Both Google and AOL Take On YouTube

May 17, 2006 By Geoff Duncan

YouTube's explosive rise to the top of the online video heap has AOL and Google worried, as both companies try to horn into the user-submitted video arena.

Digital video site YouTube has risen to the top of the heap in Internet video sites, with the latest reports estimating the site pushes more than 40 million videos per day to between 10 and 15 million unique visitors. Never mind that many of the videos are, well, insipid, and a good portion of the remainder strain “fair use” clauses in copyright law well past the breaking point. Nonetheless, videographers, amateur filmmakers, kids, and video bloggers have latched on to the site in record numbers, and some of them truly are doing interesting

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Ian Bell and Dan Gaul at 9:10am 18th May 2006 I think what makes YouTube so appealing right now is that some of the videos on there tend to be illegal videos without copyright protection, its like BitTorrent, people use it because its not controlled. AOL and Google will need to of course control things which will limit what is shown, and ultimately might turn people away.
Tim Stevens at 12:48am 18th May 2006 It's never fun playing catch-up. I think it's probably to risky for the conservative AOL to reach or beat YouTube. Google of course always has potential in my book.