mtv

MTV has a rundown of events showing that 2007 was the year the music industry broke. Not broke as in "broke big," like "The Year Punk Broke." Broke as in "became broken." (Which I suppose is followed by "went broke.")

And in Wired, David Byrne explains the modern landscape and what musicians can do about it. I'm a huge fan of his music, his writing, and his art, so far be it from me to add anything to what he said, but I'll point out my favorite part: he begins … Read more

As part of its quadrennial "Choose or Lose" youth voting initiative, MTV has announced a "Street Team" of 51 young amateur journalists, one from each state and the District of Columbia, who have been selected to cover the 2008 election and emphasize issues important to the younger generation.

"We couldn't ignore the explosion in self-publishing and self-organization and all the tools that young people have now to express themselves on issues of importance as well as consume information," said Ian Rowe, vice president of public affairs and strategic partnerships and MTV, "and … Read more

Viacom's MTV Networks unit announced on Tuesday that it has created Digital Fusion, a new-media advertising division designed to bring together the marketing for its oft-disparate digital brands.

Digital Fusion, according to a release from MTV Networks, encompasses both innovation and consolidation. On one hand, it's an efficiency move to give the company an edge in the increasingly competitive online-ad market. But with that renewed efficiency, MTV hopes to go further, using it to "create entirely new digital-ad products, from creative uses of existing inventory to original interactive experiences, including video content, online games, microsites, and widgets.&… Read more

One hundred fifteen million dollars.

That was how much revenue Activision's Guitar Hero III: Legends of Rock brought in in its first week on the market recently.

But the Guitar Hero franchise, which Activision bought in 2006, has lost its monopoly as the only major video game giving users the fantasy that they can join Steven Tyler or Bono onstage.

That's because Harmonix, the studio that developed the original Guitar Hero, has finally launched Rock Band, its own version of the rock star genre game, and the market is likely to heat up pretty quickly.

Many Guitar Hero … Read more

Back in early September, I wrote about the five finalists to win a combined $250,000 in development funding from MTV and Cisco, sponsors of the Digital Incubator contest for university-grown Web apps.

Today, they announced a prize even grander than the first--$100,000 in addition to the $30,000 finalist grant already applied to RapHappy.com's development. The social network for recording, editing, distributing, and commenting on user-generated raps won Digital Incubator's judges with a business plan detailing the nascent company's next level of growth.

Ben Leduc-Mills and Matt Fargo, both graduate students in New … Read more

On Monday, MTV Networks is set to unveil an initiative to connect its television, online, and mobile presences by helping music fans answer that crucial question--"Who the (expletive) sings that song?"

In other words, MTV Networks, the Viacom division that encompasses the MTV, VH1, and CMT brands as well as a host of other pop culture channels, is aiming to renew its focus on music by bringing lyrics to the forefront. This will begin rolling out in November and is expected to be complete by the middle of 2008.

On television, several of the networks' existing music-related … Read more

The next installment of MySpace.com and MTV's "presidential dialogue" series will take place at 10:30 a.m. PDT Monday, October 29, at Coe College in Cedar Rapids, Iowa.

The featured candidate will be Democratic contender Barack Obama, a U.S. Senator from Illinois. Moderators will be MTV News correspondents Gideon Yago and Sway Calloway, along with Chris Cillizza, a reporter for The Washington Post's online branch.

The Obama dialogue will be streamed live on MySpace's Election 2008 page, on MTV's Choose or Lose election site, and to cell phone customers who have … Read more

The first of the Webcast presidential dialogues put together by MySpace and MTV will debut on Thursday, September 27, with an appearance by former Democratic Sen. John Edwards as he meets with students at the University of New Hampshire.

The dialogue takes place at noon Eastern time.

Those in attendance at the event in Durham, New Hampshire, will be able to ask questions in person, but online observers will be able to submit questions through the MySpaceIM instant-messaging client as well as through MTV.com and e-mail. Viewer reactions will be tracked by a Flektor widget--Flektor, as you may remember, … Read more