Comedy Central Clips Return to YouTube

Talk about mixed signals – Comedy Central clips are back on YouTube, and now Comedy Central parent Viacom could be looking to join ranks with NBC and CBS by entering into a licensing deal with the video sharing site, according to Adweek.

As we reported earlier this week, YouTubers were in a huff about the sudden unavailability of Daily Show and Colbert Report clips after the site started removing them on Friday. Viacom, the media company which owns the Comedy Central cable network, had asked YouTube to remove Comedy Central clips in compliance with the DMCA.

We weren't too surprised when that happened – YouTube has dealt with copyright infringement issues before, and things have been heating up since the company was acquired by Google – but now we have a reason to say, "Hmm." Videos from The Daily Show, The Colbert Report, Laguna Beach and Spongebob Squarepants started reappearing on YouTube yesterday, according to Adweek.

Here's a statement from "a Viacom representative," as quoted in Adweek:

"Like our peers in the media industry, we are focused on finding the right business model for professionally created content to be legally distributed on the Internet. We want our audiences to be able to access our programming on every platform and we're interested in having it live on all forms of distribution in ways that protect our talented artists, our loyal customers and our passionate audiences."

The two companies appear to have reached some sort of temporary agreement. Does this mean that a licensing deal is around the corner? Time will tell, so stay tubed.

Previously:
Video: YouTube/Comedy Central – Is Length A Factor?
YouTube's Copyright Conundrum