New York – Viacom Inc., CBS Corp. and News Corp. all moved to broaden their plans to sell content over mobile phones, extending their traditional media offerings such as television shows and streaming audio to portable devices.
Viacom’s MTV Networks – whose cable-TV channels include Comedy Central – said it began selling video clips, including bits from “The Daily Show with Jon Stewart,” through Sprint Nextel Corp.’s wireless service. CBS said it will sell news alerts, including video, while News Corp. opened an online store selling ringtones and images from “Family Guy” and other shows.
The moves highlight the size of the opportunity for selling content such as TV clips and music streaming through cellphones, said Greg Clayman, MTV Networks’ vice president of wireless strategy. The global market for selling mobile entertainment may increase tenfold in five years from $5 billion today, said Cyriac Roeding, CBS’s vice president of wireless.
“Our goal is to be wherever our viewers are, and our audiences have mobile phones which are always on,” MTV Networks’ Clayman said in an interview. “The thing that has been encouraging to us is we’ve seen it grow very, very quickly from a nonexistent market over a year ago to now having some significant numbers.”
Wireless data, including text messaging and ringtone downloads, contributed about 9 percent of all cellular revenue last year, according to Telecommunications Industry Association.
That will rise to 15 percent in 2008, the Arlington, Va.-based group says.
CBS and News Corp.’s path is different from MTV Networks’ Sprint partnership. CBS and News Corp. want to persuade consumers to visit their websites to buy products directly.
Consumers who sign up for CBS’s service will get news alerts delivered to their text-messaging inboxes that include still pictures and video, Roeding said. The CBS News service will cost 99 cents a month, while another, based on CBS’s “Entertainment Tonight,” will cost $3.99 a month, the company said. Both services will begin next week.
MTV Networks, which sells some video content through Verizon Communications Inc.’s V-cast service, will charge $5.95 a month for each channel viewed on Sprint Nextel’s wireless phones, Viacom said. The Comedy Central, CMT, MTV and VH1 channels, including audio-only broadcasts, will be available through the Reston, Va.-based wireless carrier.
