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Tube Company Sues YouTube Over Brand URL

Operators of the online community website, YouTube, were probably expecting the legal pressure inflicted upon them by music labels and movie studios, after all, there are many people sharing copyrighted material on their site. However, when Ohio-based Universal Tube and Rollform Equipment filed a lawsuit against YouTube, they were taken by surprise. The owners of the small plumbing business from Ohio are accusing YouTube for destroying their website, as YouTube`s URL closely resembles their own ? utube.

More than 70,000 surfers rushed into their "utube" site looking for video content to share and watch. Obviously, they did not find what they were looking for, but the people that were actually looking for Universal Tube and Rollform Equipment`s site could not manage to access it, as it was ?ironically- flooded. Additionally, the company says that users filled in sales forms in a vulgar and belligerent manner in order to protest against the misleading address.

The URL that belongs to Universal Tube has been under their possession for over 10 years, and the company is asking YouTube, which was bought for 1.6 billion by Google last month, to stop using their internet address. The scenario where YouTube is changing their highly recognized brand name seems unlikely, and we can all assume that some sort of off-court agreement will be found. After all, what`s a little settlement compared to 1.6 billion?