YouTube Punched in Face by Italian Court
Country considers new controls on online "hate speech"
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Silvio Berlusconi's war with critics is going online, with his company victorious against YouTube and his party fighting Facebook.
Mediaset, the Italian broadcasting giant founded by Prime Minister and lover of prostitutes Silvio Berlusconi, has prevailed against YouTube in a copyright case brought before Roman courts.
The court found the San Bruno, Calif.-based subsidary of Google guilty of infringement, and ordered the removal of thousands of clips from the online video site. Mediaset further wants €500 million in damages.
YouTube is considering an appeal, citing Italian and European laws offering protections from service providers against liability for the copyright infringement of users.
The recent incident in Milan where Berlusconi was punched in the face has proven quite popular on YouTube, and on Facebook, where people quickly joined groups and became fans of the attacker, Massimo Tartaglia.
All of which has the Berlusconi's ironically named People of Freedom party considering cracking down on "hate speech" online, or at least hate speech about their dear leader.
Jackson West wonders why Berlusconi doesn't just buy a stake in Facebook like that Russian "businessman."
Copyright NBC Owned Television Stations
Posted Thursday, Dec 17, 2009 - 5:48 PM EST
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