The Iron Fist of Viacom Comes Down on You Tube

...and crushes some folks at a rib joint. Monday, Viacom told YouTube to take down more than 100,000 videos that supposedly violated Viacom's copyright. This included a non-Viacom music video and song (including Spiff's Coulton/WoW mash-ups) and some folks eating dinner at a rib joint called Redbones. ( which isn't owned by Viacom.)

"Viacom did a general search on YouTube for any term related to any of its shows, and then spammed YouTube with 100,000 DMCA take-down notices alleging that all of these clips infringed its copyright and demanding that they be censored off the Internet. YouTube made thousands of clips vanish, and sent warning notices to the people who'd posted them, warning them that they were now on a list of potential copyright infringers and telling them that repeat offenses could lead to having their accounts terminated."

Viacom has admitted to making "fewer than 60 mistakes", but there has to be more. Check out the whole story here.