Students concerned over YouTube, Google merger

People in the CMU community are concerned about the future of a popular
video downloading and uploading Web site.

YouTube, which was founded in February of 2006, was bought out by
Google Oct. 9 for $1.65 billion.

Heather Polinsky, broadcast and cinematic arts instructor, said the
merger was expected, and was in response to the News Corp acquisition
of MySpace, a social networking site, a year ago.

“Millions of people are posting their own (noncopyrighted) content
that millions of other people are accessing and sharing,” Polinsky
said. “Google is trying to build upon that and increase the popularity
of YouTube.”

However, with YouTube becoming more mainstream, copyright
infringement is becoming a higher risk.

“YouTube cannot continue to run the way it does now due to the large
amount of copyrighted material on the site,” Polinsky said. “Now that
Google is in charge of YouTube, copyright holders have a secure company
to go after for copyright infringements. Therefore, the copyrighted
material has to be removed from the site, or copyright owners must be
compensated.”

And with copyright becoming more of an issue, Polinsky said if it
came down to it, YouTube users may be asked to pay a price in order to
generate revenue.

Farmington Hills junior Aaron Lesniak said he thinks the merger will
cost YouTube its originality, which may turn away users.

“YouTube offers many people the opportunity to post their own
creative works online,” Lesniak said. “With the merger, this ability
may be lost. The main appeal of YouTube is that it is free. People go
to the site to see their movies and clips, and if there were a charge,
people would be inclined to look elsewhere.”

Lesniak said if a fee was administered, he would no longer visit the
site and look for alternatives.

Polinsky said she hopes the novelty of the site will stay in tact,
despite the merger.

“One of the unique things about YouTube is that it is an outlet for
content that is not copyrighted and content that may not find an
audience through traditional medial channels,” she said. “That is
something I hope is preserved by Google.”

Polinsky said she wouldn’t be surprised if more mergers are in the
works.

“The current news articles are suspecting a billion dollar deal for
Yahoo to acquire Facebook,” she said. “It would be interesting for
Yahoo to add Facebook and the social networks that it creates to their
success with instant messaging circles. There is potential there for
something slightly different and unique.”

Bay City junior Matt Reckinger said anytime a large corporation gets
involved and tries to make something mainstream, it is to satisfy a
large number of people. But with the potential Facebook merger, there
may be more to it, he said.

“It’s all about money,” Reckinger said. “Facebook is already pretty
mainstream. I think by merging with Yahoo, it would only generate more
ad revenue for Yahoo.”