News Corp., NBC pull together to challenge YouTube

NEWS CORP, NBC PULL TOGETHER TO CHALLENGE YOUTUBE
[SOURCE: Los Angeles Times, AUTHOR: Meg James and Dawn C. Chmielewski]
Several media giants are teaming up to challenge Google and its YouTube video-sharing service, seeking to blunt their incursion into the entertainment business. News Corp. and NBC Universal plan to announce as soon as today that they are creating an online video site stocked with TV shows and movies, plus clips that users can modify and share with friends, according to people close to the negotiations. The two companies enlisted help from some of Google's biggest Internet rivals. The News Corp.-NBC Universal partnership has deals with Yahoo Inc., Microsoft Corp., Time Warner Inc.'s AOL and News Corp.'s MySpace to place videos in front of their collective audience of hundreds of millions. Despite Hollywood's dismal track record in creating successful joint ventures, these players see little choice but to band together to compete against Google and Apple Inc., which are becoming powerful distributors of entertainment.
http://www.latimes.com/news/printedition/front/la-fi-youtube22mar22,1,402752.story?coll=la-headlines-frontpage
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