I think that early cable is one the most interesting things in television history besides early television itself. Streaming hasn't really interested me as much it's movement from interesting to novelty to weird cash grab as accelerated in a way I wasn't expecting and honestly it feels too over the top. That's not the post. Early cable had the idea of "What the heck are we really doing here?" I mean you had space for different ideas that really (back then) couldn't work as an over the air station and you also had less restriction from the government over board than you did on OTA.
On Saturday, August 1, 1981, MTV: Music Television. It's kind of weird that people out there wouldn't know that MTV ever meant Music Television or why the heck MTV airs a yearly Video Music Award show. That's because MTV has long gone off their original focus. Launched by Warner and American Express (Warner Amex) the idea was the concept of a radio station but you could also see it being done with your face and eyes. A total assault of the scenes.
Radio has (had before...that's a different story) Disc Jockeys, MTV has Video Jockeys. They played music videos because this is television and watching music videos is probably the only way listening to music on TV could at least be entertaining. They played them 24/7 like at 3:49AM on July 9th, 1992, you could turn on your TV and see them playing a music video.
Single concept channels were made for cable. Back in 1979, someone somewhere said "I'm tired of not being able to watch sports on a Tuesday afternoon in November" and ESPN was launched. (Though most of ESPN is actually people balthering than live sports you get the idea) Warner had made an all children's channel so now local UHF channel 57 could be slowly killed off by cable TV in fun ways, and kids could watch programming on a sick day at 11:35AM instead of watching "The Price is Right". In 1980, Ted Turner decided that society needed a 24/7 news channel ( I wonder if he regrets this since the news channels seem to do less of that) So a radio station but TV is also an idea.
MTV launched at Midnight Eastern Daylight Time (since it was August) on August 1, 1981 with the 1979 hit song by The Buggles , "Video Killed the Radio Star" Ironically a song about the change, between the idea of people listening around the radio for programming and now watching it on TV. MTV didn't kill music radio because well TV wasn't portable, but that wasn't it's purpose, it still was a change to television in the era of change. (Funfact: The song/video came out 2 years prior to MTV)
The future you want ?
MTV was originally styled like a rock station but instead of radio it's on TV. They had big ideas they knew they were a big new idea, they introduced their channel as a rocket launching into space, landing into space with astronauts planting the MTV flag in the moon. MTV's design was put together by Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert and you should thanks these two legends for many things. If you were a Nickelodeon kid, they are part of that so much that it wouldn't even really have made it without them (them and Geraldine Laybourne) One of the big things about radio back then was the jingles and presentation they made cable presentation and television presentation different than it ever had been before.
MTV was in someone's loft?
That's the idea, MTV was an innovator. I'm not doing a history of MTV post, I really would have to use tons of documents and really be repeating stuff found in other places. MTV is essentially part of television because of it's core, it's still on the air now. Maybe sadly. MTV now is mostly there just on the cable system, withering.
MTV was built to be the NOW channel, a channel that tapped into the current trends, it had some bumps but made it. I'm sure if the internet was there in 1994 the way it is now, you'd have people complaining about how MTV playing the current video is nothing like the MTV they were growing up with in 1984. That's how things are really, the ages of time. I know the complaint now is that MTV doesn't play music videos and really if they did tomorrow, they wouldn't play ones you remember MTV Classic does though. The school of common thought now is that MTV playing music videos would be like well a radio station airing dramas in 1980. (Look at that)
Since the marketing genius who said "cable is dying"got their phrase into the common lexicon it seems that maybe it is, whatever that means. People have been told that newspaper and radio have been dying for decades. (It changes and morphs might be more suitable) Music videos are probably not really a business to have on TV anymore in the current state. Music Videos were like marketing, MTV helped sales of records, like radio used to as well.
I remember a Disney Channel Original Movie starting where the main characters were running to the TV set to see a new music video premiere. A perfect snapshot of society at that moment of time for teens at the time, you didn't know when they were going to show it again. Now you can see it on Youtube. (Ironic you can find many of the old MTV music videos there too) In a strange way, streaming killed music videos on TV before it was called streaming.
Now if you look deep in your cable line up, if you have that, you'll see channels that run music videos still, I'm not sure who's watching Nick Music or CMT Music but run on little channels, run on! MTV later gave society some reality shows, I mean everyone was doing it, so why not? MTV has lessened up on that even because the target audience they've always wanted probably doesn't even know where they are on the line up if they have cable in the first. Now they've found other things to air multiple hours a day.
This isn't me saying I WANT MY MTV to go back to what it was doing, I'm a realist on TV matters, I know that doesn't make sense and it wouldn't be good business sense. MTV was the first, but it did inspire the idea of airing others doing music videos on TV, and making your TV feel like your radio. (Kind of )
In 1983, on March 5, CMTV (now known as CMT, yes THAT CMT) come on air it stood for County Music TV. So now, country music fans could see their videos on the TV it was a new spot on the dail for them, but wait there's more! 2 days later CMT had a country music competitor called The Nashville Network came on the air. Both these channels ended up being owned by MTV's next owner, Viacom after things merged and stuff. (Corporations games always changing their names) They are also still both on the air. CMT, actually still air music videos just between 4-9AM Eastern on weekdays and between 4 AM- Noon on weekends. TNN, after being in the same ownership as CMT became the National Network and moved away from country, then became the New TNN , then they said we need to be Lifetime, but for men, and became Spike TV, but then they found out that more women were watching so it became Spike, now it's Paramount Network.
Meanwhile, Ted Turner launched his own music channel called Cable Music Channel it launched October 26, 1984 and lasted long enough to close down on November 30, 1984. (That's not a typo) Warner, this is also ironic since Warner ended up owning Ted Turner's stuff, didn't CMT as a threat but CMC was because he was going for their audience and well... they made it hard so he sold the space to Warner. VH1 was launched as let's make it like your Adult Contemporary station on the radio. VH1 stands for Video Hits 1 for the unknown, it launched January 1, 1985. Now MTV had a sister network for those who felt too old for MTV or felt that MTV was too hard.
MTV's power was once emance enough to have an effect on the culture overall. Every year, "Frosty Returns" re airs and there's a joke about MTV, that no children will get now, becuase MTV doesn't really do that anymore. MTV's large Spring Break event was featured in "King of the Hill". I also like to think about how they had impact in their series that weren't directly related to the idea of just airing music videos.
In 1992 decided to add something else to the TV world and they got the idea from PBS, which is a strange sentence to type. A reality series called "The Real World". A show with strangers being put together and seeing what happens sounds more like a bar but alright. The original idea for this show was to make a "Melrose Place" but for MTV, but they didn't want to use "Melrose" money so they thought let's do it cheap. (Which explains a lot on many things)
I'll also mention "Bevis and Butthead" and "Daria" and the other MTV animated series, because they saw fit that animation was for an audience beyond younger children, that teens and young adults would want to see them too. There's nothing new I could say about any of this because it's all been said before though.
I guess I could babble about the logo for a minute or two.
Innovative for 1981 being a 3D logo but also playing with perspective by looking flat. The M is strong and formal but the graffiti "TV" is stuck on there off center and looks like someone just tagged the M and ran away. It fit MTV's original spirit of controlled anarchy like TV. MTV has a strong logo many TV stations and business would kill for something that's unique and recognizable. . (Read about the art of the logo from someone who's not me)
By 1996, MTV was very well known, if you ran up to someone on the street and asked them if they knew what MTV was they'd pepper spray you and scream yes as they ran away.(what?) They expanded into a new network called M2 . (M : the sequel)
August 1 is also MTV2's birthday, that's right M2 is MTV,and M2/MTV 2 launched 25 years ago ! Their first song was Beck's "Where it's At". I think digital cable was the last great television advancement, it was the chance to do what basic cable did in the start but expanded. The idea of channels to the most random of interests. Viacom was expanding their channel, so why not a 24 hour channel devoted to music videos (a third one!) It wasn't easy for M2 because some providers were like "eh there's enough music video channels thank you"
MTV was also like "here we go again" while they worked on getting carriage, M2 was like a channel that could really do what they want. It was like the early MTV in spirit with a 90's edge and gained it's own viewership and respect. It was the first place the Spice Girls video for "Wannabe" aired in the US.
In 1999, it was rebranded as MTV2 , but not much else changed about the channel. They gained more carriage by buying a jukebox music channel called The Box. In 2001 on January 1st, MTV2 went a different direction. Now MTV 2 had genre blocks like a Hiphop and Soul music block, Rock block, these were done by hours. MTV2 request with music suggested by you, the viewer, online. (These connections to online and TV were popping up across TV at the time) "120 Minutes" moved from MTV to MTV2 . The channel was still freeform at heart. They also started mixing in non music video shows with music themed shows, but also added reality shows, and reruns of older MTV shows like Beavis and Butt-head.
Viacom decided to change MTV 2's focus in 2005, after the Superbowl in 2005, they rebranded it again and made a new logo. The focus was to focus on dudes 12-34 (let's be informal , we're talking about MTV2) .
This logo makes it clear that MTV2 isn't just MTV the 2nd channel since it doesn't copy the shape the old logo had of being the MTV logo with a 2 next to it. Also it's a dog (possibly male) and the idea is represent the idea of their new core focus of Hip Hop and Rock. They even would try their chance at their own animation.
In 2007, all production staff was out at MTV and music videos were just presented on screen no VJ's. They at least still aired music videos. Eventually this was cut back and in 2001, it was down to 3AM to 8AM Eastern. AMTV2, (AMTV aired on MTV). By now there are none. MTV2 eventually has followed the line of many of Viacom's extra channels. It's mostly a dead weight channel now airing random shows
So does MTV's 40th year mean anything anymore? MTV is no longer Music Television, they couldn't even revive "Total Request Live" well. The idea the progress, the future, is good and MTV had it's time is easy to say. Just like being mad that they don't do music videos anymore, even though MTV was trying to do other things since the 1990's to stay with their audience as they were the channel for youth. That's something to note, youth really didn't have much to with TV until MTV, they didn't have a big space in the television market place before then. They could age out of the Saturday Morning blocks and just kind of drift until they might like primetime or something.
MTV is part of history in media and 40 years ago was a big moment. I think it's important to mention that history. It's sad that MTV and TV is the way it is now. Like I said, I don't streaming is as impressive as early television, early cable and even early digital cable was because it's not really doing anything that would exist without it, even cable had demand for at least 2 decades.
Some will have their own views on MTV that fits with the time that they possibly grew up with it, especially the musical era of MTV as music is a personal experience that is possibly the most nostalgic of any part of media. MTV was a network that had to fit with different moments of time, to fit their core demographic, because MTV was a business first, still is. I think they currently just can't connect anymore , so I'm not sure what an MTV 50 would look like, because I couldn't see 2021 from 2011 and the idea that media companies would be trying to glom and create a new trend of streaming services like madman ,so I'm not sure what 2031 even brings.
I'm not sure what else to write, but here's to MTV and their 40th year, a network that came from an interesting and one of the last great eras of TV media, congrats for being impactful and memorable.
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