YouTube Could Have Rival

The major broadcast networks are reported to be in serious talks about creating a site that would rival the popular video sharing site reported last week the networks are hoping to create a site that would directly compete with YouTube. An announcement on such a deal could come as early as this week. The companies that are involved are Viacom, CBS. The latter has seen an increase in viewer ship since it downloaded over 300 video clips to YouTube last month. The idea for the proposed site is to be ad supported and feature the media companies clips as well user generated clips. The negotiations are fragile and an anonymous executive close to the deal said, "They really want to do it, Ten minutes after they do it they'll want to kill themselves." Bringing all sides into agreement will be a major obstacle and negotiations could fail all together. Another area that could be a potential issue is the question of antitrust laws. It is not known if the networks would make their proposed site exclusive or if they would share clips with a competitor like YouTube. If they did decide to share clips with competitors then they would have to do something about licensing clips and if they decide to remain exclusive they could come under federal scrutiny. The blogosphere has reacted to this news in a mainly negavtive way. They see the whole venture as ill fated and with little chance of success even if the networks can reach an agreement. Del.icio.us | Digg | Reddit | Furl Bookmark Murdok: Mike is a staff writer for Murdok for the latest ebusiness news.