MTV's TRL Loses Time Square Staff

Rumors have been flying inside MTV that their afternoon music video show TRL,Total Request Live, maybe canceled or scaled back soon. Tuesday, February 13, 2007 fanned that flame. Late in the work day parent company Viacom laid off most of their Time Square staff. Viacom had announced 250 planned lay offs the day before, which is six percent of MTV Networks total crew. But, TRL's misfortune shouldn't be misread as distress for the company altogether. Viacom's website boasts MTV as the number one cable network for 12-34 year olds and Viacom's recent cutbacks are being reported not as of a sign of financial strain, but the company restructuring to "focus resources to the company's digital properties." Parent company Viacom, which trades under the symbol VIA in the New York Stock Exchange, closed at $40.16 a share on February 15th and has been steady for the last 52 weeks.

The show was launched in 1998 and was very popular throughout my adolescents. The cast overlooked Times Square from a glass building with thousands of screaming fans down below like New Year's everyday. The original host was Carson Daly. The show offered a chance for viewers to vote and call in their requests for the top ten music videos for the day. The stars of the music videos and up and coming actors and actresses would often stop in for interviews. The show quickly rose to the top of the charts and you couldn't deny that kids were elbowing each other to get off the school buses to go home and tune in. The shows ratings peaked in 1999 with 853,000 viewers. Analysts noted a trend in the shows popularity corresponding with the rise and fall of teen pop sensations like Jessica Simpson ,Brittney Spears, and the boy bands. So does this make TRL the only victim of an apparently good trend? Since the fall of those pop stars no other niche has managed to fill those shoes for TRL. By 2002 viewers had dropped to 581,000 and never again managed to rise above 609,000. At this time the show had been moved to 5:00 EST. Last year, maybe in an effort to regain viewers, MTV moved TRL back to its original 3:30 EST. After the move ratings continued to fall to 468,000 viewers in 2006 and in the first six weeks of 2007 a meager 373,000 people tuned in.

So what is once infamous program supposed to do with only 44 percent of it's original peak audience? The rumors included the possibility of cutting the show back to two days a week or getting rid of it altogether. But, MTV's spokesman David Bittler has denied these rumors. And MTV should be reluctant to cut the iconic show altogether because of the message it would send to viewers. Not to mention it is the last daily music video program left on the channel once solely dedicated to rocking it out. Currently MTVs time slots have been taken over by the reality TV craze and loads itself up with shows like Engaged and Underage, The Real World, My Super Sweet 16, and Laguna Beach. What can TRL do to save its self? Maybe nothing. Back in 1999 I remember fighting my 56K modem to log on and vote for my favorite song. Today teenagers have a slew of entertainment options available to them online like on demand music videos and endless mischief on YouTube. Many media companies are having a hard time keeping up. But, the MTV executives are putting up a big fight. Chief Executive Judy McGrath sent an email to employees Monday saying, "Our industry is at an inflection point, and many companies are going through the process of adapting their business models and organizations to the new realities."

If you go onto the MTV website these realities are painfully obvious. There's a streaming video section where their up to date programs play for free. So what was the point of asking YouTube to remove over 100,000 pirated video clips? I'm sure Google would like to know. If you move to the TRL section of the site you will be greeted by the voting section painfully stating, "The fate of the countdown is in your hands." Which has more meaning in light of the lay offs than I think their web writers intended.