Google Pitches YouTube As a TV Network

By Georg Szalai
NEW YORK - Google has started pitching its online video site YouTube to Madison Avenue more like a TV network than a Web destination, the New York Post reported Friday.

As Google has begun to target the TV sets in people's living room via its Google TV service, which looks to bring together TV and Web content, including YouTube, it is looking for TV-sized advertising buys rather than traditionally smaller online buys, the Post said.

The Web giant has been pitching ad agencies and demonstrating Google TV in recent weeks, it said.

Google executives this summer reached out to Hollywood players, urging them to bring more content to YouTube.(link) but a Google source told the Post: "The best content doesn't have to be created in a studio or on the backlot."

Meanwhile, YouTube co-founder and CEO Chad Hurley is moving to an advisor role and plans to start another company at some point, Bloomberg reported. He told a technology conference in Dublin Thursday night that  he “would have loved to stay independent” before Google bought YouTube in 2006 for $1.65 billion, although the deal gave YouTube a lot of autonomy.