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As comedians, personalities, and musicians worldwide joined together to promote the cause of environmental awareness, interested viewers took to their computers, collectively generating more than 9 million internet streams, according to Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT)'s MSN service. The previous record was set in 2005 during Live 8 - another philanthropic concert aimed to fight global poverty. "We have exceeded any other online entertainment event," MSN's product manager noted in a Reuters piece. "It's really exciting to see the enthusiasm for the concert."
Now that the concert has concluded, there will likely be a trickle-down impact of internet streaming. In the six weeks following Live 8, content from the event was viewed online more than 100 million times. Live Earth is expected to earn up to three times the viewership, with expectations that 80% of internet viewing will be requested on demand in the upcoming weeks.
While excerpts of the concert aired throughout the weekend on various portals of General Electric's (NYSE: GE) NBC division, it was hard to catch a particular act without taping hours upon hours of broadcast (consider it the Olympics of concert footage). The power of the internet enables fans to watch exactly what they want.
To access online content from dozens of musical artists as varied as the Black Eyed Peas, the Police, the Pussycat Dolls, Madonna, the Beastie Boys, Red Hot Chili Peppers, and Kanye West, visit MSN's Live Earth site. Also available for streaming are kickoff remarks from the unofficial spokesman against global warming, former Senator and U.S. Vice President Al Gore. I'm headed there myself right now to catch my boys in Duran Duran.
Beth Gaston Moon is an analyst at Schaeffer's Investment Research.
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