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Mobile video service V Cast video will be providing full-length episodes of US TV programs which has been added by Verizon Wireless. Customers can avail this service at USD 3.00 for 24-hour use or by signing up for the USD 15 V Cast VPak monthly subscription, which also includes access to Verizon Wireless’ ESPN MVP, Get It Now and Mobile Web services. The full-length episodes are provided by NBC Universal’s TV channels NBC, Telemundo, USA Network, SCI FI Channel and NBC Universal Digital Studio; by MTV Networks’s TV channels MTV, Nickelodeon, VH1, CMT, Logo and MTV Tr3s; by BET Networks by ESPN Mobile Properties and FOXSports.com on MSN.

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To explore every facet of the global music scene, Vodafone Soundbites is launched by Vodafone and MTV. Vodafone soundbites bring out a behind the scenes gossip into the world of music. It will be available on TV via a website and on mobile as a series of twenty one, three minute shows from early August. The website and mobile service will carry additional footage, as well as editorial and news elements. Vodafone Soundbites will be available in seven languages on MTV in Germany, Hungary, the Netherlands, Portugal, Romania, Spain, Turkey, the UK and Ireland, Australia, New Zealand and on the MTV European feed, covering sixteen countries.
“Through our partnership with MTV, Vodafone is successfully building on its long-lasting music heritage and continues to bring music to its customers whenever they want it, wherever they are. Vodafone Soundbites is a pioneering multiplatform communications show, will be delivered in 29 countries and will allow millions of fans to experience music on mobile through Vodafone and its partners’ high speed, reliable networks, online and TV.” said David Wheldon, Global Brand Director, Vodafone.

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Nigeria, where Zain has invested about $3billion in the last two years. Group Corporate Communication Director for Africa, Mr. Nwanbu Wanedeva, states that forthcoming Zain/MTV Base Pan-African award coming up September in Abuja. Wanedeva further said that company  had invested $12 billion in Africa, stressing that out of this, $3 billion, the highest for any country, was invested in Nigeria. Constant change of name by the company was due to bringing in of new investors, Wanedeva added. Discussing about the poor network he said that the company was doing a lot to improve the situation, stressing that last year alone, the company erected about 120 base stations in Nigeria.

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Deutsche Telekom has announced that it has signed a deal with MTV Networks Germany to offer the latter’s content in the video-on-demand library of the telco’s IPTV service ‘T-Home Entertain’. The agreement, effective immediately, allows the German giant to continually expand its selection of content from MTV Networks. Programmes cost EUR0.99 for a 24-hour rental. T-Home Entertain customers will have unlimited access to all available content from Nickelodeon – the children’s television channel – with a subscription to the ‘Kids Selection’ package, costing EUR4.99 per month.

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While many an entrepreneurs in Silicon Valley imagine their start-ups replacing established media companies, fast-growing mobile video startup MyWaves is instead working with the big companies.

Today, for example, it is announcing a deal with MTV, where MTV will — for the first time in its history — license its content to a third party mobile site that is not related to a carrier.

MTV will also sell advertising on the MyWaves site and the two companies will split revenue from any sale either company makes for ads that appear on MyWave’s MTV content.

Yes, all this is happening even as MTV’s parent company, Viacom, continues to try to sue Google’s YouTube for $1 billion in damages, due to YouTube publishing copyright-infringing clips of Viacom-owned videos. More context: Viacom is so serious about hording its content that it’s even refusing to work with Hulu, the online video startup supported by Fox and other large media companies that is publishing these companies’ premium content, hoping to make it profitable on the web.

Previously to this MyWaves deal, if mobile users wanted to watch an MTV video they would have to pay a carrier a flat monthly fee to access it. (Note: Sprint, my former carrier, offered this service, and I stopped checking it out as soon as I hit the paywall.)

Sunnyvale, Calif.-based MyWaves’ advertising services will allow it, and MTV, to sell ads based on user demographics, such as country location. On the one hand, MTV works with a large number of major advertisers, on the other hand, MyWaves works with a lot of companies experimenting in mobile advertising. For example, Microsoft is running an ad campaign on MyWaves, advertising Office to MyWave’s users in India. The revenue-share agreement isn’t disclosed, chief executive Rajeev Raman tells me, except that revenue is split in part based on which partner made the sale.

One big issue with video distribution — both online and mobile — is that they have yet to become profitable businesses. The mobile advertising market is worth $100 million in its entirety, Raman estimates, and that’s not just video, its also text message and voice advertising, and other formats. That number won’t get most investors excited at the moment, but mobile web services are growing fast, and new forms of advertising are being developed. For example, Raman says that on MyWaves, users don’t mind 15-second ads that play before a video (pre-roll ads, in industry lingo), even though they dislike pre-rolls on web videos: The reason is that any user who’s willing to use their mobile device to watch a video is willing to put up with the 15-second hassle to watch the video for free.

Meanwhile, advertisers want to have their products paired with professional content because they know what it will be, whereas they don’t want to be paired with user-generated content (as seen on YouTube) because it may not be up to the quality and taste of the advertiser’s brand.

In fact, high-quality content has already led to MyWaves seeing a sharp spike in traffic: The site had more than five million unique visitors last December and has been growing at a monthly rate of 15 to 20 percent since then, Raman says. The average MyWaves users comeback seven times a month, watches five clips and stays on the site 19 minutes, he claims.

So MyWaves seems to be doing well by working with content-creating companies — stay tuned for a post later today that explores how this strategy has been implemented.

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News such as Bjarne Riis’s doping admission and the clearing of the Youth Center on Nørrebro, Copenhagen, keep the Danes glued to the screen. And it is not just the TV screen, but also the smaller cell phone display that attracts attention. TDC has just analyzed the use of mobile TV almost six months after its launch, and the statistics clearly show that the main attraction is brief television features such as news. During the clearing of the Youth Center, there was a period with four times as many unique users accessing mobile TV as on ordinary days. Similarly, the press conference where Bjarne Riis admitted to doping abuse almost doubled the viewers for the channels showing the news.

TDC’s statistics also show that each unique user on average

Watches mobile TV for 9-10 minutes a day
Accesses mobile TV 2.7 times a day
Watches for 3.5 minutes per session, i.e. each time a channel is activated.

“The analysis has confirmed that mobile TV has its natural place in the media picture and that TV on the cell phone is particularly suited for breaking news when people do not have access to traditional television. You always carry your cell phone, so you can choose to watch the news or whatever else you fancy when and where you want,” says Anders B. Christjansen, Vice President, TDC Mobile.

The analysis of viewer habits during the first six months is also the reason behind TDC’s recent release of two additional TV channels on the cell phone: the news channel DR Update and the music channel MTV Shorts, which both bring short features. The entertainment channel Star! will soon be added. TDC already offers a broad range of mobile TV in Denmark with access to DR1, DR2, TV 2, TV 2 News, Kanal 4, and Voice TV. In addition, TDC offers access to TV 2 Sputnik as video on demand.

“After the first six months with mobile TV, we are overall very satisfied. We are still in a start-up phase, where we are gaining experience with the medium. That experience we are, among other things, using to improve the user experience and ensure that we offer the right content,” says Anders B. Christjansen.

TDC Mobile TV is accessed through the mobile portal Fly. So far, only TDC’s mobile customers can use the feature, which also requires a 3G cell phone. Mobile TV is only accessible in areas covered by TDC Mobile’s 3G network. Unlimited usage costs DKK 29 per day, DKK 49 per week, or DKK 75 per month.

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FierceMobileContent writes….In a move that proves MTV is increasingly slow in responding to the kinds of youth culture phenomena it once ignited, the Viacom-owned cable network announced the launch of its Mobile Media Group division, which will develop MTV content and brands for wireless games, ringtones and video clips. The group will administrate mobile activities within MTV Networks’ various cable channels (e.g. Nickelodeon, VH1 and Comedy Central) and among its domestic and foreign operations. Among its responsibilities: Mobile Junk 2.0, a new user-generated content service launching in conjunction with Sprint Nextel.

“Connecting with our consumers on every platform they love is at the heart of our digital strategy,� MTV Networks CEO Judy McGrath said in a prepared statement.

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FierceMobileContent writes…On March 23rd, MTV Tr3s launched MTV Tr3s Mobile in New York as the first bilingual mobile channel targeted at Latino youth. MTV Tr3s Mobile focus on music and features the TV channel’s playlist of popular artists, including American artists such as Fall Out Boy and Akon, at the same time a large percentage of Latino artists such as Paulina Rubi…

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Clickz writes…Viacom has stepped further into the mobile space this week with a series of new offerings and the signing of Pepsi-Cola and Intel as the first ever advertisers on MTV Networks mobile destinations.

As charter sponsors of MTVN mobile, Pepsi and Intel will get access to not only the MTV and Comedy Central mobile TV channels, but to new MTV, VH1 and Comedy Central mobile Web sites as well, according to the company.

The variety of content available from Viacom’s various holdings, including MTVN, Nickelodeon, Comedy Central and others, fits well with a mobile format and gives potential advertisers new opportunities to reach their target market, according to the company.

“The content we create is conducive to mobile. It’s short form and able to establish connections with audiences in a short period of time,” an MTVN spokesperson told ClickZ. “The deal itself speaks to the strength of our mobile offerings. This is another example of what we’re doing for marketers… creating integrated marketing opportunities across those platforms.”

MTVN also signed an agreement with mobile carrier Sprint to offer 14 channels of live and streaming video content, while the MTVN Kids and Family Group and Amp’d Mobile announced a new partnership where content from Nickelodeon and The N will appear within new channels on the Amp’d Live mobile service. Previously it had also made mobile video content available through a relationship with Verizon.

Other new mobile efforts from Viacom include a new GameTrailers.com mobile video channel, a new 106 & Park Mobile Fan Club from BET Networks, and a mobile movie studio site from Paramount Pictures that features micro-sites for individual movie releases.

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Telecompaper writes…MTV Japan and Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT) have begun a mobile-phone-based joint promotion trial using a new access technology currently under development by the NTT Cyber Space Laboratories. The new technology recognises videos, patterns (posters, signboards, trademarks, etc.) or solid things, and allows connections with various internet services. As a promotion, MTV video music awards Japan 2007 contents (deco-mail or mobile HTML mail and flash screensaver) will be given away to customers photographing a certain scene with a camera phone and sending the image to a special website.

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