Google and Viacom Fight to the Death

...would be a much more interesting story, but this one, from Fark, is still pretty good.

Seems that Viacom, the huge conglomerate that owns both The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report, is suing Google for $1 billion dollars. That's right, billion, with a b.

Why?

Because, as part of its Ultimate Plan for World Domination, Google bought out YouTube, and Viacom says that Google and YouTube encourage others to pirate copyrighted material.

So, in their defense, YouTube wants to depose Stewart and Stephen Colbert, who both work for Viacom, in addition to about 30 other people, to prove that, well, hey, if we are doing it, you are doing it, too.

Which seems like an excellent rebuttal, actually, considering Stephen Colbert's stunt last year with a light saber and a green screen, where he encouraged viewers to create their own viral videos of him.

Before Viacom ordered clips from The Daily Show and The Colbert Report taken down, those clips were some of the most popular downloads on YouTube.

Makes you wonder: did any Viacom employees download them?

This lawsuit could get sticky.