Hulu loses Daily Show and Colbert, Viacom to Sue Bloggers? March 4, 2010
Hulu announced on March 2, 2010, that Comedy Central (owned by Viacom) is pulling The Daily Show and The Colbert Report from the website.
Why?! The answer, it turns out, starts with an “S” superimposed with a vertical line (or two, if you’re like me). According to the New York Times, the pull is the result of failed negotiations and the culmination of a contract term. Translation: Colbert and Stewart weren’t worth their weight in Hulu’s advertising currency.
Given the rising popularity of Hulu, I was pretty shocked that Colbert and Stewart weren’t making the bucks. However, even more disturbing is a post I came across on THR, Esq., which quotes Tony Fox, a Viacom/Comedy Central PR rep, with a rather pointed remark when asked “whether [Comedy Central] will now target websites and bloggers who post unauthorized clips from the show”:
“Yes, we intend to do so. My feeling is if (websites) are making money on our copyrighted content, then that is a problem.”
Too bad that fails to take into account that little thing called Fair Use, the same principle which allows comedy shows interlaced with news to take swipes at popular culture and media from other networks. Fox’s statement does sounds somewhat unintentionally overinclusive–surely he didn’t mean all embedded video clips are instances of infringement. Even the players on www.thedailyshow.com and www.colbertnation.com allow embedding. Either way, the words were definitely provocative.
Tech Dirt followed up with the company and Viacom has since clarified the remarks:
“We have always tried to be as permissive as possible when looking at what might be fair use, and we haven’t changed our approach at all. Frankly, fair use works for us. I can’t recall a time we’ve ever sued a blogger for the use of a Comedy Central clip, and there’s no reason to believe that would be more likely to today.”
This answer is much more along the lines of what I would have expected from a PR representative. But does that make this PR fluff? Time will tell, I suppose. In the meantime, we’ll keep our eyes peeled for takedowns, nastygrams, and suits.
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