Viacom The Next Olivetti - Lawsuit Business Model

Olivetti once ruled the office terrain until IBM and Microsoft arrived. The once mighty typewriter company has been reduced to a manufacture of compact discs and printer drives for Microsoft. Disc are dead and Microsoft is in trouble. Viacom the owner of MTV and other TV brands is going through hard times and even more hard times await the company's future. TV audiences are shifting to the internet, Tivo, cable and other mediums. Following the TV audiences are advertisers. Today, production costs have dropped so much that major studio backing is not necessary to produce professional quality movies or music.

However, distribution is as important as ever and YouTube is distribution without the expensive overhead. Also, content creators no longer need to get into restrictive licensing and ownership agreements with the studios in the hopes of getting distribution. YouTube provides them control over their content and efficient ways to monetize it.

The lawsuit by Viacom against YouTube's parent Google is a desperate attempt by dying company to stay alive. Also, going forward you will see more as the old studios and networks adopt lawsuits as a key piece of their business model, claiming that shows and recordings that are not being watched on TV or listened to on the radio are being consumed on the internet. Get with the program.