Google, Viacom sling mud in YouTube court fight

The Viacom-Google battle over YouTube's alleged copyright infringement has been going on mostly behind the scenes for years. But court documents made public this week shed some light on the unfolding drama.Viacom filed suit against Google in 2007 for allegedly allowing users to upload more than 100,000 videos clips containing copyrighted Viacom content, including parts of shows from MTV, Comedy Central, and Nickelodeon. The suit, which seeks $1 billion in damages, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.Now the court is making documents public. Revelations include a Google claim that Viacom employees posted clips on YouTube and complained about YouTube hosting them. The documents also reveal Viacom's unsuccessful bid for YouTube in October 2006. Google won the bidding wars and paid $1.65 billion for the video-sharing site.Google beat out Viacom, and Viacom has had sour grapes ever since, said Ilan Barzilay, a litigator at Seyfarth Shaw in Boston. As far as immediate impact on these things on the lawsuit, this isn't going to mean much. The parties are filing motions and the court will be addressing issues on summary judgment. The court may or may not ultimately decide the case on summary judgment or may cue it up for trial, which would be a circus.