• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, January 12, 2007

Advice to TV programmers, networks, and producers: Even if you are hurt and injured, you need to keep running.

This isn't just a metaphor for the TV business.

New research has shown that one of the best things you can do if you are injured is to ice down the injury, take an anti-inflammation drug, and get back on the road.

This appears to be the timely advice for the folks at Viacom and MTV Networks. In two days, three major Viacom executives have left the company.

A day after Gail Berman took a walk as president of Paramount Pictures, Michael Wolf, president/COO of MTV Networks, has departed, after only 15 months on the job, and almost two years to go on his contract. Nicole Browning, president for MTV affiliate sales and marketing, is also leaving.

Daily Varietysays viewer numbers speak for themselves at MTV. The total number of viewers at three of MTV's most visible cable networks has sunk drastically in a year: Nick at Nite is off 21%, Spike TV is down 19% and MTV is off 10%. The three networks were also down by double-digit percentages in adults 18-49 and 25-54.

To some, it would seem MTV should stop, reassess its situation, and then continue. But in this race there's no time to rest by the side of the road, not in today's hotly competitive media world. All this comes in the wake of Viacom chief executive Tom Freston's ouster last year.

New Viacom chief executive Philippe Dauman has made it clear the network will still continue to run, not walk, in playing catch-up to the likes of News Corp. and its overachieving Internet company MySpace, the new darling of young-minded people. MySpace, the company that got away from Viacom, is seemingly blamed for everything gone wrong at MTV Networks.

Back to the running research: It seems that small additional tears in already sore tendons can actually have a physiological benefit for an athlete's health. Exercising when injured (but not severely, like a broken bone), "leads to the production of molecules that heal inflammation," according to The New York Times.

In MTV's case, that could mean working with those suffering new shows. At the very least, MTV Network should at least be cross-training--looking for other avenues while at the same time continuing with its main mission of serving the nation's entertainment-undernourished young.

MTV Network should remember that the race is long--and there's a strong likelihood other companies will bonk.