Who dares to take on the Internet proprietor giants MySpace and YouTube? Universal Music does. The company "has plans" for those devious copyright infringers who host videos owned by Universal. (We take it Universal isn't responsible for YouTube sponsor Paris Hilton's video.)

Bascially it's the same thing YouTube went through with Saturday Night Live's "Lazy Sunday" video — those who upload videos onto You Tube and MySpace shasay past the copyright and ownership of content laws. Though both sites technically act as "hosts" for content, and are known to take copyrighted material down once they're informed of it, Universal is not too happy with all their for sale content being freely distributed all over the place.

Then, there's also Huffington Post's explanation.

Universal Music Group is going after MySpace (Fox) and YouTube (not Fox) for cash because they're too stupid to come up with their own ways of repurposing their own content.

Which is probably more spot-on than the whole "YouTube doesn't respect infrigement laws" theory.

MySpace, YouTube targeted by Universal Music Group [Ars Technica]
Universal Sues MySpace, YouTube [Eat the Press]