV Networks International
  MTV Networks Online
  Neopets
  Nickelodeon
  Nick at Nite
  Noggin
The N
Spike TV
TV Land
VH1
Xfire
MTV Networks Digital Suite"

And it goes on, and on and on. Haven't we seen these mistakes before? Will these companies ever learn? Probably not as long as lawyers are running the show...

Comments

[Lori Magno]

Rage on Paulie! I will purge the bastards from my life (except for the Daily Show - I love the Jon Stewart madly.) Are there no marketers at Viacom who get it? Really? After this much time of sucking they haven't found anyone to 'splain what all the kids are doing? Maybe they need a "Truth" campaign directed their way. Dumbassery - I hate it!

[Cam Beck]

I expect this is just a power play to get the ball rolling -- because that's what idiots do when they reach an impasse -- sic lawyers on each other. They'll probably settle and reach an agreement that accords compensation for content.

(By the way, has anyone checked to see if there is anyone at Microsoft sitting on the BOD at Viacom, or vice versa?)

Don't worry. Before too long you'll see photographs plastered all over the tech news websites showing the two CEOs shaking hands.

[Marcus Brown]

fucking idiots.
Good evening.

[Latisha Simmons]

Good read.. I dislike Viacom a lot.. Especially when I noticed them trying to jack my style and run me out of business...These corporate folks will never learn...

Peace

[Paul McEnany]

Lori- I think they'll get their fair share of truth campaign. Problem is, they won't pay any attention to it. They just want control over their bullshit. So fine, fuck 'em!

Cam- I hope so. I'll keep my fingers crossed that whatever deal is reached doesn't permanently cripple youtube for everyone else.

And, I checked it out, and I didn't see any microsoft crossover. That'd been awesome if there was!

Marcus- I second that!

Latisha- We're on the same team, then! They suck!

!!! Three more exclamation points for good measure.

[Pirate]

Hey, I'm going to find out where you live and steal all the stuff you worked so hard to get. Now you can start over and make a living fipping burgers. It's theft plain and simple. You have never tried to sell anything you created, you have no origial ideas to sell. If you did and that was the way you made a living how would you feel if I stole your stuff posted on the Inet and you got squat for all of your time. Youtube/Google doesn't stand a chance. You know nothing about law.
The DMA will not protect them, it was written for Inet service providers, like Sprint and ATT. YouTube is a Web Site not provider, they cannot pirate others work to make money. They will lose big time. They have no legal defense.
Fuck You, asshole

[Pirate]

Oops, I just copied your whole web page and added a .HTM it now launches right from my computer and looks just like the real thing. I'll just change your name to mine and put in my picture in your place. Now I can host it any where I want. You can do all of the writing and I'll get the benefits. You don't have a copyright notice on your page so I guess that's OK with you. Everything on the internet is free, you said it not me. Keep up the good work.

[Marcus]

Pirate, does your mother know you're still up? I'm sure she'd be rather cross if she knew you were. I think she's been letting you watch too much "Kim Possible", although I have to admit that I'm a little disappointed you didn't end your comments with a menacing evil laugh.

Now off to bed, it's way past your bed time.

Night Night.

[WillWaugh]

Paul

Why do you want to boycott the advertisers? Don't be hater.

Will

[WillWaugh]

A hater. Don't be a hater. Damn I hate when I hit Post without proofing