Who doesn’t remember marking their calendar with the date of the next annual Video Music Award? Not so long ago, people around the country stayed up popping corn, pouring soda, and ensuring that their closest friends were only one ring away. People were thrilled to watch the live performances from their favorite entertainers.
Staying up late to watch the VMAs was the thing to do. Something controversial was sure to happen at the show, making the VMAs the topic of discussion for at least a week. Everyone gossiped about how Miley Cyrus grinded on Robin Thicke during her risqué performance, or how Beyoncé revealed her groundbreaking pregnancy after performing “Love on Top”.
The VMAs were in a television league of their own, providing us with an exclusive glimpse of what celebrities were up to. But we had seen nothing yet.
With the implosion of social media, television has been left in the dust. Platforms such YouTube, Twitter, Instagram and many more social media platforms command our time and attention in a way that television never could.
Forget marking your calendar, information and controversy are available for your viewing pleasure 24/7. You can pick and choose when to watch and who to follow. With one click of a button, people know everything that happened in the award show, without needing to watch it.
“The awards show has lost 50 percent of its viewers in three years, according to Nielsen. While the VMAs managed to rally 12 million viewers in 2011, that figure has tumbled sharply ever since,” Amy Wang wrote for Rolling Stone.
The rise of technological advances has yet again changed our lifestyle and entertainment choices, making a dent in interest for televised award shows. The television has become a decorative item. This has caused a decline in ratings which experts state will increase.
“Unbearable, four-hour-plus awards shows have trotted out the same dusty formula for close to 100 years: familiar names, monotonous speeches and lame-o zingers. Nothing sums up these death marches better than the several minutes of airtime they regularly give corporate accountants,” said Johnny Oleksinski for the New York Post.
With declining ratings and rising redundancy, the awards show is going to have to make some big changes if it wants to survive. Although maybe even that won’t be able to save it from its impending doom.
