Cable Hall of Fame Induction speech notes

Written By Yaneisy Reyes

Thank you, nice video!

Some of it is actually true!

However, it’s missing our proudest contribution 

Bringing intelligent, thoughtful, and culturally sensitive programming to the World

Jersey Shore

Beavis and Butt-head 

And of course, Jack Ass cutting edge technology, Jack Ass, 3D

We also created

The short attention span (not Twitter)

Brought the Berlin Wall down

And don’t play music anymore

My Fondest memories  - early days of cable with HBO.

Feel very lucky

From a platoon leader in Vietnam to leading a very different Army, launching MTV

Now, that proves ANYTHING is possible

It’s been

- Missiles to Music

- Iron Curtain to the Red Carpet

- DMZ to MTV

Working with amazing entrepreneurs, bold risk takers, who disrupted television in an even more dramatic way  

than it is being disrupted today

Built on being adaptable, 

partnerships of trust and integrity between all the players  – 

which sometimes needs reminding.

Cable has defined my life, and has taught me everything:

3 examples - 

1/ creative, relentless distribution

J.C. Sparkman, straight out of central casting (Gary Cooper meets John Wayne)

We did a 10-year deal (which had to be renegotiated a year later)

3 HBO launches a month – we had to be at each one.

He was hands on

In Laramie, Wyoming, signal didn’t come on - he went to the Head in- fixed it himself 

He invented scale ‘a small number on a big number, equals a big number’

These were innovative partnerships

  • Julian Brodsky, could hear his voice from Bala Cynwyd as I was still on the Amtrak

  • Brian Roberts & Ralph

  • David Van Valkenburg 

  • Bob Miron

  • Paul Maxfield 

  • My HBO/Viacom colleagues

  • Many others 

They reminded me of building the railroads in another era

I took these lessons around the world

After a lot of cheap hotels, dodgy airplanes, and exotic food, ended up with

- 200 channels 

- 200 countries 

- 2 Billion audience

- 8 of every 10 MTV viewers were outside the United States

2/ Cable also taught me to think global/ but act local

Mike Fries set the standard. He put ‘global’ into Liberty Global

We took an American invention, gave it a strong local accent to respect and reflect, and drove it around the world

3/ Cable taught me to give back 

That Doing Good is Good for Business

Many initiatives, we chose fighting HIV as our biggest

AIDS is the worse epidemic in modern history. 

Nearly -

- 80 M people impacted 

- 40 M have died 

- 40 M living with HIV               

Engaged 24/7 

And learned that television can actually save lives 

Global health now occupies the majority of my time 

amfAR, launched a countdown to the cure by 2020

MTV Staying Alive, working at the grass roots level

GAVI, providing vaccinations to the world’s poorest children, saving a life for the price of a cup of coffee. 

Cable even gave me family. I met Alex, my wife who is way out of my league, through working at MTV together.

Cable, thank you for your inspiration, friendship and family.                                

Long live Cable!

Yaneisy Reyes