This article from the New York Times describes in detail the legal issues that Google deals with on a regular basis. Katie Hafner, who wrote the article, notes that any company that is large, successful, and has deep pockets, all qualities of the search engine giant, will attract lawsuits. Yet she says that Google "invites" lawsuits because of the company's "rush to create innovative new services. Professor Jonathan Zittrain of Oxford University is quoted in this article as saying that Google's strategy seems to be "just do it, and consult the lawyers as you go". He sees this as an offshoot of the late 90's internet boom culture which promoted new ideas and technology at the expense of possible legal trouble.

With Google's recent purchase of YouTube, many believe that the company is "exposing itself to a new spate of lawsuits". Hafner points out the fact that much of the content on YouTube is copyrighted material just copied and illegally posted, as well as the lawsuit filed against YouTube by Robert Tur, which Google will now have to deal with. However, Google has plenty of experience in copyright fights, and seems ready for the challenge.

Hafner spends the rest of the article detailing the reason's behind Google's aggressive policies toward fighting litigation and some of the most well known copyright and trademark cases involving YouTube. She first notes that Google now has a team of over 100 lawyers, stationed both overseas and in the United States, many of which are experts on intellectual property law. This team works tirelessly to fight nearly every single lawsuit filed against Google. They do this because, one, Google wants to set a good legal foundation for itself, and winning cases certainly does this. Also, any lawsuit that gets to the pre-trial fact finding phase, writes Hafner, would "pose the danger of revealing too much about Google's propriety technology"

The rest of the article deals with Hafner describing the Geico case against Google, in which the courts ruled in Google's favor, and the lawsuits brought up by the French and Belgian press. The Belgian case is extremely relevant to copyright law, with Google claiming that headlines are not copyrightable, while the Belgian media thinks otherwise. A Belgian court ruled in favor of the media outlet in September, yet it remains to be seen whether or not this ruling will have an effect on Google in the United States.

This article is important in the YouTube discussion because it points out one of Google's great advantages when dealing with copyright issues- Google has tons of experience in this area.  Google's executives and lawyers both know what to expect in the upcoming lawsuits, and they firmly believe that they have a solid defense.  Google would not have purchased YouTube if they had not been confident in the company's legality.