MTV and MySpace believe they have found a novel way of making money from piracy, and will test out a new advert-serving mechanism this month.

Instead of being served with take-down notices when MySpace users post up MTV copyrighted content, they will instead be served adverts that earn the station money.

This is apparently possible due to video-fingerprinting and ad-serving technology from a company called Audite.

Matched content

The platform can compare hours of television with what is online and match it – ensuring that content providers get advertising revenue from their own content whoever posts it on MySpace.

"This is a game-changer," said MySpace's President of Sales and Marketing Jeff Berman.

"We're going from a world of 'no' to a world of 'yes', while protecting the rights of the copyright holder."

The ads served through Audite will be a 'semi-transparent' overlay over the lower third of the video player, although the final look and feel is apparently still part of the trial.