You won’t spot the series “Chicken Girls” from Brat TV on your regular cable service. But if all goes well, YouTube’s version of cable TV—its $65 a month YouTube TV service—will carry the comedy about teen girls in high school. Brat TV is one of several midsize digital media firms, including Vox Media and Pocket.Watch, that are in talks with YouTube TV about adding channels to the subscription offering.
Addition of the channels would be a relatively small upgrade to YouTube TV’s program lineup, which is dominated by big-name TV channels such as ESPN and CNN. But it is part of a bigger effort by YouTube to grab more of the ad dollars that are increasingly flowing to video-streaming services mostly watched on the TV rather than on phones or computers.