Hollywood and Vine: The entertainment industry seeks the future in viral video

[Commentary] With YouTube’s users watching more than six billion hours of video a month, and people consuming more than nine times as much digital video as they did in 2010, Hollywood planned to secure its own future by consummating a merger. And yet the buyers held off; they weren’t quite sure. An executive at a large cable network said, “We have a lot of conversations about YouTube. We ask, ‘Is it to us now what cable was to broadcast in 1992?’ The parallels are there -- lower production values; smaller, narrower audience -- and it’s even cheaper, even more niche, even less profitable today than cable was then. Only” -- he hesitated, not quite ready to change his frame of reference -- “none of YouTube’s stars have really crossed over and landed a big show on Bravo or MTV.”