Archive for August, 2006
MTV Networks, a division of Viacom, Inc. announced a definitive agreement to acquire Atom Entertainment Inc., for $200 million. Atom Entertainment has popular brands in games with Shockwave.com and AddictingGames.com as well as video via AtomFilms.com and AddictingClips.com. The company makes money through a combination of ad sales, games sales and subscriptions and has been profitable on an operating level since 2002.
Adding Atom Entertainment to MTV Networks’ overall portfolio appears to fit squarely with the company’s strategy of serving targeted, global audiences with a relevant and innovative online content. Following MTVN’s recent purchases of XFIRE, Y2M, GameTrailers.com, IFILM and Neopets, this acquisition demonstrates a continued push to consolidate it’s multi-platform media platform offerings.
Tom Freston, CEO, Viacom, said, “This acquisition is right on the money with our digital strategy. It adds great scale with users, improves our growing casual gaming position, and brings a world-class digital video library and a fantastic management team.”
Yet another “Wild West Land Grab” happening with online video. You’d have to conclude that the smart money has completed it’s due diligence and forsees some impressive growth in this area going forward. 
One might be tempted to dismiss Stickam at first glance as just a video-enabled Myspace clone for emo teens with webcams; but looking past that you’ll find a fairly robust and platform-independent Flash-based webcam broadcast and videoconferencing app. There’s a profile page with an embedabble Flash viewer, a full screen personal conference popup with privacy options, group video chat rooms, and hosted galleries for photo, video and audio content. If you can catch the Pissed-Off Caveman online.. it’s a webcam pointed at a decked-out Robot Chimpanzee Head.
Via: MetaFilter
MTV has struck a partnership with Google in which the internet company will distribute the music video broadcaster?s video programming to a series of niche websites. As part of the deal, MTV Networks will also sell episodes of its programmes through Google?s video store. It has similar agreements with AOL and Apple?s iTunes.
Some of the content the company will make available includes video clips from MTV?s Laguna Beach reality programme and its popular video music awards show as well as the Nickelodeon cartoon SpongeBob SquarePants. The two companies plan to share revenue from advertising sold alongside the video.
It also represents a strategic shift for MTV Networks. The company?s internet efforts had been focused on its own broadband sites, such as MTV Overdrive, launched last July. The arrangement with Google marks the first time that it will cede some control over its content by making it available to other websites.
Via: FT
As websites created by amateurs remake the entertainment landscape, unknown directors, writers and producers are being catapulted into positions of enormous influence. Each week, about a half-million people download a comedic video podcast featuring a former paralegal. A video by a 30-year-old comedian from Cleveland has now been watched by almost 30 million people, roughly the audience for an average “American Idol” episode. The most popular contributor to the photo site Flickr.com just got a contract to shoot a Toyota ad campaign.
While online stardom can sometimes be fleeting, and some measures of audience size are subject to debate, a look at the rising stars in this world shows how the path to entertainment success is being redefined. Traditional media companies and marketers are already in pursuit of some of these new faces.
Via: WSJ
A certain dot com agency went (way) out on a limb and is taking a beating for what might prove to be one of the most lame, and comment thrashed, attempts at creating a ‘viral’ web video to-date. The real proof of any concept is in the pudding and this one def. did not deliver. So, now they are getting rightly slammed for an obvious effort to appear hip and cool (Warning; it’s like watching a traffic accident in slow motion). There are plenty of people flaming about it so we won’t pile-on anymore than that. It was actually this unsolicited response which ‘does work’ that prompted us to post the drama via Madison Ave.
What will be interesting to see in the coming weeks is the defamation law-suit from Subway.. unless they actually approved that file - with their brand front and center - to be uploaded and ridiculed in such a manner.
Microsoft Corp.’s MSN has a strong position in Web video ads, ahead of Google and Time Warner’s AOL and behind only Yahoo, in contrast to its almost non-existent market share in the pay-per-click and banner ad market. MSN spent heavily in recent years to acquire Internet rights to programming from major TV networks, and is strongest in news clips via a 99 year deal with General Electric’s NBC. Microsoft recently signed a deal to license episodes of the Fox comedy “Arrested Development” for the next three years.
Yahoo, in contrast, has focused on its own video content, while AOL carries content from Time Warner’s Warner Bros. and cable channels Nickelodeon and the History Channel. The popularity of YouTube, which doesn’t insert ads into video uploaded to its site but soon plans to, has forced its competitors to carry user-uploaded video on their sites as well.
Via: Seeking Alpha
Current.tv is hosting a contest themed Seeds of Tolerance. In partnership with the Third Millennium Foundation, Current TV is offering the chance for you to make a difference and earn $100,000. Between now and August 15, submit a video on the theme of tolerance?any form of tolerance. Whatever story you want to tell, and however you want to tell it..
The grand prize creator will receive $100,000 cash, and $15,000 to a relevant charity of their choice. Two runners-up will receive $10,000, and be aired on Current TV, in 28 million homes across the country.
WeatherBug has launched its own video sharing community that allows any citizen meteorologist to upload their own reports and/or severe weather videos. This is a natural extension of what the company has been doing for years with photos. All videos can be rated and you don’t need to use the desktop product to participate or watch vids. There are additional features, including professionally produced content, on the broader video site.
Via: Micro Persuasion
