TVSquad

Whatever you may have thought of Napster and file sharing, one thing is clear: it changed the way people think about how music is both marketed and distributed. In much the same way, sites like YouTube have changed how people watch television. These days people have more options than simply plopping down on the couch when their favorite show airs, as the Web offers them different ways (both legally and not-so-legally) to see their favorite programs.

In the wake of Viacom's demand that all of its content be removed from YouTube and Google Video, another one of the company's properties will be offering embeddable online videos: MTV. Comedy Central began offering the same not too long ago, and it would be nice if the rest of the dominoes would fall and everyone would automatically equip all online videos with this function. Of course, that probably gets into some kind of legal mumbo jumbo that might cause my brain to explode, and if I can remember one thing my mother told me, it's this: "son, I am not going to clean your brains off the wall because you thought too hard about something."

CNET reports that Viacom is trying to catch up to this whole "Web 2.0" thing, and that it has not ruled out the possibility of partnering with YouTube sometime in the future.

Look for these new videos to appear on all of MTV's sites over the next few months.