The deal announced Thursday with TCI Music, the online entertainment company controlled by cable TV veteran John Malone, marked the latest effort by MTV to beef up its profile on the fractured online music scene.

"This is first and foremost an online play for us to bolster our position as a music player on the Internet," MTV chairman Tom Freston said in an interview.

In exchange for the 10 percent stake in its online music unit, which is expected to go public within the next 12 months, MTV will get SonicNet, a leading music news and information site, along with several other associated sites, including Addicted to Noise and Streamland. The sites are mainly aimed at younger listeners.

As part of the deal, MTV will also get The Box, a cable TV channel that allows viewers to order music videos in a way similar to getting pay-per-view movies.

For MTV, the deal helps expand the footprint of its online music unit, which already include the Web sites for MTV and its sister network VH1. Both networks are owned by media conglomerate Viacom Inc., which also controls the kids' channel Nickelodeon.

The acquisition of SonicNet was the second transaction for MTV's fledgling online music unit. It follows the February purchase, for an undisclosed amount, of online broadcaster Imagine Radio, which will allow MTV to offer some 100 channels of Internet radio.

Investors welcomed the news of MTV's latest online deal, pushing up Viacom's stock 75 cents, or 2 percent, to $41.88 in early afternoon trading on the New York Stock Exchange.

TCI Music is positioning itself as an Internet entertainment company with its digital music cable channel DMX and other Internet properties transferred from its parent company, Malone's Liberty Media Group, which has stakes in some 100 cable channels. In order to reflect its broadening beyond music and into video entertainment, TCI Music is renaming itself Liberty Digital.

AT&T Corp. gained ownership of Liberty Media Group as part of its purchase of Malone's huge cable TV company, TCI. But Liberty continues to operate independently, with its own tracking stock and Malone as its chairman.

MTV's parent Viacom also owns the Paramount movie studio, the consumer publishing operations of Simon & Schuster, "Beverly Hills 90210" producer Spelling Entertainment and half of the UPN network.

© 2006 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. The information contained in the AP News report may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed without the prior written authority of The Associated Press.

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