June 29, 2008 5:05 PM PDT

Google taps 'Family Guy' guy for Web series

by Steven Musil

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Google has enlisted Family Guy creator Seth MacFarlane to create an original animated series that it will distribute on the Web via its AdSense advertising system, according to The New York Times.

Seth MacFarlane is creating a Web-only animated series for Google.

(Credit: Seth MacFarlane)

Google plans to use AdSense to syndicate the program--called Seth MacFarlane's Cavalcade of Cartoon Comedy--to thousands of Web sites that are popular with MacFarlane's target audience, according to the newspaper. Advertising will be incorporated via "preroll" ads, banner ads, or "brought to you by" ads, according to the report.

MacFarlane is also reportedly working with advertisers to create original advertising to run with the Cavalcade content, although neither Google nor MacFarlane would reveal any of the advertisers, saying only that the deals were among AdSense's largest ever.

MacFarlane, who will receive a percentage of the ad revenue, told the newspaper that the two-minute episodes would be "animated versions of the one-frame cartoons you might see in The New Yorker, only edgier."

Google, which launched AdSense in 2003, expanded its AdSense program last year so that Web site publishers could display and make money off embedded video clips from YouTube content partners that have targeted banner or text ads. Google has experimented with distributing video and video ads on its AdSense publisher network before, but with mixed results. The company has tested distributing in-stream video ads and in-stream video clips with bundled ads.

Originally posted at News Blog

Steven Musil is the night news editor at CNET News. Before joining CNET News in 2000, Steven spent 10 years at various Bay Area newspapers. E-mail Steven.