Black Entertainment Television

Black Entertainment Television (BET) is an American cable network primarily targeting a young African American audience. Established by Robert L. Johnson on January 25, 1980, and currently owned by Viacom, BET offers music, entertainment, comedy, movies, and other programs. Much of its programming reflects hip-hop and urban cultures of contemporary American society. Although BET offered current affairs programs, such as Ed Gordon's BET News and Tavis Smiley's BET Tonight, the network's major overhauls in the early 2000s resulted in its increasing investment in music and the dismantling of BET's news division. Its sister channels include BET Gospel, BET Hip-Hop, and Centric, formerly known as BETJ or BET Jazz.

Before starting BET, Johnson worked in Washington, D.C., as press secretary to Walter E. Fauntroy, a congressional delegate, and as vice president of government relations for the National Cable Television Association. When Johnson learned about a plan to launch a cable channel targeting an elderly audience, he realized that the same principle could apply to African American viewers, which was estimated to have a $75 billion purchasing power. Initially, BET offered gospel music and reruns of low-budget films. Johnson planned to generate profit from advertising by leveraging the fact that blacks watched more television than whites and tended to be more brand loyal.

Initially, BET broadcast two to four hours a week, without original content, as a block of programming on Nickelodeon. Johnson admitted that BET showed movies considered to be Blaxploitation films because that was all it could afford. It wasn't until the summer of 1983, when Taft Broadcasting Company made a $360,000 investment, that its programming expanded to six hours a day, seven days a week. BET started showing music videos provided by record companies for free, and its own content, including Bobby Jones Gospel Hour and Video Soul.