There has always existed a tension between innovation and copyright law, especially with technology. The Sony Betamax case is most often cited to illustrate the conflict.

Just as Viacom is doing this week in suing Google’s video-sharing Web site YouTube for copyright infringement, so the TV and movie industry took on Sony back in 1984 for the same reason, although the situations differ quite a bit.

With the Betamax, Universal City Studios thought Sony was helping people “steal” their movies by giving them the ability to tape them with their VCRs.

Now Viacom, which owns MTV, VH1, Nichelodeon, and Comedy Central, among other things, is tired of seeing its work squatting on YouTube for free. It wants a billion dollars from deep-pocketed Google.

In the Sony case, the Supreme Court found that Sony couldn’t be held liable for what users do with their machines, since there were “substantial non-infringing uses” of the Betamax, which was discontinued after it lost out in competition with rival standard VHS.

The issue became cloudier recently when the Supreme Court ruled that file-sharing software, like Grokster and Morpheus, could be deemed illegal because their companies encouraged theft of copyrighted music.

The ruling seemed to indicate that illegality was closely linked to intent.

The courts have been pretty clear on Internet cases.

There are many legitimate uses of online forums, messaging, blogging and automated classified-ad systems like Craigslist that the operators can’t be held liable for how their users employ these systems. It has been accepted as reasonable that operators pull objectionable material once they learn of it.

Beyond that, they can’t police every posting. That applies to YouTube, as well, except that Viacom doesn’t think so, hence the lawsuit.

Google is in it for the money, and Google’s vaunted ad revenue stream is at the heart of the issue. Viacom doesn’t think Google should profit from Viacom property that has been hijacked and posted on YouTube.

By the same token, many Viacom properties, such as the Colbert Report and the Daily Show with Jon Stewart, receive fabulous free advertising via the snippets viewers capture — ironically using older technology similar to the Betamax and VHS — and post for the world to see for free on YouTube.

There is a synergy, a way that everyone wins. Viacom doesn’t buy the argument. They want Google to show them the money.

Others aren’t buying Viacom’s argument. CBS and NBC have struck deals with Google, and Universal Music Group, part of Vivendi SA, is following suit.

It’s not clear how the Viacom lawsuit will turn out. It may be that Google will not be held accountable as long as it deletes them when it learns of them, which is its policy.

However, today’s more business-friendly Supreme Court might side this time with Viacom, putting more of the burden on Google.

I fall where many observers fall, in favor of not killing the Golden Goose, which is of course technology. Somewhere in the middle is a solution where both sides win.

They’d better settle soon, before the next tech innovation makes the argument itself obsolete.