MTV News is the news production division of MTV. The service is available in the US with localized versions on MTV's global network. In February 2016, MTV Networks confirmed it would refresh the MTV News brand in 2016, to compete with the likes of BuzzFeed and Vice, however by mid-2017 MTV News was significantly downsized due to cutbacks. MTV News content is available from respective MTV websites, Apps, YouTube and on-air. In November 2018, MTV News began producing daily updates on Twitter titled MTV News: You Need To Know. Now titled MTV News Need To Know, the show has evolved to a digital series that covers trending topics from pop culture to social justice issues to electoral politics and beyond. History MTV News began in the late 1980s with the program The Week in Rock, hosted by long time Rolling Stone writer/music critic Kurt Loder, the first official MTV News correspondent. Since 1990, the opening riff to Megadeth's "Peace Sells" has been the main opening theme for The Week in Rock. It first began covering political news in the 1992 American presidential elections, through its "Choose or Lose" campaign. Since then, MTV has run "Choose or Lose" for other presidential elections in the United States. For the 2008 election, Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton appeared on an MTV special to discuss the Iraq war. Throughout the 2000s, MTV News began publishing digital editorial content via their website, Twitter feed, YouTube channel and Facebook page, offering information about MTV programming and music/pop-culture news aggregation. In November 2015, MTV introduced a new direction for its news department and hired Dan Fierman, former editorial director of Grantland, as MTV's editorial director and announced it would produce long-form journalism, think pieces and diversify its staff. However, in June 2017, MTV decided to restructure its news division with a greater focus on video, laying off much of their editorial staff. Later years saw a dramatic decrease in content produced by the outlet for its website or other avenues. MTV News in the U.S. Current and former correspondents MTV News International When MTV launched in Europe it used a variation of MTV News US reports with localized European reporting. Upon regionalization of MTV channels in 1997, MTV begun to localize presenters and reporting depending on the MTV region. Its flagship programming in Europe consisted of a daily news update MTV News Update and a weekly highlights