New York - Viacom, which recently filed a $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit against YouTube, was itself sued on Thursday by activist groups representing the producers of a parody video who say Viacom made an illegal request that the video be removed from YouTube.

Producers MoveOn.org Civic Action and Brave New Films said the video, a parody of "The Colbert Report" program on Viacom's Comedy Central, uses elements of the actual show that qualify as "fair use" and are protected against copyright infringement claims.

In March, Viacom demanded the video be removed from YouTube, invoking the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA).

The Electronic Frontier Foundation (EFF), a digital civil liberties group, and Stanford Law School's Center for Internet and Society filed suit in federal court on Thursday against Viacom, seeking a declaratory judgment that the video does not infringe Viacom's copyrights, and unspecified damages.

"Copyright owners need to double-check their claims and think about free speech rights before erasing political content from sites like YouTube and misusing the DMCA," said Eli Pariser, executive director of MoveOn.org Civic Action.

Viacom told Townhall.com it has no records of ever requesting the video be removed from YouTube.

Related Links:
http://www.eff.org/news/archives/2007_03.php#005176

http://tinyurl.com/2nwg3o (Townhall.com)

http://www.salon.com/wire/ap/archive.html?wire=D8O1B9J00.html (AP)

http://www.moveon.org/press