IO Group, Inc. v. Veoh Networks, Inc.

Filing 80

Declaration of Gill Sperlein in Support of Plaintiff's Motion for Summary Judgment on Liability re 78 filed by IO Group, Inc. (Attachments: # 1 Exhibit Papa Declaration Excerpts# 2 Papa Deposition Ex. #3# 3 Papa Deposition Ex. #11# 4 Papa Deposition Ex. #16# 5 Dunning Deposition Excerpts# 6 Shapiro Deposition Excerpts# 7 Shapiro Deposition Ex. #5# 8 Styn Deposition Excerpts# 9 Bilger Deposition Excerpts)(Related document(s) 78 ) (Sperlein, Dennis) (Filed on 7/31/2007) Text modified on 8/7/2007 to conform to document caption post by counsel (bw, COURT STAFF).

IO Group, Inc. v. Veoh Networks, Inc.

Doc. 80 Att. 8

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA SAN JOSE DIVISION

____________________________ IO GROUP, INC., a California Corporation,

) ) ) ) Plaintiff, ) ) vs. ) ) VEOH NETWORKS, INC., a ) California Corporation, ) ) Defendant. ) ____________________________)

CASE NO. C-06-3926(HRL)

DEPOSITION OF JOHN STYN SAN DIEGO, CALIFORNIA MAY 31, 2007

REPORTED BY REGINA L. GARRISON, CSR NO. 12921

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UNITED STATES DISTRICT COURT NORTHERN DISTRICT OF CALIFORNIA SAN JOSE DIVISION

____________________________ IO GROUP, INC., a California Corporation,

) ) ) ) Plaintiff, ) ) vs. ) ) VEOH NETWORKS, INC., a ) California Corporation, ) ) Defendant. ) ____________________________)

CASE NO. C-06-3926(HRL)

DEPOSITION OF JOHN STYN, taken on behalf of the Plaintiff, at 530 B Street, Suite 350, San Diego, California, on Thursday, May 31, 2007, at 9:57 a.m., before Regina L. Garrison, Certified Shorthand Reporter, in and for the County of San Diego, State of California.

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APPEARANCES FOR THE PLAINTIFF: THE LAW OFFICES OF GILL SPERLEIN BY GILL SPERLEIN 69 Converse Street San Francisco, California 94103 [phone], Ext. 32 FOR THE DEFENDANT: WINSTON & STRAWN LLP BY JENNIFER A. GOLINVEAUX 101 California Street San Francisco, California 94111-5894 [phone]

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A. Q. A. Q.

Yes. And would you keep track of your hours? Yes. And then you would send them a bill; is that

how it worked? A. Q. A. Q. Yes. How often would you bill them? Every two months. And again, this is prior to your -- to the

VEOH.com going live; is that accurate? A. I don't remember when it went live. That has

been my arrangement throughout my -- throughout them being a client. Q. Okay. And you said earlier that you believed

that they became a client about a year ago; is that accurate? A. Q. Yes. So before they became a client, does the fact

that they were paying you -- is that what determined when you became a -- or they became a client? A. Q. Yes. In other words, early on, were you doing some When I say

of these activities without being paid?

"earlier on," I mean, you know, at the initial formation before the site, the VEOH.com, went live. 24

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were active at the time. Q. Do you remember ever looking at

pornotube.com? A. the time. Q. A. the time. Q. A. Q. You're familiar with them now? Yes. But you're not sure you were familiar with And how about xtube.com? I'm not sure if I was familiar with those at I don't remember if that was a part of it at

them back -A. Q. Correct. Did you encourage other people to submit

video files to VEOH? A. Q. VEOH? A. Q. Not specifically. When did you first have a discussion with Yes. Was that part of what you got paid to do for

anyone at VEOH about being paid? A. Before it was a company, when Dmitry and I I did not want to be a part

had initial conversations.

of the company, but I said I could do consulting work, help advise. 27

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what I programming-type person would do for VEOH? A. Q. I don't know. Did anyone at VEOH ever ask you to encourage

certain types of video producers to submit their content? A. Q. No. Were there certain types of content producers

that you personally were more interested in seeing come to VEOH? A. Q. No. Were you interested in seeing as many people

come to VEOH and submit content as possible? A. Q. Yes. And that's true regardless of what type of

content they brought with them? A. Q. Correct. Why is that true? Why is it true that you

wanted as many people to come to VEOH and submit content as possible? A. Q. The more content, the more compelling site. Does that mean the more content that was on

the site, the more people would be more likely to come and visit the website? A. Q. Correct. And was that something that was of interest 30

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to you personally or an advantage to VEOH, the company? MS. GOLINVEAUX: question. THE WITNESS: BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. And were there any other reasons why you Both. Object to the form of the

found it important that a lot of people would come to VEOH? A. stationed. Q. So the more content on VEOH, the more people It's where my personal TV network was

would come, and the more people that would come, the more people would see the videos that you produced; is that accurate? A. Q. Yes. Did you ever make suggestions to people about

what types of programming that they could produce to put on VEOH? A. Q. Can you explain "programming"? Video content. Did you give people ideas of,

you know, something they might want to try and produce and then put on VEOH? A. Q. page? 31 Yes. And did you do that through an internet web

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Q.

And I know that these things are -- that

you're very much involved on the internet, and I don't expect you to have a complete recollection -A. Q. Yeah, no. -- of everything, but what I want to find out

specifically here is -- let me just move on with some quick questions. In any of your business dealings, have you ever heard of people refer to "18 USC 2257"? A. Q. Yes. You heard people talk about it in terms of

just referring to it as "2257"? A. Q. about? A. It is a recordkeeping rule geared toward the Yes. What's your understanding of what that's all

adult industry. Q. And have you engaged in any conversations

designed to help you better understand the requirements of 18 USC 2257? A. Q. Have I engaged in any conversations? Have you talked to any other people who tried

to understand it better? A. Q. No. Have you ever operated a website where 18 -43

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drafted on your own? A. Q. Yes. And when you added that last sentence there,

"Adult content requires some additional documentation," can you tell me what you had in mind? A. That was exactly around the -- the --

addressing the potential 2257. Q. What kind of additional documentation did you

see as being required for the submission of adult content? A. I didn't know, which is why it's vague here This is -- yeah, I

and why this was never public.

just -- I didn't know what it would be. Q. And then I just want you to look at one other

section here, and this is on the very last page of the document under No. 4. Again, I'll read part of it out

loud and ask you to read along with me. The heading there or the question, rather, is: "What are you doing to prevent content that

violates your policies from appearing in VEOH," question mark. And the response to the FAQ is: "We do a

preliminary review on uploaded shows through both a manual and automated process. Although we try our best

to detect and remove shows that violate our policy 56

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guidelines, our review process is primarily focused" -and it's cut off there a little bit. I'm pretty sure

it says "on" -- "removing adult content or obvious copyright violations and is not bulletproof." Do you recall whether that was something that was in the original document that you copied? A. Q. I don't recall. So you don't know if that's something that

you drafted yourself? A. Q. I don't know. Do you know whether YouTube has a policy of

reviewing material? A. Q. I don't know. At the time that you made changes to this

document and were drafting it, is it fair to say that you either left this in there -- in the document or drafted it yourself? A. Q. Yes. It wouldn't have come from any third

possibility; is that accurate? A. Q. A. Q. Yes. Do you understand what I'm talking about? Yes. So why would you either leave or add a

statement that said "VEOH's policy was to review 57

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content for obvious signs of copyright violations"? MS. GOLINVEAUX: THE WITNESS: If you recall.

I know at some -- at some I don't know

stages of discussions, that was an idea. if that was ever implemented or not.

But I know that

was -- that was an idea, that we would have a review. BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. Do you know if that was the plan at the time

that you were creating these FAQs? A. Q. I believe so. Does this document refresh your recollection

about any conversations that you had with VEOH about policies concerning copyright infringement? A. I remember pointing out DMCA, like, as --

because this was not their -- this was all my stuff. This document is all my stuff, and I remember, because I didn't understand some of the -- like it says, "See our DMCA policy for more information," and I do remember telling them that they should have something like that, too. Q. Do you remember telling VEOH that they should

have something like that? A. Q. Yeah. At that time, do you know that VEOH did not

have a DMCA policy? 58

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MS. GOLINVEAUX:

Object to the form of the

THE WITNESS:

I don't think VEOH was live I don't think it was a

when this was being made.

public -- I don't think it was -- I don't think the site existed. BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. So there would be no place to state that they

had a DMCA policy at the time you created this? A. Q. No. This is all theoretical.

If you had a conversation about the need for

a DMCA policy, would that conversation have been with Dmitry? A. Q. Yes. And just to clarify once more, in light of

having looked at this document, do you have any recollection of having a conversation with Dmitry about the need for a DMCA policy? A. I -- I remember highlighting it as something

in the same way I said 2257 is an issue and this is an issue that you guys need to deal with. Q. And do you have a recollection of whether

Dmitry responded in a similar way, such as to say, "I'm aware of the issues, and we've got it covered"? A. I don't remember. That was -- my 59

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relationship was more like, you know, "This shouldn't be a comma. You should make sure you do this." They would deal with

And they would do it. it. Q.

You said earlier that you believe that there

was, at some point, the idea of having a review process. A. Q. A. Is that what you said? Yes. How did you get that information? That was just the way the -- the -- the

process was explained to me at one point or was discussed with Dmitry, of going through from content to site. Q. A. Okay. So --

I believe those conversations were stopped by

other video sites once there was -- that discussion only happened before there was any sites doing this. And then once there was other sites like YouTube out there that we were competing with that had, you know, a 15-minute upload-to-visualize process, I think that's when it didn't -- you know, it was dropped. Q. Is the idea behind what you just said the

fact that YouTube was doing it and it didn't seem to be a problem, so maybe it's not as big of a problem as we thought it was? 60

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A.

Which problem -MS. GOLINVEAUX: Objection.

BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. I don't want to mischaracterize anything that You said that

you said, but I'm trying to understand.

something changed at the point that YouTube came onto the scene. was. MS. GOLINVEAUX: question? BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. Could you explain to me what changes in I'm sorry. What's the I'm trying to understand what that change

policy occurred as a result of YouTube coming online? MS. GOLINVEAUX: THE WITNESS: Object to the form. I --

I don't know the policy.

I only know in the discussion of the way things worked, we had discussions of the review. And -- and then,

realizing that -- and then I remember, then, that not being part of discussions after other sites had no review. I don't know if -- I do not -- was not a part of any conversations, if that was the reason for it. But I remember that being about the time line of -BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. Did you personally think that the idea of a 61

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review process was dropped because YouTube was operating without a review process? MS. GOLINVEAUX: THE WITNESS: BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. Do you recall if anything that anyone from If you recall.

I don't recall.

VEOH said to you would indicate that the idea of having a review policy was being dropped because YouTube was operating without a review policy? A. No. And this is -- this is a -- the relation

of YouTube to this stuff is me connecting dots, because that's when I was uploading videos to, you know, every place I could. And this -- that was not a -- that was

not an option for the speeds that all the sites were doing in. I believe including VEOH at the time. I I just

don't think anybody was -- again, I don't know.

know that videos were being uploaded very quickly. Q. And so that I understand your last statement,

are you saying that in order for videos to be uploaded that quickly, a review process was not practical? MS. GOLINVEAUX: his prior testimony. THE WITNESS: With my limited understanding Objection. Mischaracterizes

of what goes on behind the scenes, I didn't see how it was functionally feasible. I mean, I don't know how 62

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there could be technical and manual processes in ten minutes. MS. GOLINVEAUX: I would just point out for

the record that Mr. Styn only reviewed Exhibit 1, which is a five-page document, very briefly before the questions commenced. BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. I'm going to hand you another document now,

which I'll ask the court reporter to mark as Exhibit 2 today. And again, take as much time as you need to

review that document, Mr. Styn. (Plaintiff's Exhibit No. 2 was marked.) THE WITNESS: BY MR. SPERLEIN: Q. document? A. Q. Yes. This document is marked with Defendant's I meant to say "production You've had an opportunity to review the Okay.

Exhibit No. VEOH 005643. number."

This document appears to be an e-mail

generated internally as a result of your submitting a flag for a certain video file; is that correct? A. Q. A. Correct. Have you ever seen this document before? No. 63