Adult entertainment company IO Group, the parent company of Titan Media, in June filed a lawsuit against online video-sharing service Veoh Networks Inc. Titan Media is a multimedia production company specializing in all-male erotica.
The complaint alleges that the online TV broadcasting company is responsible for copyright infringement by allowing videos owned by the IO Group to be accessed through Veoh’s website without permission.
In the complaint, filed in U.S. District Court for California’s Northern District, the IO Group alleges that between June and June 22, Veoh users accessed and viewed its copyrighted works more than 40,000 times. The Io group was tipped off to the infringement by the company’s own customer base.
“Our customers are some of our best sleuths,” says Titan Media Vice President Keith Webb.
Veoh is an open peer-to-peer, video-sharing system that allows anyone to broadcast video directly to consumers who have a PC and broadband connection. Users can browse videos through the Veoh website, but must download the site’s software application in order to view videos on PCs, televisions, or portable video devices. The site was launched in 2005 and has seen two rounds of funding, the most recent from Time Warner and former Disney executive Michael Eisner’s Tornante Company. Eisner now sits on the board of directors for Veoh.
Veoh has seen some notoriety for its previous decisions of making adult content available in its site; whereas similar sites such as YouTube and Google Video prohibit adult-oriented clips.
The company unexpectedly removed all “adult” content from the site last month, the day before the IO Group filed the lawsuit. The company also said it was cracking down on copyrighted material. Veoh Network Inc. did not answer requests for comments about this story.
