text: An NBC worker who posted old footage from the "Today" show of the hosts wondering, "What is the Internet anyway?" has been fired, the network confirmed, saying the person had a history of distributing material without permission.The footage, in which Katie Couric, Bryant Gumbel and Elizabeth Vargas try to figure out the Internet and e-mail addresses, made the rounds via said Internet last week, posted and re-posted to Facebook pages and sent via e-mail.Filmed in 1994, the clip features Gumbel demanding, with a befuddled expression: "What is the Internet anyway?" and Couric stumbling to define it as: "that massive computer network, the one that's becoming really big now."In a statement, NBC confirmed it fired the employee responsible for first distributing the footage."The individual in question violated the company's standards of conduct by repeatedly copying and distributing a variety of materials without permission," the statement said. It was reported on media-watching websites including All Things Digital and PaidContent In the clip, Gumbel also complains about e-mail addresses, particularly "that little mark with the 'a' and the ring around it."As the clip gained attention, " Today " itself featured the footage and current host Matt Lauer laughingly noted: "We all felt that way at the time. It was a mystery to all of us." ||||| Yup, NBC did indeed fire the guy who put that 1994 “Today Show” clip up on YouTube. 
   
   Here’s the company’s official statement: “The individual in question violated the company’s standards of conduct by repeatedly copying and distributing a variety of materials without permission.” 
   
   Not that it needs much unpacking, but just to be clear: NBC is saying, without actually saying so, that its position is that it canned the leaker for behavior beyond posting that single clip. 
   
   And not to be too square and get-off-my-lawn about it, but there are lots and lots of companies–including, for instance, Google, which owns YouTube–that fire people for distributing things on the Internet that aren’t supposed to be distributed on the Internet. 
   
   As PaidContent’s Andrew Wallenstein argues, the fact that the clip is funny and interesting and had already been on TV 17 years ago–and on NBC’s own Web site today–doesn’t mean the NBC guy had the go-ahead to do it. (It also points out the complexity that YouTube has in policing authorized and unauthorized clips, but that’s a different story.) 
   
   But, as noted: The clip is funny and interesting! And reminds us of what Bryant Gumbel and Katie Couric used to look like. Let’s watch it again!
target: – Most people got a chuckle over the 1994 video of Katie Couric and Bryant Gumbel struggling to understand that new Internet thing, but not everybody's laughing: NBC fired the employee who posted it, reports the All Things Digital blog. “The individual in question violated the company’s standards of conduct by repeatedly copying and distributing a variety of materials without permission," said a company statement. And that came after the Today show itself ran the clip when it became popular. Click for more at AOL News.