A lesson in causality
to couple pop culture

MTV's mtvU network is expanding online, thanks in part to a partnership with Microsoft.

MtvU is a 24-hour college network broadcast to 750 universities in the US.

Together the companies will launch a new online video series called "Cause Effect." It will feature two student activists a week, each "using Windows Live Messenger to take action on behalf of a social cause," reports AdWeek.

The "Cause Effect" campaign is just one of 10 marketing strategies Microsoft is launching in an effort to combine its products in programming that prompts people to get involved with social causes.

Microsoft is also buying ads across the mtvU platform, which includes some 300 sites and the College Media Network, a collection of 550 online college newspapers.

Surprisingly, RateMyProfessors.com — which MTV purchased in January — is the single biggest driver of traffic to mtvU. Unique visitors doubled on the site from January to October 2007, from 14.6 million to 29.2 million visitors.

In May, mtvU partnered with Cisco to build a "digital incubator" for creative co-eds.