LOS ANGELES, July 7 (UPI) -- MTV executives, stunned by harsh criticism and soft ratings of last weekend's Live 8 concerts, say they may retool the program and show it again.
MTV was criticized for its broadcast of the concerts, staged in London, Philadelphia and eight other cities, for frequent cutaways from key musical performances to go to commercials, offstage banter or less compelling performances elsewhere.
"Knowing what I know now, I probably would have made the decision to go commercial-free," Van Toffler, MTV executive vice president, told the Los Angeles Times. Some kind of do-over is "not the craziest idea," he said.
A combined average of 2.2 million total viewers watched from noon to 8 p.m. Saturday on MTV (1.4 million) and VH1 (762,000), according to Nielsen Media Research.
Unfortunately for MTV, its performance also was juxtaposed with a widely praised showing by AOL, which offered coverage on its music website.
