Viacom

From The Matrix


Company Infobox
Company name: Viacom, Inc.
Company type: Public (NYSE: VIAB, VNV)
Foundation: 2006^[1]
Location: New York, New York, USA
Industry: Cable TV, Motion Pictures
Key people: Sumner Redstone, Chairman (through National Amusements, owns a controlling amount of voting shares) Philippe Dauman, President & CEO
# of employees: 9,500 (2006)
Products: MTV, Nickelodeon, BET, more...
Revenue: $9.609 Billion USD (2005)[1]
Net income: $1.256 Billion USD (2005)
Homepage: www.viacom.com

Viacom is an international media conglomerate. The companies owned by Viacom touch virtually every major segment of the media industry. Sumner Redstone is Chairman of the Board and Chief Executive Officer, and Mel Karmazin is the president and Chief Operating Officer.

[edit] History

Viacom began life as the television syndication division of CBS, CBS Films. In 1971, the division was renamed Viacom International, and in 1973 it was spun off, amid new FCC rules forbidding television networks from owning syndication companies.

Viacom made large amounts of money during the 1970s and 1980s distributing old CBS classics to syndication, including such landmark shows as I Love Lucy, The Andy Griffith Show and All in the Family. They also syndicated shows for others, the biggest examples being The Cosby Show and Roseanne.

In 1985, Viacom bought Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment, which owned MTV and Nickelodeon, renaming the company MTV Networks. In 1986, Viacom was bought by movie theater owner National Amusements, which brought Sumner Redstone to the company. Redstone made a string of large acquisitions in the early 1990s, announcing plans to buy Paramount Pictures in 1993, and buying the Blockbuster Video chain in 1994.

The Blockbuster acquisition gave Viacom access to large television holdings controlled by Aaron Spelling's company, Spelling Entertainment; along with his own productions (such as The Love Boat and Beverly Hills 90210), Spelling controlled the pre-1973 ABC and NBC back catalogs by way of Worldvision Enterprises and Republic Pictures. After these acquisitions, Viacom owned many movie and television production and syndication units, which were slowly integrated into Paramount; many TV shows previously distributed by Viacom, Republic or Worldvision have since gained Paramount closing logos.

In 1999, Viacom made what has been its biggest acquisition so far, by announcing plans to buy its former parent CBS. The merger was approved in 2000, bringing cable channels TNN (now Spike TV) and CMT under Viacom's wing, as well as CBS's production units and TV syndicators Eyemark (formerly Group W) and King World. As of this writing, CBS's production unit and King World (which has since absorbed Eyemark) are operating under their own names, as parts of CBS, and no attempt has been made thus far to move them around in Viacom's corporate structure; however, TNN and CMT were merged into MTV Networks almost immediately.

In 2001, Viacom completed its purchase of Black Entertainment Television (BET). As with TNN and CMT, it was immediately integrated into MTV Networks, causing some outcry among BET workers in the Washington, DC area (where BET was based before the merger). As a result, BET was de-integrated from MTV Networks.

Although a majority economic interest in Viacom is held by independent shareholders, the Redstone family maintains voting control of the company through National Amusements' holdings of Viacom's class A stock.

[edit] Assets

[edit] Radio Networks

Infinity Broadcasting (manages Westwood One Radio Network)
Metro Networks

[edit] Radio Stations

Infinity Broadcasting (owns and operates over 180 stations)

[edit] Internet

[edit] Film Production and Distribution

[edit] Advertising & Merchandising

Viacom Consumer Products
Infinity Outdoor (Billboards)
Famous Music

[edit] Theater Operations

United Cinemas International (joint venture with Vivendi)
Paramount Theaters
Famous Players Canada

[edit] Publishing

[edit] Television Networks

[edit] Broadcast

[edit] Cable

MTV Networks
- MTV
  - MTV2
- MTV Jams
- MTV Hits
- MTV Espanol
- Nickelodeon
  - Nick at Nite
  - Nick 2
  - Nick Jr
  - Nicleodeon Games and Sports for Kids
  - Nicktoons
  - Noggin/The-N (joint venture with Children's Television Workshop)
- TV Land
- CMT
- Spike TV
- VH1
  - VH1 Classic
  - VH1 Country
  - VH1 Soul
  - VH Uno
- Comedy Central
Showtime Networks
- Showtime
- The Movie Channel
- Sundance Channel (joint venture with Robert Redford and Universal Studios)
- FLIX
SET Pay-Per-View (sporting and entertainment events)
BET

[edit] Television Production and Distribution

[edit] Television Stations

16 CBS-affiliated stations
19 UPN-affiliated stations

[edit] Other

Blockbuster Video - Sells and rents video games and movies.
Paramount Parks - A collection of theme parks in the United States and Canada

[edit] Labor

[edit] Environmental

[edit] Social History

[edit] Intellectual Property

In February 2007, Viacom sent upwards of 100,000 DMCA takedown notices to the video-sharing site YouTube, alleging large-scale copyright infringement. Of the 100,000, approximately 60-70 non-infringing videos were erroneously removed under the auspices of copyright infringement.^[2].

On March 13, 2007, Viacom filed a US $1 billion lawsuit against Google and YouTube alleging massive copyright infringement, alleging that users frequently uploaded copyrighted material to YouTube - enough to cause a hit in revenue for Viacom and a gain in advertisement revenue for YouTube.^[3]

The complaint contends that almost 160,000 unauthorized clips of Viacom’s programming have been available on YouTube and that these clips had been viewed more than 1.5 billion times.

Publishers Join Case Against YouTube

[edit] Activism Against

[edit] Critical Websites

[edit] External links

Facts page at the Viacom website

The page was seeded with material from Wikipedia

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