Within a few years of MTV's first broadcast, on August 1 1981, marketers were talking about the "MTV generation", the 16- to 24-year-olds glued to the first 24-hour music channel on cable television.
Now, as MTV turns 25, the first MTV generation is in its 40s and the broadcaster faces the challenge of remaining relevant to the MySpace generation. The growth of social networking websites such as the one bought by News Corporation last year has taken young media consumers away from traditional TV channels and few seem as vulnerable to the threat as MTV.
