Activists drop suit against Viacom

Activist groups dropped a federal lawsuit against Viacom Inc. on Monday after the parent of Comedy Central acknowledged it made a mistake in asking YouTube to yank a parody of the cable network’s “The Colbert Report.”

Although the video in question contained clips taken from the television show, the groups argued that their use was protected under “fair use” provisions of copyright law, and thus Viacom shouldn’t have asked YouTube to remove the item.

Viacom initially denied requesting the removal but later acknowledged it and said it was in error.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation declared victory in announcing that Viacom had agreed to add information on its website about its stance on such parodies and to set up an e-mail address to receive complaints about possible errors in the future.

Viacom, however, sought to play down its concessions, saying the lawsuit’s dismissal was a recognition of “the effective processes we have consistently applied.” In a statement, Viacom said the lawsuit “could have been avoided” had the groups contacted the company ahead of time.

The Electronic Frontier Foundation and Stanford Law School’s Fair Use Project had filed the lawsuit in U.S. District Court in San Francisco on behalf of MoveOn.org Civic Action and Brave New Films, which had jointly produced the parody.

The lawsuit came about a week after Viacom filed its own, $1-billion suit against YouTube, claiming that the sharing site was rife with copyrighted video from Viacom shows, including “The Colbert Report.”