Federal Officials and YouTube Nearing a Deal 80
GovTechGuy writes "The federal government is on the verge of reaching an agreement with YouTube that would allow agencies to make official use of the popular video-sharing service. A coalition of federal agencies led by the General Service Administration's Office of Citizen Services has been negotiating with Google, YouTube's parent company, since summer 2008 on new terms that would allow agencies to establish their own channels on the site.
Agencies have not been [allowed] to post videos to YouTube (although many already have) because under the current terms of service, people who post content are subject to their state's libel laws. Federal agencies must adhere to federal law.
On Tuesday, government officials said the negotiations were 'very close' to being completed."
Comments/Ratings policy, propaganda (Score:3, Informative)
The Office of National Drug Control Policy (the "this is your brain on drugs" people) have been known to post their propaganda ads on YouTube. Once they discovered that the user ratings on it and user comments were not to their liking, they disabled ratings and comments. First Amendment, anyone?
If the Federal agencies post the public's content on YouTube, Google needs to require public comments and ratings, for the sake of the public interest and the free flow of information. Wherever the Feds go, the public goes there with them. This is the only American thing to do.
Re:Oh joy (Score:5, Informative)
Wait, you mean it will be like C-Span, but whenever i want? I don't know if youtube has the bandwidth.
Believe it or not, that site already exists. http://cspanjunkie.org/ [cspanjunkie.org]