After a 36-year run, MTV News is shutting down. According to Variety, the decision follows widespread layoffs affecting 25% of employees across MTV Entertainment Studios, Paramount Media Networks, and Showtime.
MTV News launched in 1987 with The Week In Rock, hosted by veteran journalist Kurt Loder. The company expanded into political coverage in the '90s with campaigns branded "Rock the Vote" and "Choose or Lose." The network's coverage of major events like the death of Kurt Cobain was widely viewed throughout the '90s, bringing a youthful perspective (in both execution and curation) that genuinely felt like an alternative to the existing news establishment. News coverage was a huge part of MTV's growth beyond its roots as a music video network.
As technology and culture evolved away from cable TV in recent years, MTV News lost much of its audience, but the MTV News brand has continued to operate in the digital space up until this week. In 2015, the company made a major investment in online journalism — hiring a staff of accomplished journalists and bringing in former Grantland editor Dan Fierman to run the site — but famously laid most of them off in 2017 in a quickly aborted effort to "pivot to video."
If you're of a certain age, you will probably remember the day in 1994 when Kurt Loder announced Kurt Cobain's death live on MTV News.
