In a case that may rattle video-sharing sites, an Italian court found three Google (Nasdaq: GOOG) employees guilty of violating the country's privacy code from an incident in 2006 in which a bullying video was uploaded to Google Video.
The employees didn't have a hand in making the video. In fact, Google took the clip down shortly after it was alerted of its reprehensible content. The world's leading search engine even helped Italian police catch the bullies. However, the country's legal system can hold company executives accountable in these circumstances.
Google will appeal, of course. It may even win. However, this has to be problematic if you're Facebook or News Corp.'s (Nasdaq: NWS) MySpace and you're about to be required to screen all of the content that goes up on your site.
Publishing delays in an era of instant gratification may seem tough, but the real killer here would be the need to beef up staff to vet any and all submissions.
It can't stand. Can it?
Briefly in the news
And now let's take a quick look at some of the other stories that shaped our week.
- Amazon.com (Nasdaq: AMZN) and Microsoft (Nasdaq: MSFT) signed a cross-licensing patent agreement. It sounds reasonable, but ultimately it will mean more money going Microsoft's way.
- Sirius XM Radio (Nasdaq: SIRI) posted its first profitable quarter on Thursday. The company also issued new guidance, spearheaded by its projection of landing 500,000 net new subscribers through 2010.
- Campbell Soup (NYSE: CPB) posted quarterly results that found revenue and earnings inching marginally higher, despite the fact that domestic soup revenue fell 8%. You know the recession is still lingering if we're even holding back on canned soup.
Until next week, I remain,
Rick Munarriz
