[rchaud]

YouTube had to have an informal deal worked something out with the studios. Circa 2004, the internet was awash in streaming video sites with copyrighted Family Guy and Futurama clips, which were often taken down. Then boom, one day those sites themselves go offline, and that content all moves to Youtube, where it stays up.

[maeil]

You remember the timeline very differently than I do. Dailymotion, just to give one example, was full of such content until at least 2010.