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Warner Music Group partners with Internet video service

Music company cuts deal with Brightcove as part of plan to create its own embedded video players to beat YouTube.

Caroline McCarthy Former Staff writer, CNET News
Caroline McCarthy, a CNET News staff writer, is a downtown Manhattanite happily addicted to social-media tools and restaurant blogs. Her pre-CNET resume includes interning at an IT security firm and brewing cappuccinos.
Caroline McCarthy
2 min read
Warner Music Group has cut a deal with Internet video service Brightcove to be able to distribute its video content catalog on its own Web sites--and profit from it.

In the partnership, announced Thursday, Warner Music Group will use Brightcove's software to embed Web-based video players in the sites for its labels--which include Sire, Atlantic and Elektra--as well as its individual artists. Visitors to the sites will be able to view on-demand music videos and related footage like artist interviews and performances in a free, ad-supported form.

Additionally, Web media enthusiasts will be able to embed the content into their blogs, Web sites or profiles on social-networking services like MySpace.com.

The Cambridge, Mass.-based Brightcove, which was founded in 2004 by a former CTO of Macromedia, licenses its Internet Protocol television (IPTV) software to content distributors so they can make it available without the need for a third-party service. In addition, Brightcove handles the advertising space that will eventually earn money for the content provider. The start-up has already struck deals with such companies as Reuters and Sony Music for its Musicbox Video service.

Creating their own on-demand video services is one way that major music labels can try to keep tabs on their own content and continue to profit from it--a difficult task in the era of YouTube. But now that the video free-for-all has been snapped up by Google and the future of its reportedly unprofitable current business model remains uncertain, content providers as well as potential YouTube rivals are trying to capitalize on what they see as a golden opportunity.