[osth]

Sounds like mirroring and ftp servers (or even bittorrent) would work just fine for distributing copyright-cleared video. Indeed that's how I remember it being done before YouTube and Netflix existed.

Today, with the explosion of online video, the copyright-clearance step could be administered by companies (as it already is, e.g., YouTube), but the servers providing distribution to the users at the network edge do not have to be run by companies.

1. Recall that storage is quite inexpensive and users are today quite capable of providing their own at home or on-the-go storage for terabytes or gigabytes of video.

2. Recall the "content-centric" networking idea Van Jacobsen has presented to Googlers. Does it really matter where the user gets the content? No. What is important is that it is authentic (and copyright-cleared).