*By Kristen Lee* MTV may find that reaching younger audiences means cutting the cable cord. The Viacom-owned ($VIA) network has announced it will reboot "The Real World," its pioneering social media franchise that first aired in 1992, on Facebook Watch rather than on cable. Wall Street Journal media reporter Keach Hagey told Cheddar that MTV needs to meet younger audiences on social media platforms Snapchat ($SNAP), Facebook ($FB), and the social media giant's Instagram if the network wants to retain its rep as a youth culture destination. Hagey said the experiment is a smart strategy to court young cord cutters ー who may not even own television sets, let alone watch more traditional broadcast. "In the past, they were trying to not harm the engine of their money, which was cable channels," she said, "and now they realize this is going to be a slow decline, there's nothing we can do about it. Let's jump to the next thing." The "sweet and simple" style of "The Real World" may also be a better fit on social media than on cable, Hagey said. The cable audiences of today are less patient and tend to prefer shows that are "loud, a little trashy, \[and\] really dramatic" to hold their attention through ad breaks, she added. Meanwhile, Viacom's studio Paramount Pictures is making a sequel to Netflix's ($NFLX) rom-com hit "To all the Boys I've Loved Before" directly for the streaming giant. Hagey predicted that this straight-to-streaming approach, which is novel for the Hollywood studio, will happen more frequently as demand for content surges across streaming platforms.

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