while clearly a music video channel, sought to differentiate itself from MTV not just by having a German-speaking voice, but by speaking directly to the differences in pop culture between Germany and the anglophone MTV. Before launching the channel, the labels offered to fund MTV in a German-speaking version but were rejected by MTV management at the time, as it espoused a "one world, one language" programming philosophy (at least for Europe since the Latin American channels used Spanish and Portuguese). On 21 March 1995, a second channel, Viva Zwei ("VIVA Two"), was created, initially a channel for classic music videos which later focused on lesser known and more independently produced music, mostly indie and alternative rock, metal, electronic music and alternative hip hop. However, Viva Zwei was not financially successful, so on 7 January 2002, it was replaced by VIVA Plus, a channel dedicated purely to pop and mainstream music for a younger target audience. Some Viva Zwei formats managed to continue on Viva Plus for some time though, and Fast Forward even got included in the main channel's program. VIVA Plus itself was discontinued on 14 January 2007 and got replaced by Comedy Central Deutschland the next day. Comet Awards Since 1995, VIVA held an annual pop music award ceremony known as the Comet. During the 2003 award ceremonies, VIVA openly expressed an anti-Iraq War view. The awards were last held in 2011. The 2012 awards ceremony was cancelled as Viacom wanted to focus more on the MTV Europe Music Awards instead. In 2013, it got cancelled again. Although the awards were never officially canceled altogether, they weren't held ever since. MTV's response to VIVA After MTV introduced a German-language version of itself in 1997, the competition between the two stations increased. VIVA was widely perceived as the more mainstream-oriented channel for younger viewers, while MTV Germany was directed at youths and young adults with some edgier programming. In 2003, VIVA got bad press after it was discovered that it had given Universal Music an unfair advantage in the placement of their music videos. MTV owner acquires VIVA In 2004, VIVA was acquired by Viacom International, which also owns MTV, thus ending the rivalry between VIVA and MTV and making them start to cooperate instead. After the acquisition of VIVA by Viacom, MTV Germany shifted to mostly broadcasting reality and comedy shows. VIVA became the music channel with