Starting this week, Yahoo TV will stream new episodes of several returning Showtime series, including "Weeds," "Sleeper Cell," and "The L Word." Yahoo TV also will stream a new Showtime offering this
season--"Dexter"--and will stream previews of the upcoming show, "The Tudors."
Showtime, which is owned by CBS, last year pursued a similar strategy for promoting fall series, streaming the debut episode of
"Barbershop" on MSN simultaneously with the show's debut. Parent company CBS has also made similar moves this season: Yahoo offered streams of the new CBS show "Jericho" before its air date.
A spokesman for CBS said
that the move is designed to promote the fall series. "The idea is to bet on the quality of your programming," he said. "You can expose it to a large audience--it's a chance to get new viewers for the
show."
Yahoo also plans to stream other Showtime programs, including episodes of "Brotherhood," and Showtime Championship Boxing. The site will be carrying selected episodes of each show, running
from Oct. 6 to Oct. 13.
Other TV networks this year have also stepped up efforts to boost their online audience by streaming shows on the Web. This season, MSN debuted three shows from The CW Network--"Runaway," "Everybody Hates Chris" and
"Veronica Mars"--one week before their air dates, and AOL Webcast two new fall NBC
series, the sitcom "Twenty Good Years" and Aaron Sorkin's "Studio 60 on the Sunset Strip," one week before their first air dates.