NBCU and Fox to lauch video distribution site

Daggonit. I leave town for one day and I miss the news…

NBC UNIVERSAL AND NEWS CORP. ANNOUNCE DEAL WITH INTERNET LEADERS AOL, MSN, MYSPACE AND YAHOO! TO CREATE A PREMIUM ONLINE VIDEO SITE WITH UNPRECEDENTED REACH

Read Press Release Here

Charter advertisers, including Cadbury Schweppes, Cisco, Esurance, Intel Corporation and General Motors, will now reach 96% of U.S. Internet audience through this groundbreaking venture

New site will feature thousands of hours of top video for consumers.

Will this change everything? Or is this just the new television network model? Or BOTH?!

Read the press release – and read the Paid Content coverage below. Then we’ll talk:

More coverage from Paid Content here.
More Paid Content – interview with NBC Exec.
Note: American Idol won’t be part of this deal since FOX doesn’t own the Web rights. I’m guessing we won’t see too much NFL footage on there either.
More from Paid Content – this is “different” that YouTube
More from Paid Content – who’s in and who’s out?

I have more questions than thoughts at this point:

1. Will NFL content show up on this distribution network?

2. Will NFL.COM and team sites become distribution partners in this new network?

3. Where does this leave the local TV affiliates and their Websites?

4. What will this do the iTunes biz?

5. Will consumers accept the advertising mediated model? Or will they continue to upload clips and make mashups on their own

6. Are AOL, MSN, Myspace and Yahoo the new network affiliates? Is this just a re-working of the traditional “offline” network media model? Or do these guys really “get” the spirit of the Internet?

7. Will the new company be nimble enough to nurture the all the sub-communities it plans to create around all this content?

8. Let’s ask this anothe way. Is anyone else wondering about the DIRECT implications of all of this? Imagine a network that reaches 96% of the Internet, AND gets a substantial percentage of viewers to “register” into communities. All of a sudden the content creators have a DIRECT TO CONSUMER channel in addition to their “broadcast” channel. YIKES!!

9. What happens with IPTV becomes a reality?

It’s Saturday morning and my kids all just got up…so I have no time to wax philosopic on this…but I welcome everyone’s comments and questions. This is a JUICY topic. What do y’all think?