Earlier today, the U.S. government shut down Megaupload.com, one of the largest and longest running cyberlockers in the business.
Its founders and a handful of employees have been arrested, as well, and charged with copyright infringement.
The indictment and arrests come just one day after major websites including Wikipedia and Google staged anti-SOPA “blackouts.” SOPA was created to fight piracy, but has seen massive criticism due to its ability to shut down sites with very little appeal time, at the behest of media companies or other content owners.
Megaupload and its owners are accused of taking over $500 million from copyright holders due to piracy, and cashing in on $175 million in profits from ads and premium subscriptions.
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The US Department of Justice has sent Google a request for additional information as part of their scrutiny of the search giant’s proposed purchase of Motorola Mobility.
As with any deal of this magnitude, the DOJ must conduct an investigation before it can be finalized. In addition, the Federal Trade Commission may have a say in the matter.
Google Senior Vice President David Drummond announced the DOJ request on the company’s Public Policy blog, writing, “Today we received what is called a “second request,” which means that the DOJ is asking for more information so that they can continue to review the deal.”
He added that he doesn’t believe there is any reason to believe the Justice Department will not approve the sale.
However, that doesn’t mean there won’t be additional hurdles to clear before everything is said and done. At a US Senate antitrust hearing last week Google’s Erich Schmidt faced hostile legislators who accused Google of anticompetitive behavior.
Even though the hearing was focused on their search business, more than one Senator intimated Google uses the Android OS primarily to further their dominance.
With national elections for the US presidency and more than half of all legislators coming up next year, political pressure and grandstanding could easily lead to significant delays.
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According to BI, Yahoo would be willing to purchase on-demand streaming TV service Hulu for $2 billion, as long as certain demands are met.
Hulu is owned by Disney (ABC), News Corp. (Fox), Comcast (NBCU) and private equity firm Providence.
Yahoo is only willing to make the deal if Hulu guarantees them 4-5 years of exclusive access to the media content.
Hulu, on the other hand, seems to be only willing to give 2 years of exclusivity, albeit with 5 years guaranteed access to the content.
Says one source:
If [Hulu's content creating owners] came out and said, we’ve renewed [Hulu's exclusive rights] for four years at the same terms we have today – it’s really easy to model [a valuation between] $1 billion and $2 billion – maybe more.
Without four or five years of exclusive streaming rights to TV shows and movies, Hulu is not worth anything.
If Hulu does offer 5 year exclusivity, Yahoo would have enough time to “build enough equity with consumers that you’ve created a real leader in premium content and premium advertising,” adds the source.
Without exclusivity, Yahoo (and other bidders) could simply just bid for the rights to stream the content in the future, as it would cost significantly less. In fact, when the exclusivity period for Hulu’s current content ends, Google and Amazon are expected to bid hundreds of millions of dollars for the rights.
