AOL, XM, AEG form Joint Entertainment Venture

Filed in archive IPTV on July 12, 2005

This just in: America Online, XM, and AEG have form a joint venture called Network Live that will deliver live and on-demand concerts and comedy shows via the Internet, wireless and satellite. They have named Kevin Wall as its CEO.

"We're creating the network of the future, being able to access entertainment digital content anytime, anywhere on any particular device," Wall said.

AOL recently had success in delivering seven separate feeds from the July 2 Live 8 concerts -- all without any meltdowns. Kevin Wall was in charge of that project. Some 5 million people viewed the shows online, and AOL broke its own records with a peak of 175,000 simultaneous users.

Network Live will also try to license programming for distribution on wireless, HDTV and other platforms, though AOL said no deals have been struck yet.

Revenues will come from ads and licensing fees, with no current plans to charge for shows on a pay-per-view basis, Wall said.

In a previous post, I noted that AOL Video offers free access to search and playback for more than 15,000 licensed and originally produced video assets from Time Warner, including television programs and music videos, movie trailers from Warner Bros. and news clips from CNN, MSNBC and others.