MTV should be given back to Generation X after celebrating its 40th birthday with Ridiculousness

Variety

On the 40th anniversary of its launch Sunday, MTV showed wall to wall Ridiculousness. The groundbreaking Music Television cable network has become a zombie channel, "and for those of us still rooting for the brand, it’s a sad sight to see," says Michael Schneider. He adds: "As the major conglomerates shift their attention to their streaming services, the legacy basic cable networks have become secondary priorities. In many cases, they now serve more as incubators for programming that will eventually find a broader audience on a streamer. But because MTV meant so much to so many of us growing up, especially those of us in our 40s, the de-evolution of the channel stings extra hard. As recently as 10 years ago, MTV still felt like it had the pulse on pop culture, and that was long after it had moved on to embraced a younger millennial audience, leaving us Gen X-ers in the dust. (No hard feelings, MTV, we get it.) Interestingly, MTV is a brand that ViacomCBS continues to embrace, even recently renaming its portfolio of cable brands — MTV, Comedy Central, Paramount Network, Pop TV, CMT, VH1, TV Land and Logo — to MTV Entertainment Group. But again, it’s now less about those channels, and more about what MTV Entertainment Studios is producing as a whole, and especially for Paramount Plus." As Schneider notes MTV's recent The Real World Homecoming: New York was shown on Paramount+. Which begs the question: "What to do with a legacy linear brand on autopilot? or its 40th anniversary, I say: Give MTV back to the 40-year-olds," says Schneider. "MTV is a brand that has always adapted to the times. And even now, that means a new MTV for the streaming generation. That’s fine. But young viewers don’t watch linear TV anymore. Hence the decision to program mostly Ridiculousness repeats on the channel as a bit of a nightlight. But are we really going to let MTV as a channel fade away, with a whimper like that?...That’s why I’d say, ViacomCBS would have nothing to lose at this point in making MTV back into a lifestyle channel for the original MTV Generation. A generation that, yes, still subscribes to cable."

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