Does MTV actually exist anymore?
Sure, for its namesake it still does, but when has “Music Television” last actually been about the music?
In fact, there’s a case to be made that MTV should changes its name to Ridiculousness TV as the Rob Dyrdek driven clip show seems to be the dominating voice behind the network these days. MTV appears to be primarily a non-stop cycle of the show.
Now, don’t get me wrong, I love Ridiculousness. I love that at any given moment, if there is nothing else to watch, I can always turn on this show and enjoy some mind-numbing television for a few minutes or hours at a time. In fact, if I find it is not in rotation at any given moment, I find myself to be disappointed. Truly disappointed.
But again, I digress. When Ridiculousness started back in 2011, MTV had already stopped playing music videos on any regular basis. When the network started, it was all music all the time. Then at some point in the 90s, original programming took over and began to push out the music videos. When the early 2000s rolled around, MTV was already known as the network formerly known as “Music Television.”
As Ridiculousness enters its 10h year and 19th season, the show is inspiring spinoffs (Delicousness) and dominates the programming at MTV. At this point, it seems like viewers only go to MTV for this show. So back to my question, does MTV actually exist anymore? I’d say co-host Chanel West Coast sums it all up on an episode I recently saw, where Rob Dyrdek references the network as Music Television and Chanel reveals that she doesn’t know what that is, unaware that MTV and Music Television are the same thing or at least once were.
