Or for that matter the present.

Televsion is dying. The cost of distribution is exorbitant and more and more programs will be streamed over the Internet. The only thing that’s safe on television is live and interactive. So F1 is safe – it’s live.

Traditional televsion makers face a situation where a recorded version on the Internet might infringe on their intellectual property and the ability for the program makers to make money from broadcast (ads are paid for viewers) and DVD sales.

But you can’t watch the race in advance on the Internet. And basically F1 has low resale appeal. The annual DVD of the year will still sell to fans regardless. So to make more money you need more fans.

Bernie knows this of course. He uses very spurious numbers to create the tv viewing figures he needs. He in fact includes people who simply watch the news as viewers if they have a five second clip of F1. This makes no sense to sports fans but it does to sponsors. Those people are watching their brand in the news.

Now if only there was a way that F1 videos could reach millions of new fans who might learn about F1 but certainly would watch a video with branded cars in it. And what if that system could even tell you how many people watched so you could sell that exposure to the advertisers.

There is a truth emerging from the social networking era of marketing: personal recomendations are far more powerful than anything an ad man can cook up. You are far less likely to do something if an advert asks you to do something than if a friend asks you to do something. That is why embedding of videos works so well, people are effectively making personal recommendations.

Bernie shouldn’t issue take-down orders to YouTube. He does it because he sees F1 as his and that you’re stealing it. There’s a way through this though, his own company can upload the clips. Then he retains the copyright.

Personally I would like total freedom to use the clips as I’d like. Bernie should see that this is the best way to harness the “personal recommendation” aspect of this. But that might be a bit too radical. All the major news networks in the states are harnessing the power or YouTube to help grow their brand (they too are the early adopters because news is live and therefore safe) – perhaps now CBS and NBC are in on the game it might start seeming more kosher?