Was Mike Nesmith compensated financially when MTV became successful?

[TMC]

Since it’s said that he was responsible for the idea of a 24 hour video music channel.

[PracTz]

I'm not sure MTV would agree with Mr. Nesmith on that.

If he WAS compensated, it sure wasn't enough for him to decide to never produce more music or tour again.

[Zoneboy]

He was definitely responsible for the 24 hour music video channel. This has been common knowledge for years.

[Duster76]

There were several early experiments in music video programming Bruce Morrow and Murray the K hosted specials in the 1960's that featured performances of top hits of the day. Some of the folks visiting this site may remember the most ambitious forerunner of MTV called "The Now Explosion" hosted by "Skinny" Bobby Harper:

"The Now Explosion was an early experiment in music video produced in Atlanta, Georgia in 1970, more than a decade before MTV was launched. The program was televised in Atlanta on WATL-TV and, later, WTCG-TV (later WTBS-TV, now WPCH-TV). In 1970, The Now Explosion began its first regular broadcasts on Atlanta's WATL-TV, where it aired 28 hours each weekend. By this time, the show was produced at WATL's studios."

The programming ran on other stations in different parts of the country (they had it in my market). So with respect to Mike Nesmith he was far from the first.

[TMC]

From Wiki:

During this time, Nesmith created a video clip for "Rio" (not the Duran Duran song), which helped spur Nesmith's creation of a television program called PopClips for the Nickelodeon cable network. In 1980, PopClips was sold to the Time Warner/Amex consortium. Time Warner/Amex developed PopClips into the MTV network.

Nesmith won the first Grammy Award given for (long-form) Music Video in 1982 for his hour-long Elephant Parts.

He also had a short-lived series (1984-5) on NBC inspired by the video called Michael Nesmith in Television Parts. Television Parts included many other artists who were unknown at the time, but went on to become major stars in their own right: Jay Leno, Jerry Seinfeld, Garry Shandling, Whoopi Goldberg, and Arsenio Hall. The concept of the show was to have comics render their stand-up routines into short comedy films much like the ones in Elephant Parts. Nesmith assembled writers Jack Handey, William Martin, John Levenstein, and Michael Kaplan, along with directors William Dear (who had directed Elephant Parts) and Alan Myerson, as well as producer Ward Sylvester to create the show. The half-hour show ran for eight episodes in the summer of 1985 on NBC Thursday nights in prime time.

Nesmith formed the Pacific Arts Corporation, Inc. in 1974 to manage and develop media projects. Pacific Arts Video became a pioneer in the home video market, producing and distributing a wide variety of videotaped programs, although the company eventually ceased operations after an acrimonious contract dispute with PBS over home video licensing rights and payments for several series, including Ken Burns' The Civil War.

The dispute escalated into a lawsuit that went to jury trial in federal court in Los Angeles. On February 3, 1999, a jury awarded Nesmith and his company Pacific Arts $48.875 million in compensatory and punitive damages, prompting his widely quoted comment, "It's like finding your grandmother stealing your stereo. You're happy to get your stereo back, but it's sad to find out your grandmother is a thief." PBS appealed the ruling, but the appeal never reached court and a settlement was reached, with the amount paid to Pacific Arts and Nesmith kept confidential.

Nesmith's most recent Pacific Arts project was Videoranch 3D, a virtual environment on the internet that hosted live performances at various virtual venues inside the ranch. He performed live inside Videoranch 3D on May 25, 2009."

Pacific Arts was also involved in the Pee Wee Herman TV series.