(Dieser Artikel ist auch in deutscher Sprache verfügbar)

A set of principles desired to create an online environment for the development of User Generated Content (UGC) services and the protection of copyright owner rights has recently been set out by several media and Internet companies such as CBS, Dailymotion, Fox Entertainment Group, MySpace, NBC, Veoh Networks, Viacom, at the initiative of Walt Disney and Microsoft. Other major companies such as Google or other rights owner (Sony, TimeWarner, Paramount) did not sign the document.

UGC Services refer to services such as MySpace, Soapbox on MSN Video, Dailymotion and Veoh.com, but exclude technologies such as browsers, email, or search services.

The principles are a set of guidelines which has objectives such as the "elimination of infringing content on UGC Services, the encouragement of original and authorized user-generated audio and video content uploads, the protection of the user privacy and the encouragement of a fair use of the copyrighted content on UGC Services", but also seen by outsiders as an attempt to bring DRM into the online video-sharing space.

Although the principles are meant to "foster innovation and encourage creativity" they have in view the use of a state of the art filtering and blocking technology that may eliminate infringing content from UGC services. The regular removal of the unblocked infringing content and the links to sites that are clearly or predominantly used for the dissemination of infringing content are targeted as well. The companies should also collaborate in creating procedures to deal with claims of blocking out of error. The principles mention "fair use" four times in the document, but do not refer to what the signatory organisations understand by this term.

One of the obligations set out by the principles is that of preserving for a 60-day period the connection information related to an Internet user having posted infringing content online, information that the site is suppose to provide to the rights owner, at request.

Another interesting commitment of all the members of the UGC agreement is that, while observing the rules, they should not attack each other in case some of the content is not properly filtered; this, in the context that two of the members, NBC Universal and Veoh, have applying complaints one against the other. Having signed the agreement might bring a leverage of the litigation.

The big absent from the signatories of this agreement was Google, which, on 15 October, unveiled its filtering technology for YouTube video-sharing site that it owns now. Google representatives were part of the negations but have decided not to sign the agreement for the time being. YouTube Engineering Director Jeremy Doig stated: "(..) industry-wide technology mandates are generally a bad idea. This industry is still young and we believe that marketplace innovation can lead to creative solutions we can't even begin to imagine today."

A reason for this reserve could be the law suit between Google and Viacom over copyrighted content on YouTube. One other reason may be the fact that Google's new filtering technology removes the infringing content immediately from the site while the guidelines suggest "blocking infringing uploads before they are made available to the public."

Internet and Media Industry Leaders Unveil Principles to Foster Online Innovation While Protecting Copyrights - Press Release (18.10.2007)
http://www.ugcprinciples.com/press_release.html

Principles for User Generated Content Services
http://www.ugcprinciples.com/

Disney, Microsoft Lead Copyright Pact (19.10.2007)
http://online.wsj.com/public/article/SB119269788721663302.html

Studios unveil their copyright protection guidelines (18.10.2007)
http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-9799778-7.html

Sharing videos: towards the end of the process? (only in French, 19.10.2007)
http://www.ecrans.fr/Partage-de-videos-vers-la-fin-des,2377.html

Microsoft, Viacom Posture On Content Sharing (19.10.2007)
http://www.webpronews.com/insiderreports/2007/10/19/microsoft-viacom-p...