Merry Christmas from all of us here at 80swerethebest.com. We hope you and your family have a great holiday and happy and healthy new year! Looking forward to bringing you even more 80′s music, news, and nostalgia in 2012!

MTV turns 30 today and what can we say… is it even about music videos anymore? All they have really is reality-based programming now. Take a look at Gawker’s take on MTV’s evolution.

Michael Jackson is apparently not only the King of Pop, but also the King of Auctions too. The famous red and black leather jacket from the “Thriller” video brought in a whopping $1.8 million. Now that’s zombie-like!

Something that we’ve long said on this site – the 80′s were not then, but more of NOW. A recent article I read in DC completed a full study on the similarities we share now in the 2000′s and 2010′s with the 80′s. Definitely worth the read. Here are some excerpts from the full Washington Post Article :

…the 1980s are our very own Six Degrees of Kevin Bacon game: Everything defining today’s politics seems connected to that decade…

…In the 1980s, children didn’t see “E.T.” just in a movie theater — we saw that anti-government parable about kids fleeing faceless, jack-booted federal agents in our Atari cassettes, Happy Meals, board games, action-figure sets and Reese’s Pieces wrappers…

…History may not have ended, but we are stuck in a loop, our Walkmen endlessly rewinding and restarting the soundtrack to a movie we’ve seen too many times. It’s time to turn it off — or at least to recognize that it’s still playing…

What are your thoughts??

Most will remember him as Arnold Jackson on “Diff’rent Strokes” in the late 1970s and early 1980s, but others may recall Gary Coleman’s life after the show which included years of financial, legal, and health troubles. Coleman died last week at the age of 42 from a brain hemorrhage. Easy Rider Dennis Hopper also passed last week at the age of 74 from prostate cancer. He earned an Oscar nomination in 1986 for his role in “Hoosiers,” in which he played an alcoholic basketball team manager. That same year, he received critical acclaim for his performance in David Lynch’s “Blue Velvet.” Rue McClanahan, Golden Girl herself, died yesterday at 76 from a brain hemorrhage. Golden Girls seized the #1 rating its first night, in 1985, stayed in the top 10 for 6 seasons and captured ton of Emmys. It’s a sad month in Hollywood that’s for sure. RIP…

Gary Coleman

Dennis Hopper

Rue McClanahan