2005 host Diddy hoists the venerable moon man trophy.
		MTV

And for those who do enjoy Beck's E-Pro, Common's Go or any of the mini-musicals that provide the spindly premise for MTV's annual celebrity shindig, chances are they've seen them elsewhere.

Yesterday's bloated video production with a name director, a Hollywood budget and a FedEx trip to MTV is gone. Today's music video is a humbler commodity with a less-exclusive address, popping up on competing music channels, band Web sites, bonus DVDs, online music services and anywhere artists feel they can hold the public's wandering gaze. (The White Stripes just premiered My Doorbell on Nickelodeon, the first time the cable channel aired a music video.)

Artists still crave an MTV slot and its accompanying cachet. But with reality shows monopolizing the schedule, artists can't risk making pricey promotional vehicles steered toward a single destination with limited parking spaces, especially when the Internet's boundless capacity green-lights both the sleek and the simple. Digital wizardry in cameras and computers enables amateurs to create music videos that don't entail big crews and costly equipment.

MTV still pulls video watchers; 61.7 million viewers saw music videos on the network in July. Yet the rate of spins has been spiraling down for years as MTV front-loaded the docket with shows from Pimp My Ride to Date My Mom. The bulk of video content has been relegated to smaller platforms, including MTV2, which is increasingly elbowing videos aside with such programs as Team Sanchez and Wildboyz. Cable outlets VH1, CMT and Fuse blend videos and other fare. MTV Hits boasts wall-to-wall videos, albeit a narrow playlist, but reaches only 21% of MTV's audience. It's on digital cable, where music channels with a higher concentration of videos, including VH1 Country, tend to roost.

"When MTV moved away from videos, that created a vacuum," says Phil Leigh, senior analyst for Inside Digital Media. "Just like nature, commerce abhors a vacuum."

The action shifted to the Internet, where Launch pioneered videos on demand. It was acquired by Yahoo, translating into more exposure and traffic. Other music outlets cropped up, as did countless fan and band Web sites touting music videos.

Evolution of a format Dark ages (pre-1981) "Promo films" by such artists as The Beatles, The Turtles and The Who are shown on TV in the mid-'60s. Groundbreaking '70s clips such as Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody and the Boomtown Rats' I Don't Like Mondays foreshadow the coming video age. Aug. 1, 1981 MTV launches with rock format; later named "product of the year" by Forbes. March 1983 Michael Jackson's Billie Jean video airs on MTV, which subsequently plays more pop and R&B videos, including ... December 1983 Michael Jackson's 14-minute Thriller film, which raises the ambition bar for music video. September 1984 First MTV Video Music Awards January 1985 MTV launches companion, older-skewed network VH1. April 1987 MTV premieres equally influential metal-heavy Headbangers Ball series. March 1986 MTV premieres influential late-night alternative music show 120 Minutes. August 1987 Dance-oriented Club MTV premieres. August 1988 Yo! MTV Raps premieres, followed by Yo! MTV Raps Today. May 1989 Madonna's Express Yourself, the costliest video to date and possibly ever (upward of $1 million), airs on MTV. January 1990 Acoustic music series MTV Unplugged begins. May 1992 MTV introduces Real World, which kicks off reality trend and influences MTV's emphasis on non-video programming. December 1992 MTV begins to credit video directors. August 1996 MTV launches sister channel M2, now MTV2, partly in response to 1994 launch of rival MuchMusic USA, now Fuse. August 1997 VH1 launches Behind the Music, whose success influences its emphasis on non-video programming. September 1998 MTV starts hit daily countdown show TRL. June 1999 MTV's Making the Video begins, celebrating the video-making process. May 2002 MTV Hits and MTV Jams, two video-intensive spinoff channels, launch. October 2003 Palm Pictures releases first DVD series of collections of music videos by top directors such as Spike Jonze and Michael Gondry. October 2004 DualDisc CD/DVD hybrid launched with releases by, among others, The Donnas and Simple Plan. Pioneers: John, Paul, George and Ringo did early video-type work in films such as Help! September 2005 50 Cent issues new edition of Massacre album with disc of videos for each track added. New group The Sun bypasses CD release altogether, puts out album on DVD only.

Suddenly musicians "had an ability to put videos on their own Web sites without having to plead with MTV for airtime," Leigh says. "MTV shot itself in the foot by going to reality programming. The viewership went up with that stuff, but it left a latent demand, and the Internet is tapping into that."

Videos didn't go extinct on MTV.

"The number of people exposed to videos under our umbrella is greater than it's ever been," says Brian Graden, president of entertainment for MTV Music Group. A Web site has depth, but TV still has the power to create a cultural event, he argues, adding, "We view the two as very tethered together."

Downloading fat video files is more time-consuming than plucking songs from cyberspace, but as high-speed connections grow, that hurdle is disappearing.

"AOL reports that dial-up connections are declining," Leigh says. "In the U.S., more than half the people connected to the Internet now have broadband. And kids on college campuses have instant access to super-high-speed broadband. It's not unusual for people of college age to get more music videos from the Internet than MTV.

"This has profound implications beyond MTV. Ultimately all programming will be on demand. People will look in the rearview and say, 'Gee, they had to wait for things to be broadcast?' It will be a quaint anachronism."

Among types of streamed video fare online, music videos are ahead of newscasts and second only to movie trailers in popularity, according to Edison Media Research. Music-video production is up for the first time in years largely because record labels can count on broad online exposure at little investment.

AOL Music and MTV Overdrive maintain thriving video-on-demand vaults online. MSN is building one. Pulling roughly 24 million visitors monthly, Yahoo! Music ranks first among digital music sites, and its video component is booming, with users glimpsing more than 350 million clips each month.

Yahoo prides itself on tailoring services for individual tastes by remembering past choices and introducing acts with similar traits.

"We help people discover new artists," says Jay Frank, head of Yahoo! Music programming and label relations. "We know people who like Mariah will like Teairra Mari. We can alert them to videos they might like, and they can watch any time they want. It's compelling and refreshing."

While the rise in high-speed access and Yahoo's partnership with SBC has enabled faster downloads of high-quality videos, Frank says the site is a popular showcase for inexpensive clips as well.

"To get a video on TV, it has to be big and expensive and flashy," he says. "Online, people just want to see the artist. We've had enormous success with modestly budgeted videos. Some artists create videos solely to be online, with the idea that, 'I'm going to wait for MTV to come to the party.' "

Such was the case with Hawthorne Heights, an Ohio emo quintet whose low-budget video won over Yahoo visitors and helped push sales of its debut album.

"Then MTV called and said, 'We're thinking of playing your video,' " Frank says. "The cat's out of the bag. Yahoo Music is the tastemaker for the industry, and MTV follows what we do now. It's happening today, not in the future. Kids watch videos online, period."

They're not passive viewers. Songs and videos are widely posted, discussed and exchanged online, especially in MySpace.com, a hugely popular social-networking site with a strong music orientation. Members establish home pages and seek like-minded friends who share favorite tunes and clips. The site encourages sharing and exploration, habits more natural to the Gen-Y character than compliance to MTV dictates.

"You might see 10 videos a day on MTV, and radio conglomerates have pretty much the same playlist," says Chris DeWolfe, CEO of MySpace. "This generation of 16-to-34-year-olds has grown up with choice. They program their own iPods. The music area of MySpace has grown so fast because the whole process is interesting and interactive and it offers a central place to discover music. The same thing is happening on the video side."

While fans relish unrestricted communication and nearly limitless choices, artists are reaping greater benefits in recognition, credibility and financial savings. A video posted in MySpace can fly across the friend communities formed by 26 million users.

"If people watching videos in a social environment see something they like, they tell their friends, and it spreads virally," DeWolfe says. "Word of mouth is much more valuable than advertising."

And thanks to ever-cheaper technology and the available workforce in MySpace's membership, a video can be made on a shoestring budget with a motley crew.

"The labels don't have the budgets anymore to produce high-quality videos that cost $500,000, " DeWolfe says. "Bands are finding directors, cameramen and extras on MySpace to make a video. That community effort also spurs more people to watch it."

In the past, making a video meant a huge investment and an anxious wait for a payoff, all while the band idled on the sidelines as its label and MTV pulled the strings. Now artists take control.

"A band with no history can get 40,000 people looking at its video just by getting on the site and doing some work," says MySpace president Tom Anderson. "It's a strong incentive. The technology has changed so much in the past six or seven years. You can make a video cheaply. The quality may be lacking, but I think fans get excited when they discover a band that's made its own record or video. They're the first to see them underground."