YouTube Adds Full-Length CBS Content

**halfwaytree** · 10-10-2008, 11:40 PM

Re: YouTube Adds Full-Length CBS Content

**j-kid** · 10-11-2008, 12:51 AM

YouTube adds 'click to buy' for music, video games.

YouTube Adds Full-Length CBS Content

Select Cable and Network Shows Will Contain In-stream Ads

By Abbey Klaassen

Published: October 10, 2008
NEW YORK (AdAge.com) -- YouTube is getting its Hulu on. The Google-owned video site has partnered with CBS to air full-length TV shows, starting today.
CBS will sell pre-roll, mid-roll and post-roll ads and YouTube will get a cut of the revenue.
CBS will sell pre-roll, mid-roll and post-roll ads and YouTube will get a cut of the revenue.

For now a select group of old and new shows will appear, including "MacGyver," "Star Trek" and the original "Beverly Hills 90210," the season premieres of Showtime's "Dexter" and "Californication," and current episodes of "The Young and the Restless."

Spurred by rivals' site
Over the past year YouTube has dabbled in full-length TV content with documentary films and premieres for Showtime and HBO shows. Jordan Hoffner, director of content partnerships, said the move was spurred on by the success of those early trials but acknowledged that other sites such as Hulu, a joint venture between NBC Universal and News Corp., and ABC.com had proved there is a market for this kind of online video.

"This is the first time we're putting on full-length content from a partner on a consistent basis," said Mr. Hoffner. Other partners are likely to join shortly, he said.

The content will be ad-supported by pre-roll, mid-roll and post-roll ads. CBS will sell the ads and YouTube will get a cut of the revenue, although YouTube declined to specify the terms of the revenue-sharing agreement.

CBS's video distribution strategy, including this new one with YouTube, has been one of syndication -- doing deals with many sites but using technology that allows it to serve advertising to those sites. Under the strategy, about half of its web-streaming traffic comes through its distribution partners asopposed to its own site, CBS.com. CBS didn't partner with NBC and Fox on Hulu because it doesn't want to give up 30% of the revenue it would have generated, as per Hulu's required split; CBS instead has done some 80%-20% revenue-share deals with its partners.

Launched new player
YouTube also launched a new player for the longer-form content, called Theater View, which plays video in a higher-quality 16:9 format so it looks less pixelated. "When you go to full screen you can actually kick back and watch it," said Shiva Rajaraman, senior product manager.

Mr. Rajaraman said YouTube is "very much committed" to in-video overlay on short-form video. But, he said, "on this type of content we believe customers accept and the content experience merits in-stream ads."

The video-sharing site dwarfs other video destinations. According to ComScore, Google sites, which primarily include YouTube, accounted for 44.1% of online videos viewed in the U.S. in July, up from 34% in May. The next closest competitor was Fox Interactive, with a share of 3.9. Hulu, which launched in February as almost the anti-YouTube, offering full-length, professionally produced programs from both its parent companies as well as other media companies, had a 1% share.

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YouTube adds 'click to buy' for music, video games
New program marks latest effort by Google unit to generate a steady YouTube revenue stream

By Heather Havenstein

October 8, 2008 (Computerworld) YouTube LLC this week is moving to step up its efforts to generate revenue by adding e-commerce links that let users buy music and video games from the site.

The new "click to buy" links that the company unveiled Tuesday are first being used to embed iTunes and Amazon.com links on videos from companies like EMI Music, and to provide Amazon.com links for the new video game Spore from Electronic Arts Inc.

The new program marks the latest attempt to generate revenue from YouTube since Google Inc. acquired the online video firm in 2006. Past efforts to include advertisements in videos met strong resistance from YouTube users.

"Just as YouTube users can share, favorite, comment on and respond to videos quickly and easily, now users can click-to-buy products -- like songs, books and movies -- related to the content they're watching on the site," YouTube said in a blog post.

YouTube added: "This is just the beginning of building a broad, viable e-commerce platform for users and partners on YouTube. Our vision is to help partners across all industries -- from music, to film, to print, to TV -- offer useful and relevant products to a large, yet targeted audience, and generate additional revenue from their content on YouTube beyond the advertising we serve against their videos."

The retail links are gradually being added to YouTube's music library, but are now only available to users in the U.S., YouTube said. The long-term goal is to add retail links for additional content and to add access for international users, the company added.

As it struggles to find a way to monetize YouTube, Google is working to fend off a $1 billion copyright lawsuit filed against it by Viacom Inc.

Marshall Kirkpatrick, a blogger at Read Write Web, noted that this move comes almost a year to the day after Google announced that YouTube videos would be offered inside AdSense, something Kirkpatrick said should have generated a substantial profit for the company.

"Apparently it hasn't, or else we'd have all heard about it," he added. "Figuring out how to monetize YouTube is widely believed to be one of the biggest challenges Google faces. We're not excited about seeing e-commerce links strewn all over YouTube, but if there's one bit of good news here it's that music sales will happen through both iTunes and the DRM-free Amazon.com. That way … you can pay 99 cents and get that song yourself."

Source

**Tuff Gong** · 10-11-2008, 04:09 AM

Re: YouTube adds 'click to buy' for music, video games.

I wonder about user produced games and videos when are they going to allow click to buy on that?

YouTube Adds Full-Length CBS Content

YouTube Adds Full-Length CBS Content

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