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"Don't Fret Google's You Tube Buy"

By Jim Cramer
RealMoney.com Columnist
11/28/2006 7:59 AM EST
You want to know why Google's (GOOG - commentary - Cramer's Take - Rating) taking over the world? All you have to do is get together with friends who have kids.

You will know. Last night, charity dinner, couples with children, what did I hear, what kind of Thanksgiving was it? It was a You Tube-download Thanksgiving.

Pretty much everyone at the table had been asked to watch a video their kids had downloaded from You Tube. None of the videos were the same. I couldn't wait to tell my kids about the ones that were talked about.

The stuff is just the opposite of what the suits want us watching on TV: huge, perfect productions without glitches designed to get you hooked for a season. Other than Idol and 24, who has time for a season anymore?

But we do have time for two-minute videos that make us laugh. We have time for goofiness and for amateurism and for spontaneous fun. We have time for viral must-watch TV about things that interest us in particular.

Google, above all companies, saw this.

Google, above all companies, did not care about cratering their stock.

Google, among all companies, was not afraid of NBCI.com, or whatever it was called, or Goto.com like Disney or all the now unimportant little CBS.coms.

Nor did Google fear that it was buying Broadcast.com or Skype, unmonetizable assets.

Lastly, Google did not care about bogus copyright issues that will always be worked out in the wash, which is what has to happen when you have a tidal product.

So, today, Google announces a deal with Verizon (VZ - commentary - Cramer's Take - Rating) for You Tube. If you are like me, watching the plodding Yahoo!, the insular MSN.com -- what is MSN anyway? -- or the revolving door of AOL, you know that none of the other Big Four could have pulled this off so fast. And the cell phone is the ideal vehicle to watch a lot of You Tube stuff precisely because of their short duration.



Now I am not saying "buy Google" with this piece. I am merely saying that one more example of what the media called a colossal overpay has probably just paid for itself. And one more example of how the old media doesn't get it and can't be saved is now manifested.

You know how funny this is? If Tribune Corp. (TRB - commentary - Cramer's Take - Rating) had simply sold the Cubs, and not bought back stock, it might have been able to buy You Tube and be a player.

But then again, that's pure fantasy.

I am sure the people who run Tribune Corp. would have the same experience I had last night at dinner, if they bother to listen to what the kids are doing. But then again, they are in the newspaper business, which presumes a total lack of knowledge of what kids are doing because almost no kids read the paper at all."

(in www.realmoney.com)