Viacom is now being blamed for secretly uploading copyright infringing content by YouTube's chief counsel, Zahavah Levine. This announcement comes as the court prepares to render a decision in the $1 billion copyright infringement lawsuit Viacom (VIA) brought against Google's (GOOG) Internet video giant, YouTube.

Attorney Levine has stated in a blog post: "For years, Viacom continuously and secretly uploaded its content to YouTube, even while publicly complaining about its presence there."

Twitter's a pretty lucky company. Few get two bytes at the hype apple in rapid succession, but this social media platform has found a way to make up for its disappointing announcement about its advertising model. According to VentureBeat, Twitter might unveil its long-awaited, heavily-hyped and possibly investor-satisfying corporate accounts. Next month, at its inaugural Chirp developer conference, we could finally see what might just be the foundation of Twitter's business model.

I'm sure everyone knows about the growth problems at the social-networking site. This recent article at Reuters discusses them. Morale at the company appears to be waning. Unique visitors aren't what they used to be. An ad agreement with Google (GOOG) is about to expire; any new transaction on that front may not be as valuable now that MySpace has been relegated to not-as-cool-as-it-used-to-be status.

Google has had an ongoing dispute with Chinese censors over Google's search engine content. China maintains strict censorship of the Internet sites that appear on Chinese search engines. Google (GOOG) on the other hand wants complete freedom of content on its site -- Google.cn.

Both sides have reached an impasse. Google has all but decided to close its Chinese search engine.

Record label EMI, which was purchased by Terra Firma Capital Corporation (TII) in 2007, was dealt a serious blow yesterday by the band Pink Floyd. The band filed a lawsuit against EMI because the record company started selling individual music tracks from Pink Floyd's two block buster albums, Dark Side of the Moon and The Wall online. The selling of individual music tracks is expressly forbid by the band's contract with the record label. Yesterday a judge affirmed that contract condition.

This turn of events comes not only as a serious blow to EMI, but as a gut wrenching twist in Terra Firma's continuing downward spiral. Terra Firma is currently engaged in a legal battle with Citigroup, Inc. (C) regarding its purchase of EMI at auction. Terra Firma has accused Citi of the use of "fraudulent measures" in completing that sale.

Yahoo! (YHOO) received an analyst upgrade from JMP Securities Monday. The thesis is that online advertising is improving, so now may be the time to get in on the possible capital appreciation of the business. The stock closed yesterday at $16.52 per share -- a gain of 2.8%. Volume was active.

The upgrade also comes with a price target of $21. Yahoo!, like many stocks, has bounced off its 52-week low quite strongly. Over the 12-month period, the company has risen by better than 20%. From one angle, I like the idea of this trade. Technically, the shares might be ready to move.

Instigated by an agreement negotiated between the European Commission (EC) and Microsoft Corp. (MSFT), a new browser selection utility has just become available. Although the browser choice software is intended mainly to be distributed through the Windows update system familiar to Microsoft's Internet Explorer (IE) users, it is also available online for anyone to access.

It is reported that Microsoft IE currently holds approximately 62% of browser market share. That is a powerful position for the company to be in when considering that web browsers are absolutely essential pieces of software. That is, in part, why the EC put pressure on Microsoft to open up the playing field to lesser known browser utilities. With their demands, European regulators essentially cut Microsoft's exclusive IE umbilical cord in July of 2009.

Where there are plenty of women, you're bound to find more and more men. Though the gain was small, the number of men on Facebook grew faster than women in February 2010, making the social networking site look a lot like every hot club in Manhattan -- men chasing women.

Facebook picked up an additional 5 million users in the United States last month, reaching 113 million. Since the middle of last year, the social media site has gained users every month. Though every demographic is showing increases, men are leading the charge. In January, women owned 56.07% of Facebook use, a share of activity that fell to 55.6% in February. Among users age 18 to 44, new male users outpaced females by approximately 2:1.

Apparently, all the hype wasn't worth it. After Twitter COO Dick Costolo explained that the company was going to unveil a "non-traditional" advertising model and claimed that "people will love it," what we're seeing is a foray into decidedly charted territory.

According to AllThingsD, Twitter's ad model will resemble the one that has been so successful for search and online ad giant Google (GOOG). Ads, essentially, will be tied to search.

Yawn.

An interesting piece of legislation is now blasting its way through the chambers of the Maryland legislature. This legislation threatens to lay waste to Internet social networking as we know it, if not for the inclusion of one solitary line of text.

While it appears honorable and well-intentioned on it's face, Maryland's HB65 (pdf file) is meant to place severe restrictions on the practice of international marriage brokering. If signed into law, the bill will place strict and deeply invasive disclosure requirements on the clients and providers of international match making services. This legislation does not bode well for the likes of eHarmony and Match.com.