Why YouTube Might Not Go Down

[Ted] Okay, time for me to weigh in here. While I trust and respect Josh's experience with content piracy -- after all, who else wrote a piece called "Music Lessons" that used the Kubler-Ross model of grieving to analyze the music industry?

But, I can see a way out for YouTube, and it goes something like this:

• Do lots of deals quickly to make YouTube a legitimate video destination. The deal with Warner Music Group is a good start, but hardly enough. What about sports bloopers from CNN or Sopranos outtakes from HBO? Share that traffic, split that ad revenue, love those guys to death.
• Listen carefully to the jungle drums of Universal to see if there's a way out.
• Lobby hard for copyright protection, publicly and visibly in the site experience.

With those steps, YouTube will likely survive, even if battered, an onslaught of the video industry legal attacks. But if YouTube fails on all three accounts, I have to agree with Josh.

Disagree? Lemme know.

[signed] Ted