After launching with much fanfare (including a story in Hyphen), MTV is closing down its channels that targeted Asian American audiences.
MTV’s move follows programming cuts at AZN Television, which is mostly repeats and movies now. ImaginAsian is still hanging in there as well.
MTV should get credit for making the effort and trying the niche in creating MTV Chi (for Chinese Americans, MTV Desi (for South Asians) and MTV K (for Korean Americans) rather than the one-size-fits-all approach that many other media outlets have taken.
The reality is there is no definition of “Asian American” that rolls off a marketing executive’s tongue easily. According to this study, Asian-American youth feel ignored, excluded and misunderstood by most brands. It’s probably just not the youth that feel this way.
Many Asian American media outlets have tried and died, but Hyphen, where I’m and editor, is going strong and will make its best effort to be relevant to as many people as possible.
A version of this post can be found on Hyphen magazine’s blog.