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I think that this is an issue of pre-moderation vs post-moderation of postings. Should all postings be verified by a web site owner before publication? I would argue not. On many web sites it is a 'crowd responsibility' to identify inappropriate content and have it excised as soon as possible. This is pretty effective - on Youtube, for example, there is a large 'Flag' link for users to identify inappropriate content.
If Google had refused to remove the content, there may have been a case to asnwer. But even then it becomes a matter of personal judgement and grey areas...

I think it's a pathetic attempt by the parents to make a fast buck out of it all.

Pre-moderation is just a slow death to any web service and they do so much good that they can not be allowed to fail because of a few selfish people who would milk the system for all it's worth and beyond.

The equivalent would be banning all live TV because one swearword got through before 9pm.

There is nothing wrong in broadcasting a criminal act when the guilty are exposed. The victim of the bullying is the only party in this case that should have any opinion as to the effect of damages that may have occurred from such a broadcast. The advocacy groups behind the case do not say they are acting specifically on behalf of the victim. It would appear they are instead driven by policy. Can it be clearly determined that such broadcasts contribute to the victimization of minorities? If these groups wish to approach the judicial bench with such a premise, they should have to provide statistical data as grounds, not simply departmental policy or expert witness opinion. The fact the criminals were caught and disciplined would tend to discount their position.

The advocacy groups generating this case should not defer censorship responsibility on GOOGLE given its willingness to remove the material when directed to do so. If the advocacy groups were truly committed to their professed mandate, they would build a policy bridge to GOOGLE and develop a means to accomplish their mandate. It is both administratively lazy and unrealistic to expect GOOGLE to do it for them under threat of courts these groups get taxpayers to pay for.

There are several issues to be considered. Among them:
1-GOOGLE as publisher.
2-Democracy of Internet access and content.
3-Usefulness of the Internet to act as deterrence to criminal activity.

That GOOGLE may or may not profit by such content is immaterial, especially given the true import of the case: video content. GOOGLE did not contract, solicit nor encourage the content found in this case which would appear to defend its position as internet service provider. GOOGLE should only be held as a publisher if, for example, it controls content from source, it receives upload revenue from the author, it extracts rights to the video or solicits individual pay-per-view revenue such as music or video download providers.

The fact that GOOGLE is not a public or government authority in order to claim service provider anonymity is also immaterial and only serves to weaken the intent of privacy protection. Part of GOOGLE’s mandate is to provide access to information as per the generally accepted necessity for a free and democratic Internet environment. To be sure, there are exceptions to this that are easily distinguishable, such as child pornography. In such a case it is justifiable to err on the side of caution on all levels. In the case of a bully video, it is not so obvious.

To provide editing and exclusion of separate video content on a global scale in real time is impossibly onerous and would be contrary to the nature of Internet democracy. This is not to say it cannot be done regionally: If I am not mistaken GOOGLE has already engaged in this type of activity by aiding the Chinese government to limit political discourse on the Internet in that country. Italy might study that methodology to see if could be implemented in a democratic fashion. I am not sure that is possible.

Finally, it should be remembered that one of the most universal means to mitigate victimization is to expose and make visible the criminal element. This sometimes comes at some cost to the individual victim, to which the service provider must honour requests for censorship from a legitimate source. This should be exercised with caution however: The criminal element is always seeking shelter from visibility, the use of technicality as immunity and politically correct paralysis to continue the victimization of the innocent.