Verizon Thursday launched online and on-demand content from Disney, drawing on the agreement between the two companies announced last fall to offer exclusive programming to its customers.

The ability to offer exclusive programming becomes more important as Verizon sees competitive response to its high-speed services. Most recently, Cablevision added a 30 Megabit per second downstream service to its Connecticut Optimum Online customers for a $14.95 premium and boosted its basic service from 10 Mb/s to 15 Mb/s, positioning its services to compete directly with FiOS’ 15 Mb/s and 30 Mb/s offerings.

Verizon’s new content includes ABC News Now, a 24-7 news channel; Disney Connection, an ad-free interactive service for children offering games, videos and other content featuring Disney characters; ESPN360, an online sports channel that covers live events but also offers other exclusive programming and video games; and Movies.com Max, an informational service for movie fans that includes reviews, video clips and more. The programming is available to Verizon’s consumer broadband customers via the Internet and its FiOS TV customers via on-demand programming.

According to the announcement, the online programming includes live video news feeds, live sports events, children's entertainment and other content packaged for broadband Internet users, including both DSL and FiOS customers. That includes exclusive content such as local sports action. Verizon cited a recent Villanova-South Florida men's basketball game which aired live in the Tampa, Fla., area only on ESPN360, exclusively shown in that market via Verizon Online.

In addition, Verizon has added 80 hours a month of free on-demand content from Disney properties to its FiOS TV lineup, including programming from free on-demand titles from Disney Channel, Toon Disney, Radio Disney, Jetix, ABC News, ABC Family, SOAPnet, ESPN, ESPN Deportes and ESPNU.