Some people viewing YouTube videos have gotten an alert saying antivirus software has detected a computer virus called Actns/Swif.T. That virus is real enough; it redirects people to a website which then installs a piece of hostile software deceivingly called Antivirus 2009. The software is actually spyware, and notoriously annoying to remove.

But YouTube is not actually infected with a virus, it turns out. Instead, out-of-date antivirus software is mislabeling YouTube clips as a threat.

Panic over, right? No. The video format YouTube uses, Flash, has proven insecure before. YouTube processes users' video files and generates its own Flash files, so it's unlikely that YouTube would host hostile code — but never say never. As people spend more time on video sites and social networks like MySpace and Facebook, they increasingly become targets for virus creators.

The bigger problem here is figuring out whom to trust. Outdated virus-detection software, or the websites they're labeling as dangerous? Blogs which report new viral threats, or the ones that debunk them? Software which labels itself "Antivirus" but actually infects your computer? We're going deep down the rabbit hole, and I don't think Keanu Reeves is waiting for us on the other end.

Web 2.0 was a bubble that never inflated — a shimmery illusion that popped well before we stopped talking about it. Precious few people got rich from the notions its proponents championed, such as user-generated content and social networks.

Calacanis was the only person of note to cash out on the blogging craze, selling a set of blogs to AOL for $25 million. That was a paltry figure in the grand scheme of things, but enough to set him up in a comfortable home in Brentwood and buy him a $109,000 electric sports car. And enough to make him a Web celebrity, with thousands of followers on Twitter and friends on Facebook — the quantifiable metrics of fame preferred by those who are not really famous.

The startups of the Web 2.0 era have proven similarly vacuous in their success. Skype, the Internet-calling service, sold for $2.6 billion to eBay in 2005; the auction giant wrote off $1.4 billion of that purchase last year. YouTube, sold to Google for $1.65 billion, is an acknowledged failure, with product managers scrambling to bedaub it with enough advertising to merely pay for its bandwidth bills. And the IPO market that powered the '90s bubble? All but invisible. The most recent big offering was in August for Rackspace, a boring company which hosts servers, and its stock has since fallen by half. With Wall Street on its knees, no one expects another IPO soon.

Will there be another bubble? Technology moves in cycles and is prone to investing fads, so yes, almost certainly. But there is nothing that looks set to inflate it. Cleantech, the next big hope of Silicon Valley, requires vastly more capital than Internet startups, and capital is now in short supply. (Falling oil prices, too, discourage the development of green energy.) While Internet users are devoting more attention to social networks, advertisers are staying away. Calacanis's venture, Mahalo, is a spiffed-up rehash of the kind of Web directory Yahoo built in 1995; he's now cooking up a new, secret project — which suggests that the loquacious entrepreneur realizes his original plan fell short. He may be onto something, if only in admitting failure. If this bubble fell short in making the likes of Calacanis rich, they have their own paucity of ideas to blame.

Slapping an infomercial on YouTube will generate far worse publicity than talking to friendly Detroit-based hacks on the automotive beat, who are every bit as dependent on the U.S. car industry for their paycheck as assembly-line workers are. The 81,724 YouTube viewers who have watched the clip are as vicious as ever, rating it two stars out of five (a mercy rating, surely), calling for GM's collapse, and decrying the notion of a government bailout. The only upside for Detroit's messagemakers: The instant YouTube reaction allows them to take their PR campaign back to the shop all the sooner.

Google has plenty of business in Washington these days, from the Federal Communications Commission to the Department of Justice. Convenient, then, that CEO Eric Schmidt endorsed Obama weeks before the election, joining his board of economic advisors and appearing in Obama's primetime infomercial. Schmidt doesn't need a government job — he's clearly volunteering to be America's CTO in his spare time.

Schmidt is savvy enough to realize that YouTube's growing prominence as a media outlet could help the company become a larger political player — which is why the site sponsored two campaign debates. Traffic? Come on. YouTube hardly needs the help. Schmidt — who attended one debate with a mistress on his arm, like an old-school power broker — orchestrated the events to maximize Google's political influence.

The outgoing administration has not been friendly to Google, whose management team tilts strongly to the left. The Department of Justice's threat to sue Google if it proceeded with a deal to sell search ads for Yahoo may have been, at least in part, politically motivated.

Google mostly wants a free hand from Washington to cement its lead in online advertising — but it also wants help bullying telephone and cable companies into letting its services and ads flow unimpeded on high-speed broadband lines and cell phones, a cause it has dubbed "network neutrality."

Network neutrality is an abstract issue. But YouTube, helpfully, makes it very concrete to politicians, who have long understood the power of the moving image to influence the public. It's easy to picture Google lobbyists pulling up a politician's YouTube videos, and asking them, "Now how would you feel if Verizon slowed down your videos? Wouldn't it be wrong if AT&T didn't let customers view them on their cell phones?"

Even in its copyright enforcement, Google can club politicians. The McCain campaign complained about YouTube's takedown policy, which has a mandatory waiting period before videos whose rights are disputed can be reposted to the site. Will Democratic politicians — or any politician who votes the right way on network neutrality — find that a YouTube account manager is glad to make that kind of problem quietly go away?

It's a symbiotic relationship, to be sure. Google helps politicians reach young voters on YouTube and hosts their videos for free. YouTube benefits from the free content and the traffic political videos generate; even if it doesn't sell ads directly on the pages, it's estimated that it could make $1 billion a year on search ads — and in that business, merely cementing YouTube's traffic lead helps Google make money.

In that light, isn't there something that stinks about handing the president's weekly addresses to a single commercial outlet controlled by a political ally of the president? Obama's YouTube chats amount to a large, unspoken, behind-the-scenes government kickback. Every election has something dirty about it. And there's no question Google won this contest.

If so, it's scant reward for America's CTO. If transition co-chair Valerie Jarrett's two-minute talk yesterday is any indicator, most of these clips will be no more exciting than a White House press release. Obama himself, though, has one of the most awesome telepresences I've ever seen. Mr. President, get yourself a bulldog and a skateboard and you'll blow Avril Lavigne and Justin Laipply right off the Most Viewed (All Time) page.

There's more than a hint of desperation around YouTube's scramble. And that's as it should be. Google, in its early days, scrambled around for a business model; at one point, it thought it might do enterprise software, which is how it ended up with Schmidt, a former computer scientist, as a CEO.

Mistakes happen.

And that's the point: YouTube needs to make mistakes, lots of them, fast. Google's advertising business is, for now, gushing cash, giving YouTube some room to maneuver. But shareholders are not infinitely patient. The more ways YouTube tries to make money, the better the odds it will happen on something that works. It needs to carefully measure what's working, and tweak its efforts. This kind of mind-numbing lather-rinse-repeat gruntwork is actually something Google is good at; feed its engineers data, and they'll come up with an algorithm for success. What Google can't afford to do is waste time chasing some impossibly elegant solution which springs, full-grown, like Minerva from the skull of Google god-king Eric Schmidt.

There is a lot of other content on our global site that our users around the world find to be equally important, including, by way of example only, political campaigns from around the globe at all levels of government, human rights movements, and other important voices. We try to be careful not to favor one category of content on our site over others, and to treat all of our users fairly, regardless of whether they are an individual, a large corporation or a candidate for public office.

The real problem here is individuals and entities that abuse the DMCA takedown process. You and our other content uploaders can play a critical role in helping us to address this difficult problem...You can file counter-notifications. You can seek retractions of abusive takedown notices. You can hold abusive claimants publicly accountable for their actions by publicizing their actions...

(Photo by AP/Amy Sanchetta)

MacGyver will now be available on YouTube, and you won't have to watch it in frequently taken-down 10-minute chunks. Yeah, you didn't know that was a CBS show, and you didn't care. But it's on YouTube! Californication, too. It airs on Showtime, which is owned by CBS. But what it really means to me is that my Duchovny-obsessed writer, Paul Boutin, is going to get even less done. Thanks, YouTube!

And departed Silicon Alley Insider reporter Michael Learmonth wasn't entirely wrong in his article saying that Google had nixed the idea. Google and YouTube won't necessarily be offering live streaming video to users of the site any time soon. Why, when the search advertising company is already stuck subsidizing YouTube and venture capitalists are happy to continue subsidizing sites like Justin.tv and Ustream with their own money?

Since Wired links to Bloomberg News as the source of its information, one possibility is that Bloomberg published a story about the new channel before they were supposed to. That kind of thing seems to happen a lot at Bloomberg these days. Seeing the article, YouTube PR panicked and pushed out a blog post that triggered a Twitter message. Then Bloomberg pulled its story and YouTube PR followed suit. Update: In an updated post, Wired now calls the link to Bloomberg their own "big goof."

Another possibility: Bank of America, named as a channel partner, pulled its support from the project because it either doesn't have cash to throw at experimental sponsorships or would prefer to keep a low brand profile while weathering the current financial crises.

Which, granted, has a long tradition on YouTube (even Williams has admitted to gaming his view counts in his early days on the site). How might it hurt the popular video distribution platform? But once again, it's not the kind of thing advertisers like to hear — especially while YouTube's parent company, Google, has CEO Eric Schmidt telling anyone who will listen how awesomely transparent online advertising is.

If YouTube doesn't act to stop a content partner from gaming the viewership numbers, it will have a hard time convincing advertisers to buy inventory when those advertisers feel some of that inventory is fraudulent. Especially when those advertisers can create distribute their own ads using YouTube for free and get reliable data for themselves by simply not manipulating audience metrics.

Can you spot the one that doesn't belong?

The efficiency of communication is deeply correlated to the time it takes for data to be accessed and transmitted. Text based data will always be faster to access and transmit than video based data (not just talking the web here), and therefore will be more efficient. Text is already highly accessible and ubiquitous, and anyone who thinks video is going to replace text is not only an asshole, but probably retarded.

Chad Hurley is a douche bag who got lucky and got rich. The company he built hemorrhages money and has done nothing but create an outlet for outcasts and undesirables to communicate their nonsense in a space insulated from society. YouTube is nothing more than an expensive mental institution.

This is almost as ridiculous as when Zuckerberg referred to Facebook as an OS. Fucking lucky idiots.

Hurley claims his own site's "exponential growth" means video is becoming the dominant means of communication — not just for news and entertainment, but for everyday communication between individual people. He ignores the real-world evidence that people vastly prefer text-based communications — email, IM, phone texting — rather than the video tools built into nearly all new computers and most phones. Because he's rich and works for Google, Hurley's claim will be widely quoted today, and conveniently forgotten in ten years. Here's what no one will ask him: Chad, why did you post your world-is-changing claim in text, instead of uploading a video? (Photo by AP/Danny Moloshok)

The move seems more politics than pragmatics. Most Al Qaeda videos are posted outside YouTube. LiveLeak has plenty. Lieberman's been after YouTube since May, but the Google-owned site didn't update its community guidelines until the day before 9/11's seventh anniversary, at a time when Al Qaeda's momentum is fading.

Look, I'm as jingoistic as the next guy. But if Lieberman wants to fight Islamic militants on YouTube, what he needs isn't a ban, but a countercampaign: More clips that show insurgents missing the target and running from U.S. troops. I'll bet there's a lot more such footage out there.

The company's hands are largely tied — there is no provision in the DMCA that allows sites and ISPs to confirm the provenance of claims. Issuers of bogus takedown notices can only be held accountable after the fact in court, and while it's not clear, YouTube would have to be wary of exposing to itself to more liability if it manually monitored cases. For instance, in Bunker's case, his XenuTV channel has been taken down and restored multiple times. Because either through flagging or phony takedowns, the automated system rewards the whims of "concerned citizens" who may well have an axe to grind.

What YouTube can do is help users affected by illegal copyright notices go after the liars. Individuals acting alone with no legal or financial support would have an uphill battle against L. Ron Hubbard's disciples. But YouTube could certainly lend both lawyers and money to a possible class-action suit, either directly or through a proxy like the Electronic Frontier Foundation (so as not to offend a paying advertiser). While rightsholders are given a warning that issuing false claims could result in a perjury conviction by the automated takedown system, until someone actually pays the price its just that — only a warning.

Traditionally, bands playing covers of songs written by other bands had to pay a royalty to music publisher organizations like ASCAP and BMI. The irony is that under traditional recording contracts, bands didn't make much from album sales, but touring and (to a lesser degree) publishing rights. So toeing the record industry party line on illegal file sharing, while giving in to the abuse of the band's publishing and public performance rights, actually makes the least economic sense for musicians in terms of the old music business.

The story: Two British guys adopt a lion cub in 1969, raise it for a couple years and then release it into the wild. Later, the pair go to to Africa to visit their old friend. Despite warnings that the cub will no longer recognize its old friends, it decides not to maim them. Or something. Anyway, watch the clip below and trust me, you'll squirt a few drops. 13 million others have, which is exactly why, during these troubled economic times, Sony Pictures just announced it plans to adapt the clip for a feature called "A Lion Called Christian."

The terms of service for Google's popular email product Gmail contains the same language as the Chrome TOS mentioned above, but it's also got this Orwellian gem tucked in it:

Google reserves the right (but shall have no obligation) to pre-screen, review, flag, filter, modify, refuse or remove any or all Content from any Service.

Not that Google is actually going to stop you from sending that dirty email about sex and drugs to your dirty friends, but they could.

Facebook is the Internet's most popular photo-sharing site. Which, according to Facebook's terms of service, means Facebook could be a very profitable stock photo firm if it wanted to be.

By posting User Content to any part of the Site, you automatically grant, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant, to the Company an irrevocable, perpetual, non-exclusive, transferable, fully paid, worldwide license (with the right to sublicense) to use, copy, publicly perform, publicly display, reformat, translate, excerpt (in whole or in part) and distribute such User Content for any purpose, commercial, advertising, or otherwise, on or in connection with the Site or the promotion thereof, to prepare derivative works of, or incorporate into other works, such User Content, and to grant and authorize sublicenses of the foregoing.

The terms of service for YouTube also say that uploading anything onto the site gives them license to do whatever with it. More obnoxiously, YouTube also says that even after you delete content from the site, they're allowed to keep it forever:

You understand and agree, however, that YouTube may retain, but not display, distribute, or perform, server copies of User Submissions that have been removed or deleted. The above licenses granted by you in User Comments are perpetual and irrevocable

My favorite obnoxious terms-of-service clause is in the license for AOL's instant messenger client. You're only allowed to use AIM for lawful purposes, so no pinging your friends about smoking up or scalping tickets. Also, turns out you can't say dirty words or obscene things over the service, which probably means most people can't talk about their bosses, last night's overtime loss, or that girl in fourth period:

You May Use the AIM Products for Lawful Purposes Only. You may use AIM Products for lawful purposes only. You may not post on or transmit through community areas (e.g., message boards, chat, e-mail, calendars, instant messaging products) or other means any material that (1) violates or infringes in any way upon the rights of others, (2) is unlawful, threatening, abusive, defamatory, invasive of privacy or publicity rights, vulgar, obscene, profane, indecent or otherwise objectionable, (3) encourages conduct that would constitute a criminal offense, (4) gives rise to civil liability, (5) violates any policies posted in any community areas or (6) otherwise violates any law. You also may not undertake any conduct that, in AOL's judgment, restricts or inhibits any other user from using or enjoying the AIM Products, including without limitation the community areas.

Both Mozilla's terms of service for Firefox and Microsoft's EULA for Internet Explorer 7 don't have these weird clauses.

In the view of one Madison avenue agency exec, Google bought YouTube back in 2006 "because they didn't want someone else to, and now they don't know what to do with it." Clients don't always want to take over an entire site and would prefer to purchase a smaller run of good inventory. Site takeovers can work as an expensive one-off — think movie premieres — but don't help promote a brand over the long term. But Google doesn't have a YouTube product to serve that need. As a result, the exec told Valleywag, the YouTube sales people try to sell the same things over and over again, just with new names. Well, at least now they're trying new sizes, too.

I've no plans to vote for McCain, but I'm all too aware that if the numbers were the other way around, I could collect a couple thousand bucks this afternoon in MSM assignments on Barack's "YouTube victory" and how it changes politics forever. As is, I'm reduced to pitching The Weekly Standard.