Brindle Media

Posts Tagged ‘MTV’

August 1st, 1981 was a day which ushered in a transformation not only for a music industry suffering from the “Disco Sucks” backlash but also for television.

MTV: Music Television was the first TV channel created specifically for a lifestyle.

The radio industry had been forced into creating niche boutique formats targeted at specific psychographic audiences by the growth of FM as a viable broadcast distribution channel. The number of listener choices on the radio dial were significantly increased.

Meanwhile, the television landscape of 1981 resembled that of radio in the 1950s and 60s. CBS, ABC and NBC dominated and under their big tents were a variety of program types appealing to a broad spectrum of lifestyles and age groups ranging from the cradle to the grave.

Cable TV distribution was still in its infancy. HBO became the first viable cable channel as a destination for uncensored movies. However, there wasn’t much else driving significant audiences to cable TV from the broadcast networks.

In the late 70s/early 80s, American Express created a marketing plan for its Gold Card which was targeted at the affluent Baby Boom generation. Part of that plan was the company’s partnership with Warner Communications to create WarnerAmex and their brainchild was a shopping network named QUBE. The concept was simple: viewers would see products showcased on QUBE and use their AMEX Gold Card to buy them.

But before they could launch QUBE, WarnerAmex needed to encourage more Americans to sign up for cable TV. In the early 1980s, the cable industry was dominated by small, local companies rather than multi-system operators (MSOs). It wasn’t unusual for the cable operation to be running out of a local mom & pop hardware store. The industry may have been able to lay cable throughout their communities, accounting for “homes passed” but not many of those homes were actual cable subscribers.

To encourage Americans to become basic cable subs, WarnerAmex created three networks: The Movie Channel to compete with HBO, Nickeldeon to attract the Sesame Street crowd, and MTV: Music Television. Expectations for these channels weren’t all that high. Essentially, they were dog & pony shows offered free to encourage increased use of cable TV and to set up the introduction of the big money machine, QUBE.

Unfortunately for WarnerAmex, the company spent too much time tweaking and researching their product. So, in 1985 , the Home Shopping Network launched and QUBE went into the history books as the cable TV industry’s version of the Edsel.

However, MTV: Music Television began to catch on at least in the markets which could get it. Viewers in places like Albany (NY) and Peoria (IL) were mesmerized by the new video music channel. Parents and their teenagers gathered around the tube and discussed the videos. It was, to quote the sagacious Sly Stone, “a family affair”.

Oddly, music industry executives in New York and LA weren’t all that interested. They’d heard about this new fledgling cable channel but they couldn’t see it. MTV wasn’t available on the cable systems serving New York City and LA. So, for its first two years of operation, MTV was pretty much off their radar screen.

The Michael Jackson phenomenon changed all that as did the introduction of MTV onto the New York and LA cable systems late in 1983 which resulted in network TV and national magazine coverage. The channel’s brand continued to grow throughout the 80s and 90s. The sales department won more arguments about the ratings value of long-form programming versus short-form music videos. “Real World”, “Beavis & Butthead”, and other long-form show continued to encroach on the channel’s schedule real estate making less time available for music videos until MTV could no longer refer to itself as “Music Television”, at least not without its tongue in its cheek, and the channel evolved into what it is today.

MTV’’s approach to targeting a specific lifestyle group was similar to what the social media world today refers to as “communities of like-minded end users”. MTV’s Bob Pittman used to say that the channel was about “fashion”. And, whether it’s fashion in the sense of clothing styles, in the sense of an individual’s overall tastes and preferences, or in the sense of a collective group’s tastes and preferences, MTV opened the door and led the way for successors like BET, E!, Bravo, Lifestyle, CMT, The Comedy Network and OWN. Meanwhile, the audience segmentation and changes in expectations created by these highly targeted networks have had their impact on the decline of broadcast network TV viewership.

As I mentioned earlier, during MTV’s first two years on air it was unavailable in Manhattan where our offices were located. So that we could monitor the channel, video airchecks were messengered in from the Long Island uplink on a daily basis. Sometime during this period, news came out that many of the classic episodes of “The Ed Sullivan Show” and Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show” had been destroyed because the networks were reusing the old tapes on which they’d been recorded. Amazingly, no one thought it was important to preserve these shows for history.

I had a stack of MTV airchecks in my office and sensing that these might be of some historic value I contacted New York’s Museum of Broadcasting to see if they’d be interested in the tapes for their archives. The museum official with whom I spoke informed me that, no, they would not be interested in having those airchecks for their collection because MTV was (and I think I actually heard him sniff as his nose went up in the air) “cable…not TV.”

MTV was destined to transform the television and music industries but to the short-sighted it was irrelevant because the channel didn’t fit into their preconceived notions. There’s a lesson in that story.

In late 2009, Augmented Reality was incorporated a book celebrating Michael Jackson’s career. Since then, I’m not aware that there’s been much buzz about AR in the music world. However, today I received this press release:

THE BLACK EYED PEAS DEBUT IN WORLD`S FIRST 360-DEGREE MOBILE MUSIC VIDEO CREATED BY will.i.apps

New “BEP360″ App for iPad, iPhone and iPod touch Takes Fans Inside “The Time (Dirty Bit)” with 360-Degree Motion Control and Augmented Reality Developed by Peas Front Man will.i.am

LOS ANGELES January 24, 2010 – Music industry pioneer and front man of The Black Eyed Peas, will.i.am, today announced the iTunes App Store launch of BEP360, an iPad, iPhone and iPod touch app that immerses fans in a 360 degree universe of the legendary music group. Featuring the world`s first 360-degree view music video (“The Time 360″), BEP360 features the song “The Time (Dirty Bit),” the first single from new CD, “The Beginning”, now available on Interscope Records.

“will.i.apps and the BEP360 app have been established to help artists tap into the potential of our hyper-connected mobile world and bring fans deeper inside the music far beyond a four minute audio recording. It`s a unique and completely new way to experience 360 degree music immersion that will bring artists and fans closer together,” said will.i.am.

Key Features of BEP360

· Point iPad, iPhone and iPod touch device at the cover artwork of the band`s latest album, The Beginning (Interscope Records) and watch augmented reality take form with BEP avatars dancing to the beat

· Direct a virtual photo session with Fergie, will.i.am, apl.de.ap & Taboo allowing users to capture their own shots and share them.

· Stay up to date on everything about the Peas via an aggregated Twitter feed

· Play an addictive Peas-inspired puzzle game

· View pictures and comments posted by other BEP360 app users on a virtual earth

The BEP360 app is available for $2.99 from the App Store on iPhone, iPod touch and iPad, or at: www.bit.ly/bep360app.

Image: As soon as you point your iPhone onto the CD a virtual 3D character appears and the music starts.

A demo of BEP360 app featuring The Black Eyed Peas and the making-of behind the scenes video can be seen at: www.williapps.com.

I’m going to be interested to follow this story over the next few weeks to learn how fans react and how the rest of the music industry responds.

I’m creating this blog to help those of us born between 1946 and 1964 to cope with the rapid changes that are happening all around us. Remember at the end of the last century when a big question was what we were going to do with all of our spare time? I don’t know about you but even though I left my last “official” job over two years ago, I don’t find that I have a lot of spare time.

One of the challenges I’ve encountered is that I don’t have a college degree. When I was 13, I decided that I wanted to be in the radio business. During my sophomore year at Northeastern University in Boston, I was offered a job in broadcasting and I was learning so much and having so much fun that I left school and pursued my career. Over the next 40 years, I had a successful communications management career in places like Providence, Albany, Washington, DC, Pittsburgh, Chicago and New York working for companies like NBC, SFX, AM/FM and MTV Networks.

Despite not having a college degree, I was also invited to teach a communications course at New York University’s Tisch School of the Arts, served as a faculty advisor at Siena College and was certified by the New York State Education Department as a licensed private school teacher. Nevertheless, I’m finding many organizations refusing to even consider me for employment because I don’t have a college degree. I’ve also noticed that many of the online job application forms that HR departments are using to screen candidates no longer include “Some college” as an option.

Have you encountered this problem? Have you figured out a way to deal with it?

Tell me about it.