Funniest headline of the week: 'MTV, RealNetworks to Mount Challenge Against iTunes'

It appeared over Jeff Leeds's story in yesterday's New York Times.

What's surprising rather than funny is that the suits at both MTV and RealNetworks responsible for both companies' failed entries into the world of online music sales have somehow managed to convince their bosses that the sum of two zeros is a positive integer.

Memo to the mathematically challenged: those numbers begin with 1 — not 0.

Billy Preston in his 1974 smash hit was spot on when he sang, "Nothin' from nothin' leaves nothin'."

In this case the difference = the sum.

What a joke.

Here's the Times article.

MTV, RealNetworks to Mount Challenge Against iTunes

MTV Networks said yesterday that it would fold its floundering digital music service into a venture with RealNetworks, owner of the Rhapsody music subscription service, as part of a renewed challenge to Apple’s market-leading iTunes store.

MTV’s year-old Urge service, which gained little traction despite being packaged with Microsoft’s Windows Media Player software, will be combined with RealNetworks’ service in a partnership called Rhapsody America. The venture will be led by Urge’s manager, Michael Bloom.

Urge’s troubles had been attributed to lackluster marketing and the fact that its paid downloads were not compatible with Apple’s popular iPod. The music unit’s poor showing came as a disappointment to MTV, which had also been criticized as responding too slowly to the appetite of young music fans for interacting on social networks like MySpace.

Rhapsody’s songs cannot be played on an iPod either, but the new service will be carried on PCs and mobile phones under an exclusive pact with Verizon Wireless. As a result, Verizon will be able to market a digital music service to compete with AT&T, which is the service provider for the Apple iPhone.

Details of the new service were scant yesterday. Urge’s Web site was made over to announce the new service yesterday, and a range of promotions for the service are expected to unfold as part of MTV’s annual Video Music Awards, scheduled for Sept. 9.