No Daily Show, Colbert for Hulu

Viacom will remove “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart” and other Comedy Central television shows from Hulu the week of March 8, 2010, apparently unhappy with the incremental ad revenue the Hulu viewings generate, or other terms of the deal.

You might say it is a skirmish in the wider war over content pay walls and other ways content owners want to preserve the value of their copyrights in the online ecosystem.

Consider the move a vote to protect and preserve the value of multi-channel video distribution. that isn't to say content owners are averse to extended online distribution, only to note that, at the moment, the value of multi-channel revenue streams vastly outweighs what Viacom has been able to realize from Hulu distribution.

Comedy Central apparently will continue to stream full episodes of the shows on TheDailyShow.com and ColbertNation.com, where Viacom might believe it can better profit from restricting the content to its own sites.

Hulu executives say revenue for both “The Daily Show” and “The Colbert Report” had been growing. “In the past 21 months, we’ve had very strong results for both Hulu and Comedy Central, in terms of the views and revenue we’ve generated,” says Andy Forssell, Hulu SVP.

Three of the broadcast networks, ABC, NBC and Fox, own stakes in Hulu. Viacom’s decision may suggest that the economics of Hulu make less sense for content providers that lack equity in the Web site.

It isn't as though online availability now will cease. It is simply that viewers will have to navigate to the Viacom-owned sites.

No Daily Show for Hulu

Microsoft Gets Viacom Online Ad Deal

Viacom Inc. has selected Microsoft Corp. as its Internet advertising partner in a five-year agreement initially valued at an estimated $500 million, also involving online games, shows and movies.

Microsoft will help Viacom place advertising on Viacom's U.S. Web sites and be the exclusive seller of its remnant display advertising, or ad space Viacom has been unable to sell.

As part of the deal, Microsoft will also license on a non-exclusive basis long and short-form television and movies from Viacom for the MSN portal and the Xbox 360 game system's online network.

Microsoft has also agreed to buy ads on Viacom's broadcast and online networks over five years and help Viacom establish itself as a publishing partner on Microsoft's casual Internet gaming sites.