Google Wants Colbert, Stewart to Testify

By Ed Oswald, BetaNews

August 13, 2007, 5:27 PM

Google took a shot at Viacom on Monday by calling two of the company's best known personalities from the Comedy Central network to give depositions.

According to court documents, both Jon Stewart of The Daily Show and Stephen Colbert of The Colbert Report have been asked to testify. Google has also asked for nearly three dozen others to testify as well.

The request stems from Google's attempts to fight the $1 billion USD lawsuit Viacom filed against it in March of this year. The Mountain View, Calif. search giant's move may seem peculiar, but both Colbert and Stewart played a role in the tussle between the two companies.

Before Viacom and YouTube had official relations, Stewart and Colbert's shows were some of the most popular videos on the site. Both The Daily Show and The Colbert Report were some of the programming that was included when the two sides initially struck an agreement to syndicate content in October 2006.

However, that deal was short lived, and ended with Viacom asking for all content to be removed in February.

It may end up that neither Colbert nor Stewart testify, as Viacom will have the chance to challenge the deposition requests in later proceedings. Conversely, Google could attempt to block Viacom from deposing some of its own officials.

In any case, the actual trial still looks quite far off, giving both sides an opportunity to settle out of court. An actual jury trial is not expected to begin until the spring of 2009 at the earliest.