You can debate whether Oprah Winfrey’s plans to shut down her broadcast show–in 2011–and move to cable constitutes “news.” Ditto for what it means for the culture.
But what do Oprah’s plans mean for the TV business? Not that much, argues JP Morgan analyst Michael Meltz.
Here’s a match up that makes plenty of sense: EMI Music Group, which has a new Norah Jones album to promote, is showing her videos on Hulu, the video joint venture that specializes in “premium” content. But the deal is the only one of its kind. While the big music labels have played footsie with Hulu in the past, they have yet to actually move any of their clips there. Instead, they’re concentrating on YouTube, which makes plenty of sense.
Slowly but surely, YouTube has been able to bump up the number of “premium” content creators willing to hand over some of their stuff to the world’s biggest video site. Here’s yet another one: Funny or Die, the comedy site backed by Will Ferrell, Sequoia and HBO, among others.
Would you pay $30 a month to watch TV via iTunes?
That’s the pitch Apple has been making to TV networks in recent weeks. The company is trying to round up support for a monthly subscription service that would deliver TV programs via its multimedia software, multiple sources tell me. The industry finds this idea both tempting and terrifying.
The man who helped shape CBS’s standalone Web video strategy explains himself, for the record.
Is Hulu putting up a pay wall around its Web TV site? Nope.
Does Hulu want to charge people to watch Web TV? Yes.
Confused? Don’t be.
Here’s the explanation about what’s going on at the premium online video site.
Is there anything you people won’t watch online? Doesn’t look like it, based on the newest Web video numbers from Nielsen. While stats show that the overall size of the Internet video audience has increased by 12 percent in the last year, the amount of video consumed has shot up 25 percent.
Ideal Bite, the green-flavored lifestyle newsletter business Disney bought in June 2008, faces an uncertain fate: Its parent company is shuttling the unit from one corporate silo to another and says it’s not sure what will become of it once that happens. Translation: The job market is going to see a few more resumes.
YouTube sneaked up on big media, then scared the hell out of them, then tried to do business with them, more or less unsuccessfully.
Now, three years after Google plunked down $1.6 billion for the video site, it seems to have figured out an approach that works for at least some big players: Hand over a chunk of the site to content creators, who get to control it, sell ads on it, program it with their stuff and share some of the ad dollars. Newest example, reportedly: Britain’s Channel 4.
Here’s the big media deal everyone has been waiting for. Or at least, here’s the report: Sharon Waxman of TheWrap reports that cable giant Comcast is buying all of NBC Universal from GE for $35 billion. Comcast says the report is “inaccurate.”
You already know this, but it’s always good to be reminded: In online video, there’s YouTube, and then there’s everybody else. Today’s data point: ComScore’s August video report, which shows Google’s video site generating 10 billion views and owning 39.6 percent of the market. That’s 10 billion views, and that’s just counting Web surfers from the U.S. Factor in international visitors and…it would be a lot bigger.
Just how big a deal was a federal judge’s ruling Monday in the copyright-infringement fight between Veoh and Universal Music Group? Depends on who you ask, of course.
Sure, you’re watching lots of video on the Web. But that doesn’t mean you’re cutting back on your boob-tube time. At least not yet.
Does Google need a Hollywood guide? It may be getting one: Jim Wiatt, the former head of the fabled William Morris talent agency, has been talking to the company about a consulting gig for its YouTube video site.
Wiatt, who is leaving his old job in the aftermath of his agency’s highly contentious merger with the Endeavor agency, discussed the idea with Google and YouTube executives in Mountain View last week, multiple sources said.
Get used to headlines like this: Disney is buying up comic powerhouse Marvel for $4 billion. The cash and stock deal values Marvel at $50 a share, up almost 30 percent from its Friday close.
We’ll get more details during a conference call later this morning, but if you want to kill time until then, you can play amateur M&A guy and draw up your own list of big media companies that will be buying or selling in the next year or so.
Peter Kafka has been covering media and technology since 1997, when he joined the staff of Forbes magazine. Most recently, he has been the managing editor of the tech and media Web site, Silicon Alley Insider. Read more »
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