London - Entertainment Rights, a U.K. media group that holds children's programming rights, on Tuesday announced new Web distribution deals that will bring shows like "He-Man," "She-Ra," "Rocky & Bullwinkle," "Fat Albert" and "Casper the Friendly Ghost" to YouTube, Joost and Babelgum. YouTube will get a Retro Heroes channel featuring 2-5 minute webisodes, while Babelgum and Joost will feature select long-form programming.

New York - Playboy Enterprises (NYSE: PLA) on Wednesday announced a number of new digital initiatives, including a new YouTube channel that will host video submissions for prospective new models, and the creation of a Playboy Audience Network of video sites through which it will distribute content. Along with YouTube, Break, Veoh, Howcast and Metacafe will host video highlights such as the "Playboy Radio Minute," with content from its show on Sirius; and a video blog featuring one of the star's of E!'s "The Girl Next Door." The company said it also partnered with Mixercast to develop ad-supported content and contest widgets.

Los Angeles - Filmaka on Monday announced the launch of its new digital entertainment studio, which will fund feature films, documentaries, Web series and other content culled from a network of amateur filmmakers.

San Bruno, Calif. - Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube has paid out more than $1 million in total revenue to members of its Partner Program, which shares ad revenue with "the most popular and prolific original content creators" on the site.

Online video is a hot topic these days with new entrants coming online (e.g. PluggedIn) and out of beta (e.g. Hulu) every day. We are seeing users spend a bit more more time with the video websites, spending an average of 16 minutes and 12 seconds for the week ending April 12, 2008 as compared to 15 minutes and 14 seconds during the same week last year. One interesting trend that I have noticed is that search engines and social networks are now accounting for an equal share of referred traffic. Last week (ending April 12, 2008) the share of upstream traffic from search increased 35% over the same week the previous year, while the referred traffic from social networks declined 20%.

Jakarta, Indonesia - Following complaints from Web users, Internet service providers in Indonesia have lifted a ban on YouTube and other sites, enacted earlier this week to block a controversial Dutch film about Islam, the Associated Press reported. Instead, the ISPs told AP they will attempt to block individual Web pages hosting Geert Wilders' film, "Fitna."

Pasadena, Calif. - Sony (NYSE: SNE) BMG's Epic/Legacy Recordings on Friday announced a promotion for the 25th anniversary of Michael Jackson's "Thriller" album, in the form of a video mashup that will let users insert themselves as Jackson in the legendary music video to the title track. The label teamed with Big Stage and YouTube (NASD: GOOG) on the promotion, which prompts users to upload photos of themselves, which will then be turned into a 3D avatar by Big Stage and integrated into a version of the video with its own YouTube page.

Jakarta, Indonesia - Several Internet service providers in Indonesia have blocked access to Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube video site, over the posting of a Dutch film that purports to accuse the Koran of inciting violence, Reuters reported, citing an official with Indonesia's information ministry.

London - Universal Music Group has launched a new Rolling Stones channel on Google's YouTube, that lets fans upload videos of themselves posting questions to the band, with the band to respond personally to some of them, Reuters reported. The new channel will mainly promote "Shine a Light," the new Stones documentary from director Martin Scorsese.

Tokyo - Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube has reached an agreement with a Japanese rights holder, and will pay an undisclosed royalty for the rights to allow YouTube users to post cover song videos of tracks by Japan Rights Clearance (JRC) acts like Mr. Children and Spitz, Japan's Mainichi Daily News reported.

UK Internet traffic to online video websites increased by 178% between February 2007 and 2008. A Hitwise custom category of the top 25 video websites in the UK accounted for 2.22% of all UK Internet visits in February 2008, equivalent for one in every 45 Internet visits last month.

Pittsburgh - Wizzard Media, a podcast hosting service that counted over 1 billion download requests last year, announced on Tuesday that it has signed a content licensing and advertising agreement with YouTube. Wizzard's YouTube channel will showcase the best video content from the Wizzard Media Network across a variety of categories.

Beijing - Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube has been blocked from the view of Chinese Internet users, after dozens of videos documenting protests against Chinese rule in Tibet appeared on the site over the weekend, the Associated Press reports.

First, let me offer a great big thank you to Youtube from me and everyone on the internet, including many small businesses. Im just guessing here, but based on reports coming from Compete and others, I don't think its a stretch to say that Youtube subsidizes the cost of more than half the user generated internet bandwidth consumed in the United States.

San Bruno, Calif. - Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube video site on Wednesday introduced updates to its application programming interfaces (APIs) that will allow developers to integrate videos from the site into other applications, and showcased implementations from TiVo (NASD: TIVO), Electronic Arts (NASD: ERTS), Animoto and the University of California.

San Francisco - A number of top music managers say that their artists have not seen any revenue from deals made by their labels to offer their music videos on Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube video site, CNET News.com reported. "I don't know any artist who has gotten a royalty statement (from their label that includes YouTube money)," music attorney Chris Castle told News.com.

Los Angeles - The homepage of Google's (NASD: GOOG) YouTube tomorrow will be taken over by the Icelandic band Sigur Ros, whose feature-length documentary "Heima" will be offered for streaming in its entirety. The rest of the page will feature the band's selections of the 10 best entries in its "Minn Heima" competition, which asked fans to create their own version of the film -- which features the band performing in far-flung locales in their home country of Iceland -- using audio and video clips posted online. The online screening is the first full-length music DVD to be featured by YouTube.