Yes, we’re not at NAB, or MipTV, or Web 2.0 Expo, all going on at the same time...our own EconSM conference is less than 10 days away, and that’s eating up all of our time. Anyway, we’ll bring any important developments out of those as they happen: Google CEO Eric Schmidt did a keynote Q&A today at NAB in Vegas, and said the company is very near enacting a filtering service on YouTube.

The new system, which he called Claim Your Content, will automatically identify copyright material so that it can be removed. he said. “We’re testing this with a couple partners, and we’re very close to turning this on.” This system has been delayed for at least five months now. A report in Feb said that Google will use fingerprinting tech from Audible Magic.

On Viacom: “Ah Viacom...You’re either doing business with them or being sued by them...we chose the former, but ended up the latter.” On Microsoft’s complaint about Goo-DCLK deal: “The specific complaints Microsoft has made are clearly false...I think a more likely scenario is that they are making those arguments because they are a competitor of ours.”

Variety: He said his company is experimenting with running ads before and after videos play, but he seemed specifically excited about the possibility to target those who watch numerous videos on a specific topic. “We can separate the fans from the casual viewers and take them to a much deeper site,” he said, citing a partnership with NBA on YouTube that drives frequent basketball watchers to NBA.com.