Court rules for Veoh in UMG suit

Getting a four-year legal fight between Universal Group and video-discussing site Veoh to some likely close, an appeals court in Pasadena today upheld an early on decision in support of Veoh, that was prosecuted by UMG for copyright violation in 2007. A federal district court ruled in Veoh's favor last year, rejecting UMG's claims that Veoh and it is traders were responsible for UMG-copyrighted material published to the site by customers. Both court rulings discovered that the website was protected underneath the Digital Millennium Copyright Act's safe-harbor provision, saying yes that Veoh had made good belief efforts to watch content and also to remove infringing material upon request from copyright proprietors. Veoh, that was released in beta form in 2006 and loved early investment from former Disney topper Michael Eisner, remained around the edge of personal bankruptcy by Feb of 2010, with then-Boss Dmitry Shapiro stating the continuing legal fight like a adding factor. It had been shortly after that acquired by Israeli company Qlipso. Though only briefly reported within the ruling, the UMG-Veoh situation bears numerous commonalities for an violation suit filed by Viacom against YouTube, where a federal court ruled in support of YouTube this year for similar reasons, placing the responsibility on copyright proprietors to inform host sites of infringing material. Viacom's benefit of that decision is presently pending. Contact the range newsroom at news@variety.com