MTV Information is shuttering operations after 36 years following widespread layoffs, The Hollywood Reporter and Selection report. Twenty-five p.c of workers throughout MTV Leisure Studios, Paramount Media Networks, and Showtime had been laid off Tuesday (Might 9), roughly 5 years after MTV endured important job cuts in 2017.
In a memo to employees obtained by Selection, Showtime/MTV Leisure Studios and Paramount Media Networks president Chris McCarthy wrote that senior leaders “in coordination with HR” “made the very arduous however mandatory choice to scale back our home crew by roughly 25%.”
McCarthy continued: “This can be a powerful but essential strategic realignment of our group. Via the elimination of some items and by streamlining others, we can cut back prices and create a simpler strategy to our enterprise as we transfer ahead. As we speak we’ll notify workers whose positions are being impacted with leaders speaking the information on to these groups/or people. These conferences might be adopted by particular person 1:1s with our HR companions.”
MTV Information emerged in 1987 with one present: The Week in Rock, hosted by Kurt Loder. Correspondents like Alison Stewart, Tabitha Soren, SuChin Pak, and later Meredith Graves reported for the outlet all through the years, their protection spanning music, politics, intercourse, popular culture, and extra.
MTV Information was particularly influential within the Nineteen Nineties and early 2000s—on April 8, 1994 Loder confirmed the demise of Kurt Cobain, and MTV Information transitioned into extra frequent programming after breaking that landmark story.
Within the ensuing years, reporters for MTV Information went on to win Emmys and Peabody Awards for items on pure disasters and the Iraq Warfare. In 2017, a number of MTV Information writers had been laid off as the corporate re-strategized to focus extra on video and short-form content material.
Pitchfork has reached out to MTV and Paramount representatives for additional data and remark.