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Viacom could work with Google in future-CEO

Fri Oct 19, 2007 12:45am EDT

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SAN FRANCISCO, Oct 18 (Reuters) - Viacom Inc (VIAb.N) Chief Executive Philippe Dauman said on Thursday the entertainment company could work with Google Inc (GOOG.O) down the road, despite a pending $1 billion lawsuit it has filed against the Web search leader.

"I suspect at some point in the future we'll work with Google," Dauman said at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco.

Viacom sued Google and its video sharing site YouTube earlier this year, accusing them of benefiting from illegally downloaded clips of its shows. Since then, both sides have taken steps to bolster copyright protection, but have yet to reach a compromise on how to safeguard popular television shows and movies on the Web.

Viacom, along with Walt Disney Co (DIS.N), Microsoft Corp (MSFT.O) and other top media companies, said on Thursday it had agreed to guidelines for protecting copyrights online, including blocking pirated material before it is loaded onto a site for public access.

Google was absent from the pact, but its YouTube unit said earlier this week it was publicly testing a video-matching database that helps identify pirated material on its site.

It had previously tested the technology with nine media companies, including Disney and Time Warner Inc (TWX.N), but YouTube officials would not say if Viacom had participated.

"To the extent the ... announcement reflects a positive evolution in their thinking, I welcome it," Dauman said of YouTube's move. "I think Google is a high-quality company. They can do things very quickly when they want to."

He said that Viacom seeks a standardized way of protecting copyrights on the Web. "What no one wants is a proprietary system that benefits one company to the exclusion of others," he said.

(Reporting by Michele Gershberg)

((E-mail: michele.gershberg@reuters.com, editing by Deborah Cohen)) Keywords: VIACOM GOOGLE/

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