Beyonce and Kendrick Lamar at the BET Awards 2016
Beyonce and Kendrick Lamar at the BET Awards 2016

This year’s BET Awards aired tonight across its parents company’s (Viacom) major networks; in addition to BET, the awards show also aired on MTV, VH1, SpikeTV, Comedy Central and even Nickelodeon. Obviously Viacom believes that the show has mainstream blockbuster ratings potential, guaranteeing that it will be accessible to the vast majority of its audience – not just BET’s audience, and certainly not just black audiences.

I’m certainly curious to see how it plays on the non-BET channels, when ratings are released later this week.

It’s worth noting that Viacom has done the same thing for the MTV Awards in the past, so why not the BET Awards as well?




I don’t have cable TV, so I didn’t watch the show, although I followed much of the excitement on Twitter, as I’m sure a lot of you did as well, whether you have cable TV or not. But for those who couldn’t/didn’t watch for whatever reason, I compiled a few of the evenings most tweeted about moments – notable the surprise open featuring Beyonce and Kendrick Lamar, as well as the evening’s tributes to the late Prince, which BET previously bragged would blow you away, especially after the Madonna tribute at the Billboard Music Awards a month ago that many were entirely unimpressed by. So did BET’s tributes come through for you? And while we’re talking about tributes, were you expecting similar honors given to Natalie Cole and Maurice White, who also recently passed (Cole in December; White in February)?

Watch the few clips I was able to put together below, some are better quality than others. I was hoping BET would make them all available on its YouTube channel by now, but that hasn’t happened. So this is what I’ve been able to put together. Some of these may be yanked from the web, because, well, this is what Viacom does. So if you notice any that are suddenly blank, you’ll know why:





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