In what may be the first of many agreements, Lionsgate has partnered up with YouTube to allow certain clips of it's movies and TV shows to be posted to the video sharing giant, in exchange for a little ad revenue.

This is all still Wild, Wild West and, of course, the exact details of the agreement have not been revealed, but it looks like Lionsgate will get its own special YouTube channel and actually post popular clips on YouTube that have been cleared for people to use. This is a very important and interesting development that raises a lot of questions which can only be answered as this experiment plays out in the next few months.

First, I think this is definitely a good thing in principle. People are going to post clips from movies and shows online no matter what and content providers can either chose to make a little money or not. Or they can chose to actually lose money by playing Whack-A-Mole trying to stop copyright violations.The Lionsgate deal seems to go half-way by attempting to give people limited access to certain clips for limited uses. 

Second, YouTube users are going to complain. They always do. They'll complain a little if the ads are to the side of the videos and they'll complain a lot if the ads are overlays or pre-roll style. Tough darts, I say. YouTube is not a charity or a First Amendment crusader and neither is Lionsgate. You don't like what YouTube is doing, go post your copyright-violating videos somewhere else.

Third, what about legitimate Fair Use material and mistakes? Granted, 99.9% of YouTubers using copyrighted material do not fall in this category, but it is clear that however this is implemented, mistakes will be made, and someone's backyard remake of a scene from Dirty Dancing is going to get annoyingly loaded up with ads for whatever YouTube/Lionsgate wants or taken down as a violation of copyright. While this is unfair and unfortunate, I hope a mechanism will be put in place to contest and appeal ad decisions, I don't think this is going to be a significant problem.

The idea that legitimate copyright owners deserve to have control of their creations and deserve to make money from them is not novel or controversial, at least to anyone who's thought about the issue for more than two seconds. It's actually nice to see movie studios struggling with this and looking for real solutions, instead of simply hiring an army of lawyers and digging in their heels, like a certain other entertainment industry did not so long ago.

• YouTube, Lionsgate in Ad Pact - Adweek. July 17, 2008.