This is such a BS story all around.

The cops are Idiots, no doubt. But they have to be there to deal with fools like this student.

Prior to Pepper Spray and Tasers, Choke holds were used. Unfortunately people were being killed quite often, such as in this example.

http://www.findarticles.com/p/articles/mi_m1355/is_7_98/ai_63735777

So In my estimation, he got off easy.
And if he was at USC, campus security would have shot him.

An interesting talk by Revver founder Steven Starr at USC:
http://uscpublicdiplomacy.com/index.php/events/events_detail/1861/

some notes...
Mentos / Diet Coke vid - sold $70,000 of ads. Creators got 35K.
Content is under a Creative Commons license from the creator.
Uses dynamic ad insertion - does a callback to server, for a single frame JPEG.
No ads if there isn't a 'net connection.
Rever has employees review submissions for copyright infrigement. Have only had one C&D, for 100,000 (?) pieces of content.
TV networks- putting shows online not easy. Have to negotiate with many stakeholders.
Lots of copyright liability discussions/legalese

Here is the link to this flash game:
http://intihuatani.usc.edu/cloud/flowing/
pretty nice