Cablevision has accused Viacom in an antitrust lawsuit of forcing it to pay for more than a dozen low-rated cable networks in order to get access to Viacom's more popular channels such as Nickelodeon, MTV and Comedy Central, the latest flare up between distributors and program makers.
While some of the biggest brands have grown their values by more than 20% since last year's report by Interbrand, others have fallen precipitously. Here are the brands that lost the most value over the past year.
If you've been noticing a little bit less of SpongeBob on Nickelodeon, Snooki on MTV, or Stephen Colbert on Comedy Central, it's by design: Viacom is squeezing more commercials into every hour of programming. That's the bad news. The worse news is that it's not working.
Teens aren't consuming music the way that their parents do -- and it's not just the usual taste-related generation gap. An eye-opening Nielsen survey shows that teens are relying on YouTube to supply their tunes more than any other medium.
Popularity can be fickle: One day America loves your brand; the next, you're passe. But every year brings some surprising rebounds, and you won't believe some of the companies that made 2012's list for most improved images in the eyes of U.S. consumers.
Viacom and DirectTV said Friday that they have settled a dispute that had cut off access to Viacom's channels for the satellite TV service's subscribers.
Abercrombie & Fitch has offered to pay Mike "The Situation" Sorrentino, a cast member on MTV's "Jersey Shore," money to stop wearing its clothes. But does the brand really hate Sorrentino, or is the move simply a way to score a free affiliation with the star?
In piecing through the bits and pieces revealed in the reality stars' we-are-broke-and-we-were-stupid confessionals, The Price of Fame set out to quantify their fiscal waste. The couple has reportedly burned through at least $10 million. And here's how they did it.
College tuition is already absurdly high even before you start adding on the extra fees. But with students graduating deeper in debt every year, it could be time to draw the line. Let's start with the mandatory fee at Rutgers for the fund that paid $32,000 to bring Snooki to campus.
Hulu reached an agreement with Viacom that will once again allow the video site to air episodes of Jon Stewart's "The Daily Show" and Stephen Colbert's "The Colbert Report," 11 months after the shows were pulled from the site.
MTV's controversial new teen drama Skins won't set any of its young viewers on the road to ruin, and it isn't pornographic. It is in bad taste, and MTV must have known would offend some audiences. Still, with 3.26 million viewers for its debut, Viacom is getting exactly what it wanted from the show -- publicity and viewers.
MTV's Jersey Shore may bring in big numbers on TV. But recent attempts by the program's stars to become best-selling authors have met with, at best, modest success. And the same goes for other Jersey Shore-related books.
