LA reporter abandons YouTube copyright case
Journalist Bob Tur, accused of leaking confidential court documents to CNET's Greg Sandoval, settles copyright lawsuit with YouTube.
A Los Angeles journalist who was accused of leaking confidential court documents from his lawsuit against YouTube has abandoned his suit and has agreed to pay $20,000 to the video-sharing site.
Bob Tur, the chopper-piloting broadcast journalist whose company filed a 2006 lawsuit alleging copyright violations, agreed to drop out of the current suit and not file the same one again later. In return, YouTube agreed not to pursue its request for a federal court to levy fines on Tur's attorneys at the law firm of Proskauer Rose or other sanctions.
YouTube, which is owned by Google, previously had claimed that court documents with excerpts from CEO Eric Schmidt's deposition were leaked to CNET reporter Greg Sandoval and excerpted in two articles that appeared last fall. Schmidt's deposition described how Google decided on the $1.65 billion it paid for YouTube.
Neither side admitted any wrongdoing in the six-page settlement, which was signed by U.S. District Judge Louis Stanton and filed with the clerk's office on Tuesday. The settlement also said that neither side "shall issue a press release or affirmatively contact the press" and that both parties "agree not to make public statements inconsistent with the terms" of the agreement.
In January, Tur agreed to allow his e-mail and phone records to be disclosed to a third party, FTI Technology, for a confidential analysis. Tur also turned over a hard drive that had been scrubbed in a 7-pass wipe, which he said was related to having its operating system restored so that it could be given to his daughter.
Judge Stanton sided with YouTube in a decision in late June, saying the company is shielded by the 1998 Digital Millennium Copyright Act. Viacom filed papers on Wednesday for an appeal to the Second Circuit.