Viacom sued Google for $1 billion over copyright infringement charges, claiming all those Daily Show clips were posted illegally. So sad news for Viacom chief Philippe Dauman: A judge ruled he's entitled to exactly zero dollars punitive damages. The only award he can receive are for the actual costs of infringement. Meanwhile, wasn't Viacom one of those big media companies arguing they weren't making any cash from their online content? The full ruling follows.

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In exchange for creating the best time suck for pot smoking university students, Alex Rigopulos and Eran Egozy are set to receive a $200 million-plus payday. The duo, who created the video game Rock Band at their company Harmonix, sold their equity to Viacom in October 2006 and pocketed $175 million, in cash, during the sale. Now, with game sale revenues expected to hit $600 million, Viacom is preparing to dole out another nine-figure sum to its creators. [NYP]

Tony Bennett wasn't the only one singing a toast to Sumner Redstone at a tribute to him last week. Face The Nation anchor and country crooner Bob Schieffer, who's leaving CBS News, also gave the Viacom honcho a tune:

"You are the guru, and who would know but you what a little change in Viacom’s name would do. Have an éclair, Mr. Redstone, buy some networks, make a movie, play a tune. Take a break now, Mr. Redstone, ’cause another deal will come along real soon."

But a call to arms wasn't the only idea on Bob's mind; the ousted Tom Cruise also got a shout out.

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NO ONE CARES ABOUT YOUR CAUSE In the eight weeks since the writers strike began, we, the viewers, have been hurt with repeats and reality TV, but networks haven’t been squeezed. Viacom and Sony stocks are up a bit; News Corp, CBS, Time Warner and Walt Disney are flat, and GE is only down two points. [Variety]

Permalancers are people too, people who need health benefits, 401(k)s and paid vacation days. To remind the bigwigs at Viacom about these issues, the “freelancers” staged a walk out yesterday.

Viacom managers were “supportive of the strike;” a freelancer told Mixed Media, "The word of the day is, 'Do what you gotta do.'"

These managers are so trying to be the cool father who can still rap with their teenagers’ friends. How about instead of rapping, you help get these kids some benefits?

MTV's pissed off freelancers show they're much more creative than any of those striking writers: They've flipped the "M" in "MTV" to turn it into a "W," and changed the "TV" into "TF," creating "WTF." And then they put it on stickers! [Gawker]

Not content with rotting the brains of Americans and Europeans, MTV has gone after the Arab market: MTV Arabia premiered this weekend. The channel will have 60 percent international music and 40 percent Arabic music.

A note to the casting directors of the Real World Baghdad: It might be too soon to see what happens when Sunnis and Shiites stop being polite and start getting real.

"WNYC Public Radio, New York magazine, Viacom, CBS Radio, and movie mogul Harvey Weinstein’s company have recently taken office space in Hudson Square, joining Community Media L.L.C., publishers of Downtown Express, The Villager, Chelsea Now, Gay City News and Thrive NYC." [DE]

Viacom honcho Sumner Redstone is scheduled to speak at Boston University tomorrow afternoon. If there's a Q&A portion, we sure hope someone asks him about his awesome new web platform Flux, which is sure to be the hottest social networking site this Yom Kippur.

Tired of illegally downloading South Park episodes off of YouTube, creators Matt Stone and Trey Parker finally bring their lewd, crude and generally amazing cartoon to the internets.

To make up for BET's degradation of black culture. [Stereohyped]

Google wants Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert (of Viacom's Comedy Central) and Viacom chief Sumner Redstone to give depositions. Viacom, meanwhile, wants Google heads Larry Page, Sergey Brin, and Eric Schmidt. [Reuters]

Aww, have Sumner Redstone and daughter Shari patched things up? Well, likely not. After the Viacom chief's comments last month – that Shari was contributing nearly nothing to the company – the twosome did meet up on Wednesday night at Il Postino to celebrate Viacom's successful quarter (where successful = profit declined from last year). But they arrived separately and dined at opposite ends of the table. Which pretty much means daddy still wants Shari's 20 percent stake in the CBS- and Viacom-controlling National Amusements.

Remember that cheesy CNN Money article we made fun of told you about last week? The one that was over-the-top effusive, and this-close to saying "I am madly in love with Les Moonves and want to have, like, 10,000 of his babies" and, um, conservatively titled "Everybody Loves Les?"

Well, we just found another person who really loves Les! It's mogul (and consummate family man) Sumner Redstone, an otherwise grumpy old miser who was nonetheless dancing on the ceiling during the conference call announcing CBS' second-quarter results.

A giddy Sumner Redstone, CBS’s chairman, gushed about the performance of CBS and raved about the company’s CEO Leslie Moonves. Redstone called Moonves “the best executive in the media industry” and raved about the “smart strategic moves” that CBS made to “position itself in the digital landscape,” referring to several notable acquisitions as well as the establishment of an online network to syndicate CBS content.

Redstone then celebrated CBS' incredible second-quarter gains by toasting to Moonves' performance, raising a glass for continued success, and trying to get his daughter (and presumed successor) forcibly evicted from the boards of both CBS and Viacom because he's a crazy, megalomaniacal control freak.

Sumner Redstone boots daughter Shari from the possibility of taking over when he's gone. If Sum keeps going this route, his legacy will end up in the hands of … Murdoch.

• Kirsten Dunst quits "stroking" Fab Moretti, starts stroking Razorlight's Johnny Borrell.

• Paris Hilton and Jenna Jameson join
forces to create a new, super-powerful STD.

• We're not falling for Melinda Doolittle's humble big-headed dwarf act…anymore!

• The Onion challenges AMNY to a competitive eating duel!

• Slate takes a gamble, launches political futures market. We're betting it'll be a huge success!

• Legal experts cleverly find a way to make the Viacom/YouTube lawsuit even more boring.

• Dita Von Teese with no makeup on is actually, surprisingly, pretty.

• Anna Nicole Smith judge Lawrence Korda gets busted for smoking the reefer. Police apparently didn't believe his plea that he was "just trying to get a better understanding of the victim."

• A Sopranos spinoff? Fuhgeddaboudit.

• Conrad Black is accused of lifting cash from a company in Chicago. So how come he's never even heard of Abe Froman?

• Who will replace Paul Steiger as WSJ's managing editor? We smell a reality show!

• 30 Rock continues to be that show you DVR, but never actually watch.

• Is Vicom's $1 billion suit against Google shortsighted? Experts say, "hello! Have you been to the Googleplex?"

• Time Warner could spin off AOL this year, despite what Time Warner spokesman Ed Adler has to say.

• Carol Burnett sues Family Guy for parodying her parody show.

• Conrad Black celebrates the start of his fraud trial by holing up at the Ritz Carlton.

• Two LA Times Pulitzer finalists nominated themselves. When questioned about it, they haughtily remarked, "well somebody had to do it!"

• With the Viacom/YouTube lawsuit heating up, Google suddenly needs to hook up with one of the "popular" media kids.

• Not just anyone can emulate The Economist's overly expensive and "aggressively boring" style!

• Will the publisher of Cookie join the leagues of Conde Nasters jumping to Reader's Digest? Who cares, you only read Teen Vogue, anyway.

• Stuff for sale! No, seriously, Stuff. As well as Maxim, Blender…

VH1 Classic will live on, at least according to an internal memo sent out yesterday by VH1 general manager Tom Calderone. Forget the fact that there's nary a PA to run tapes around, but that channel that's now in 45 million homes? Yeah, it'll still be on that channel you can't find.

It's been a tough week, and I'll be coming around to talk to all of you over the next few weeks about how we're moving forward. But before the dust settles, I want to dispel any rumors or speculation that we're shutting down VH1 Classic. That's just not true. [...]

The painful staff reductions we had to make will ensure that the channel continues to grow exponentially as we invest even more in VH1 Classic's programming. VH1 Classic is an even bigger priority now, and I will make sure that the channel continues its upward trajectory.

To recap: Nearly the entire staff of VH1 Classic has been fired, but the channel will continue to operate … you know, as per usual.

Calerdone's full staff memo, after the jump.

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Goodbye Kendrick Reid. We hear as part of Viacom's job cuts, Comedy Central's chief graphic designer is among the casualties. He was the man in charge of branding efforts for all of CC. He joined the company in 2000 to help spearhead the network's reshaping. And, naturally, he's repaid with a firing squad.* Cheers.

* Update: We hear Ken was let go in person by boss-slash-friend Peter Risafi, according to a well-placed source.

Update 2: Comedy Central's PR department checks in with this statement: "Please note that your item today on Kendrick Reid is inaccurate. Kendrick’s leaving the company has nothing to do with the recent layoffs at MTVN. Months ago he started a transition to work with Comedy Central as a consultant in order to have the flexibility to work on the launch of Comedy Central International channels and on other outside projects." Spin makes you dizzy, doesn't it?