Copyright infringement on YouTube was once again put under the spotlight last weekend after a proposed amendment to the Digital Economy Bill suggested the High Court could potentially serve injunctions against the file-sharing site.

Quoted in the Telegraph, Lord Clement-Jones, the Liberal Democrat peer who proposed the amendment, said the it would protect content creators who are not being rewarded for the work they put in.

“I believe this is going to send a powerful message to our creative industries that we value what they do, that we want to protect what they do, that we do not believe in censoring the internet, but we are responding to genuine concerns,” he said.

It’s another example of the not-so-softly-softly approach the Digital Economy Bill seems to be taking towards copyright infringement online.

While the Bill’s patron Lord Mandleson seems to have backed down from his previous “three-strikes and you’re out” policy for file-sharers, throughout the Bill’s lifetime politicians seem to have had nothing but contempt for any file-sharing or copyright infringement online.

That’s not a justification – not in the slightest – more that it just shows how out-of-touch Whitehall continues to be with the web. It’s great that the UK is theoretically heading into its first ‘digital election’, but it sometimes seems MPs are jumping onto a bandwagon they don’t quite understand; although that’s perhaps nothing new.

The basics are this: the brilliance of the web in 2010 is that it’s been built on the principles of sharing. While the first few years surfing the web meant you did just that – finding websites yourself – these days its much more about sharing content with your friends and peers. Often, however, it’s sharing content that you perhaps shouldn’t.

But sites like YouTube and Facebook – another site that’s previously been criticised for hosting copyrighted material – do their utmost to prohibit unauthorised content from being hosted within them.

For all the thousands of copyright-infringing videos currently on YouTube, there are probably a thousand-times more that never made it up due to parent company Google’s policing.

However, all we see is politicians constantly pointing the finger at web companies saying that they’re hurting honest content creators; this does nothing but damage the reputation of the YouTube’s and Facebook’s which do actively look to take down illegal material.

So, rather than threatening these sites, why can’t Parliament look to aid them in their fight? The web is social – that can’t be stopped.

Will is News Editor for Reputation Online’s sister publication, new media age

Image via Kevin Branchett