TV, the music channel subsidiary of Viacom, has recently launched a music video on demand service in Italy. The television commercial, also viewable at www.mtvon.it and www.youtube.com, is set in a house shared by four young people.

Two girls are sitting at the dining table; they prefer pop to any other sort of music. A gothic, much-tattoed man, who likes heavy metal, is making himself some sort of concoction. He takes some raw minced meat and blends the lot in a mixer to make a meat smoothi, while the girls look on. He then opens the blender and raises it to his mouth, and the two girls promptly faint. He carries on drinking the formidable stuff and walks out of the room with the jar. In the next room is a young man wearing a cowboy hat, who likes country music. So, of all the MTV music in that house, 60 per cent is pop, another 30 per cent is heavy metal and the remaining 10 per cent is country music. The advertisement ends with the slogan: �MTV Video on Demand; Freedom of Choice'.... more