First Of YouTube's Original Channels, Latino-Targeted ClevverTeVe, Launches

Clevver Media on Friday launched an online TV channel on YouTube, the Spanish-language entertainment news channel ClevverTeVe, making it first of some 96 partners producing professional content for the site slated to go live over the next year.

Google's YouTube is pumping about $100 million into the original-programming effort, with a mélange of partners including Madonna, Deepak Chopra, Shaquille O'Neal, The Wall Street Journal and World Wrestling Entertainment. The initiative is designed to let YouTube -- the most popular video destination on the Internet -- be in a better position to sell video advertising inventory.

ClevverTeVe, available at www.YouTube.com/ClevverTeVe, debuted with three original programs: Teve Hollywood, a daily entertainment news show covering the latest headlines from Hollywood; Radar Latino, a daily news show covering Latin celebrities and entertainment headlines; and Teve Moda, a twice-per-week show featuring celebrity fashion coverage.

The channel plans to post 20 videos on Friday -- each ranging from 75 seconds to a minute and a half -- with plans to add roughly 10 new shows per day, or about 60 videos per week.

This winter, Clevver also plans to launch ClevverNews, a daily entertainment news channel, and ClevverStyle, a beauty and fashion channel.

Los Angeles-based Clevver Media, founded in May 2006, already serves more than 60 million views per month on YouTube to 650,000 unique users. The privately held company has more than 12,000 videos hosted online.