Neither corporation is thinking about democracy, but about the right to make a profit. As much as I love YouTube, it doesn't democratize images/videos/films. If it really did democratize, then it wouldn't have spotlights on certain videos. Democracy is a tricky word, and I think in the U.S. it's basically lost its substance. I think it would be more appropriate to substitute the word "capitalist" for "democratic." In that case, it would be a chicken fight between two corporations. Ever noticed you can't download a video from YouTube? That's their way of protecting their profit--so you have to go back to the page to see the video again, and be exposed to their advertising. So I say, FIGHT FIGHT FIGHT!

You have a point. To clarify, I think I was trying to talk about the opposing approaches to media — YouTube has a populist approach to who has ownership of media (and makes its money through that approach), while Viacom believes they own the same media. It's another iteration of the debate on intellectual property rights that has been around since the Internet showed up, and it'll be interesting to see how this goes. I don't disagree, though, that both countries are motivated by the profits they can make.