Google has just been indicted for violating newspapers' copyright laws by Brussels Court of First. (For the past 4 months, Google has been publishing links to Belgian newspapers without permission & against their wishes.)

The world's most-used Internet search engine Google has been ordered to re-imburse $32,500/- per day to all Belgian newspapers from the date it published links till the date it removes all links, articles, photos, graphics from all associated sites, including Google News. The order extends upto cached information displayed in search results. In addition, Google will have to pay an additional $1,300 per day to copyright groups like SAJ (journalists), till it removes their content from its sites.

The order is in reponse to a copyright infringementsuit filed by Copiepresse, which represents leading Belgian newspapers. (By the way, Copiepresse has threatened similar action against Microsoft & Yahoo! if they continue to use their stories.)

Now Internet sites may have to think twice before linking / caching / displaying content from newspapers & news organisations at least in Europe. (What's true for Belgium today could easily be true for Europe. And may soon be applicable to the rest of the world!)

As expected, Google has agreed to remove the content, even as it declared its intention to appeal to a higher court. But the industry expects Google to forge agreements with newspapers for revenue sharing. Almost as if in confirmation, Google and Copiepresse have both declared that they were "open for negotiations".

After all, the new economy demands new marketing techniques like Google's signature "fait accompli" approach. (Start by using for free. Reach deal later, if absolutely unavoidable.) Nor will this be the first time when Google has used its signature approach !

Yahoo & Social Networking
Yahoo seems to be going the social networking way - by embedding instant messaging features (IM) inside its e-mail. Everybody knows that today's young Internet users who are frequent visitors to social networking sites, routinely jump between e-mail and IM. Now Yahoo plans to attract these young visitors by integrating chats with their e-mail.

Expect more web-sites to add on social networking features !

Beyond YouTube: The New Online Video Sites
Veoh.com is the latest in a long line of online video sites. Backed by ex Disney Chief Eisner, San Diego-based Veoh Network's claim to fame is "DVD quality" videos. And it promises to take viewers from online video clips to Internet television. Exactly how different is that from the other new online video web-sites, is not clear.

After a year and a half of testing and stocked with 1,00,000+ high-quality videos, Veoh represents one more challenge to YouTube.com. But apart from the redoubtable Eisner's considerable influence in brokering deals with content partners, Veoh seems to offer little more than other competing video sites. (Count Google YouTube, MySpace, Facebook and Joost to name just a few.)

As far as Veoh's claims of better (DVD) quality video goes, it is more than likely to be replicated in the near future by most competitors. In fact Veoh's revenue model, which is roughly "pay content publishers based on (ad) viewership and charge subscribers for paid downloads" is not much different from other video sites like Break.com, Revver & Brighton.

What Veoh does represent though, is the new, developing faces of Internet television.