Grumbled about by the left, hated by the American right, MTV has nevertheless redefined the way people relate to music

As any pub quiz specialist will know, the first video broadcast by MTV back in 1981 was Buggles's Video Killed the Radio Star. That first programme, prefaced with the ominously stiff announcement "Ladies and gentlemen, rock'n'roll" and played over footage of the Apollo 11 moon landing, was watched by just a few thousand people. Today, MTV is a global franchise, with numerous sister channels and offshoots, so broad in its outreach that it represents not so much a TV channel as the condition of popular culture.

Radio stars didn't immediately die with the inception of MTV – during the 1980s and 90s, the likes of Dire Straits, Sting, Madonna and later Nirvana survived and thrived in its medium. However, depressingly for some, it did redefine the way we related to popular music. Hearing kids ask, "Have you seen the latest Paula Abdul single?" was jarring to an older generation for whom singles were to be heard, not seen. Purists were dismayed that the rise of the video, with its single, visual interpretation of a song, suppressed the more multiple, personal, imaginative ways in which pop had been consumed by listeners in the past. What's more, the requirement to accompany new releases with highly expensive videos meant that the punk and post-punk era, in which singles could be bashed out cheaply by indie labels such as Chiswick and hopefully attain a sniff of chart success would be short-lived. From now on, chart music would have to be backed by big bucks.

Founded and manned by people with a background in radio and a deep consciousness of the importance of branding, MTV introduced a corporate and marketing dimension to the world of rock'n'roll. As far as the delinquent, rebellious, countercultural aspect of the music went, you might say MTV wanted to have their cake but not eat it. On the back of a viciously, expletive-laden, highly opinionated column I used to write for the late Melody Maker, I was once asked by MTV in London if I might script something for their own channel, for a spoken word VJ interlude. Only, could I script something minus the viciousness, expletives and opinionatedness? What they wanted, was the "energy". The job, needless to say, didn't happen.

MTV has often been accused of cowardice, of backing down to calls for censorship, excessive use of the "bleep" button, or for banning the likes of Jesus Christ Pose by Soundgarden. Is it really possible to preserve the spirit of rock'n'roll with such a neutering approach? Can "attitude" merely be a branding exercise, a gel, a sheen? Certainly, you look at the main MTV channel today and it appears to exist in a post-rock'n'roll landscape, perhaps of its own making. A day's random programming on the main channel might run as follows; The Family Crews, a reality doc about comedian Jack Crews as he raises his family; Cribs, a look at the luxury pads of celebrities; a Jackass marathon; Hellcats; Jersey Shore; all night teleshopping. The way the kids dress suggest there were such things as Goth and The Sex Pistols back in prehistoric times, but that they are as extinct as the dinosaurs nowadays.

Granted, there is still music – MTV Classic Rock, for example, in a pantheon in which Bon Jovi and Take That sit alongside Nirvana in the running order. Again, the feel is distinctly Hard Rock Café. However, if MTV is grumbled about by the cultural left, it is loathed by the increasingly vocal American right, who consider it to be, among other things, "anti-family". They are wary of its persistent, albeit non-partisan drives to "Rock the Vote", suspecting, probably correctly, that the people the channel would mobilise wouldn't be especially likely to vote for their beloved Tea Party candidates. Moreover, although it was initially slow to showcase African-American music, during the 90s and beyond, it surely played a key role in the globalisation (and visualisation) of hip-hop and R&B. Moreover, it has been praised by the Gay And Lesbian Alliance Against Defamation for the amount of content (42%) that its programming devotes to reflecting the lives of gay, bisexual and transgendered people. In today's climate, such things are more than small mercies.

30 years of MTV

• As part of their original 1981 introduction to MTV, producers Alan Goodman and Fred Seibert had wished to use, as well as footage of the Apollo 11 mission, Neil Armstrong's famous "One small step for man, one giant leap for mankind" quote. However, Armstrong enforced copyright of the words, so they had to be replaced by a beeping noise.

• The first non-white act to appear on MTV was The Specials – the racially mixed UK group's Rat Race was the 58th video to be played on the first day of broadcasting.

• Although MTV can claim credit for introducing Beavis And Butthead to the world, they moved it from its original 7pm slot to 11pm and heavily edited the content, following a panic that arose when a child supposedly burned down his house after watching one of the episodes.

• Occasionally, during the early broadcasts of MTV, the screen would fade to black. This would be due to a station employee switching cassettes in the VCR.

• The first time Kiss ever appeared in public without makeup was on MTV in 1983.

• Among MTV's most successful modern creations was Punk'd, starring Ashton Kutcher, who played elaborate pranks on celebrities. However, these do not always work out good-humouredly. American Pie star Shannon Elizabeth filed for divorce from her husband from husband Joe Reitman after he participated in a stunt in which she'd been led to believe the pair of them had been filmed on a celebrity porn tape.

• Those who started out as MTV VJs: Davina McCall, Russell Brand, Justin Lee Collins

• Those who ended up as MTV VJs: Paul King (of King of Love And Pride fame) and Miles Hunt (The Wonder Stuff)