Google announced today that it has agreed to acquire YouTube for $1.65 billion in a stock-for-stock transaction. Following the acquisition, YouTube will operate independently “to preserve its successful brand and passionate community.”

The acquisition is likely to lead to rapid changes at YouTube. Google’s announcement places emphasis on the legal distribution of professionally produced content. “The combined companies will offer new opportunities for professional content owners to distribute their work to reach a vast new audience,” notes Google in its announcement.

Earlier in the day, Google announced a deal with Sony to legally distributed music videos and videos that feature music from Sony artists.

The deal is also likely to affect video bloggers that distribute their videos through YouTube. With a $1.65 billion valuation, YouTube will have to regulate the use of traditionally copyrighted music and video in videos posted to the site. It’s also likely that mainstream ad-supported content will be featured prominently at the site, putting video bloggers in the same position that audio podcasters have found themselves in at the iTunes store.

YouTube will continue to be based in San Bruno, CA, and all YouTube employees will remain with the company. With Google’s technology, advertiser relationships and global reach, YouTube hopes to continue to build on its success as one of the world’s most popular services for video entertainment.