YouTube, Google, Rumors, and Blogs

October 31st, 2006

Technology Mark Cuban posts some juicy information about the goings-on behind the recent $1.6 billion Google-YouTube acquisition, which Cuban admits could be totally inaccurate, but it’s interesting to read anyhow. Let’s not forget he’s the one that said only a “moron” would buy YouTube.

Don Dodge has a good summary of the long post, which I’ll further summarize. Basically, it claims that before the deal, YouTube was getting hit with tons of complaints from copyright holders and threats of lawsuits from media companies. Therefore, with the Google deal, a large part of the $1.6 billion dollars was set aside to pay for large litigations.

To me, the only fuzzy part is when it’s claimed there was an agreement that in order to hold off more lawsuits, the media companies agreed to sue other web copyright infringers in the meantime. Second, it does kind of put a leak or two in the bubble when you consider that a large part of that $1.6 billion is collateral damage, and not spent on technology, or the employees of YouTube.

Anyhow, that’s the gist of it, but let’s take a step back and realize that this information, although it rings true, could be complete speculation and fantasy. I’m reminded of the people who try to write scripts for movies that haven’t come out yet, or the famed photographers of imaginary Apple hardware. You take the truth, extrapolate out a bit, add a few gems of speculation, and you have Indiana Jones IV.

So here’s a quick post at ZDNet.com of some research regarding Cuban’s information. The source is fingered as Jeff Reifman. He has a website. Disclosure, anyone?

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