One of the more interesting parts of this announcement, however, was what got stuck in the bottom:

But YouTube has been the target of criticism in the media industry for allowing pirated video clips to be uploaded.

"YouTube until now has been a community garden. Once you get the corporate backing of Google I do think it becomes a more inviting target for lawsuits," said Jeff Lindgren, an intellectual property attorney with Morgan Miller Blair, a law firm in Walnut Creek, California.

The fact that the big media publishers now have someone they can sue means that Google has to do a good deal of work to ensure that it avoids the Napster-like problems of copyright violations by its users. On the other hand this snippet seems to indicate that some publishers do have a clue:

Earlier on Monday, Universal Music Group and Sony BMG said they signed distribution deals with YouTube, building on a similar agreement with Warner Music Group last month. Google also signed similar deals Monday with Warner and Sony BMG.

It isn't clear to me whether this will apply to all content but it does look like the major studios are slowly realizing that they need to work with these new distribution channels instead of against them...