• CNNMoney.com, Tuesday, November 21, 2006 11:15 AM

News Corp., Time Warner, Viacom and CBS Corp. have seen executive shake-ups recently, with each subsequent new hire having significant experience in TV or online video. Of these, the departure of Ross Levinsohn, president of News Corp.'s Fox Interactive Media, is perhaps the most surprising because under his watch, MySpace, FIM's major property, is now worth 10 times what it was when News Corp. bought it in 2005. Levinsohn is being replaced with his cousin Peter, who initiated deals involving Fox Studios and online media stores like Apple's iTunes and Amazon.com.

Time Warner's big news, of course, was the hiring of former NBC president and COO Randy Falco as the head of AOL. He replaces Jonathan Miller, the current CEO. CNNMoney (a Time Warner unit) sees the move as evidence that AOL will focus even more on growing its online video business.

At Viacom, Mika Salmi, the former CEO of online video provider Atom Entertainment, which the media giant bought in August, is now taking the helm of global digital media at MTV Networks. And at CBS, Quincy Smith, a former investment banker whose focus was media, has been named the new head of digital media.

The big question now is, will these new media executives be friend or foe to Google and YouTube in their quest for online content rights?

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