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“Ladies and gentlemen, rock and roll.” And with this, Music Television was introduced. With the bouncing, techno sounds of The Buggles’ “Video Killed the Radio Star” providing a hauntingly ominous backdrop, this new form of “video radio” was brought to the forefront of television history. As of Aug. 1, 1981, at precisely 12:01 a.m., any member of the cable subscribing community could turn on MTV and gorge themselves on a feast of music and rock stars. Over 20 years later, MTV has maintained a relatively steady course of direction… or has it?

Despite the station’s overwhelming popularity with the preteen to young adult age group, MTV was once seen as a risky, dead-end venture. Proposed by John Lack in the late 1970s, Music Television was advertised as a showcase for bands and their upcoming albums. Employing such assault tactics as celebrity interviews, music and entertainment news and the possibility of meeting a favorite artist through one of the station’s many contests, MTV rose from its bastard child position at Warner-Amex Satellite Entertainment Company to the throne of the most profitable twenty-four hour cable station (it reached over 30.8 million households just seven years after its birth). MTV eventually gained enough power in the cutthroat television industry to conquer another cable channel; with its Midas touch, MTV molded the slagging Cable Music Channel into its ever-present sidekick, Video Hits One. Like Wayne and Garth, MTV and VH1 would remain a pair of outcast innovators in the television world, despite their dwindling video rotation lists.

7 a.m…. 11:30 a.m…. 4:29 p.m…. 7:06 p.m…. Once upon a time, you could flip on MTV or VH1 at any one of these times and catch the latest music video from whoever was the hottest new artist. Now, however, you flip on music television and are met with one of many random programs broadcast on the channel. Instead of the new one from Billy Idol, the Rolling Stones or Sting, viewers are met with blind-daters in “Taildaters,” college chicks in “Sorority Life,” and copious sexual commentary throughout “Undressed.” Twenty-four hours of music has been slashed pretty much in half.

“I swear, I have yet to turn on MTV and see a music video,” Katherine Harris, a 19-year-old student at Boston University laments. “It’s almost disgusting how much other programming they play, and then replay and replay and replay.”

This desire to see music videos and artists 24/7/365 was the reasoning behind Lack’s proposition of a twenty-four hour music channel. With no full-time job and limited responsibilities, teens and young adults have an extremely flexible viewing schedule. And, they’re lazy: the teenage generation has time on its hands and no real desire to do something active with it.

“MTV was a godsend during middle school,” Harris remembers. “It filled that little time before school and after school before dinner.”

But just as Harris has evolved from middle school to high school to college, so has MTV. What was once strictly a showcase for music videos, is now a station providing a plethora of eclectic programming. For every viewer like Harris, who misses the old rotation schedule, there’s another viewer who finds the mix of music, celebrity and daytime drama a welcome change.

“I don’t know who would want to sit around and just watch music videos all day,” Lyndsey Rizzotti, a 20-year-old student at Monroe Community College offers. “Plus, what would anyone do without ‘The Real World?’”

“The Real World,” along with other programs such as “Total Request Live” and “Cribs,” has become almost synonymous with MTV. Offering reality TV, the chance to vote on favorite videos and a peek into the homes of the biggest celebrities, Music Television has expanded its limited video format. Anticipating the change in taste of its audience, MTV has created programming that caters to what many viewers want to see: people like themselves and people who are celebrities. The station allows a mingling of the ordinary and extraordinary; the idea that you could be sitting on your couch one day and three feet from Carson Daly the next. It’s a connection not created through the straightforward music video format.

For those who crave the visual interpretation of their favorite songs, however, there are some alternatives to MTV and VH1. MTV2 and VH1 Classics stick to the twenty-four hours of music originally proposed by Lack. However, these channels are not offered with standard cable packages; the viewer must subscribe to a digital or satellite cable package. It costs a bit more money, but for those die-hard music video fans, it might just be worth the extra expense. For the rest of the MTV and VH1 viewers, who are a bit frustrated with the lack of video clips but aren’t willing to shell out the extra dough, they’ll just have to “put the blame on VCR.”

Or in this case, MTV.