Sunday, October 16, 2011

Whine and Dine

There was a time when I - and a whole bunch of other people - really thought anything that came from MTV was cool.

I read about Max Headroom - a UK-produced show done in the US - way before TV3 got hold of it.

Max Headroom was random before random became a hipster thing, and now embraced by dunno who.

[added, to clarify between Max Headroom AND MTV]Meanwhile, MTV at the time managed to convince everyone and everything on the planet that it was edgy, avant garde and is the thing all teenagers want.

Watching Beavis and Butthead and Aeon Flux was cool. Non-linear storytelling, slacker culture, and blah blah blah.

I turn on MTV now, and I don't even get music videos. The channel is dominated by reality shows, in an age when reality shows have turned mean-spirited and spiteful.

I don't enjoy MTV anymore. I don't see it as representing anything, other than an excuse for the MTV Movie Awards. Remember Joe's Apartment?

Being silly and glorifying silliness was the MTV staple - it was their backbone, their soul. We carried that and everything we thought was cool, into t3h Interwebz. Everything's gone now. Institutionalised.

The Internet used to be the last bastion of stupidity. Then, old people went in, bringing their commerce and rules and adult political fights. Then a new generation went in, without the cynicism, with a trust for structure and systems.

MTV has changed. The Internet has changed. The world has moved on.

But I'm still here, saying fuck the free world.