Google is once again displaying its intentions to be the big player in the online video distribution game with a pending investment in Xunlei ("Thunder"). The Shanghai-based company offers a P2P application designed to make the swapping of large video files easy and reliable. Just like the dominant sites like YouTube and Google Video, there is plenty of unauthorized content available.

The service has an estimated 100 million users. Therefore, the company is trying to use its userbase as a negotiation tool with content providers, looking to strike deals in similar fashion as its western counterparts. Google, with its Google Video and YouTube services, seems completely determined to push content providers into deals, while taking the risk of copyright infringement lawsuits.

Google has gone up against content providers in the past. Challenges to Google's "Book Search" plans are still ongoing from authors and publishers and there has been disagreements over web linking, indexing and thumbnail creation by Google. With video, Google has put itself up against the media giants and several analysts predict numerous huge lawsuits are coming.

Source:
Ars Technica