Fresh off her amazing performance at the Super Bowl, BET announced Monday that Beyoncé would be the headliner for the BET Experience at L.A. Live in June.

Beyonce’s performance is the first stop of the North American leg of the Mrs. Carter Show World Tour. Comedian Mike Epps, Erykah Badu, The Roots, Kendrick Lamar, Snoop Dogg, Miguel, Schoolboy Q, Kirk Franklin, R. Kelly, New Edition and The Jacksons (MJ on hologram?) will also perform between Staples Center and Club Nokia from June 28-30. The weekend concludes with 2013 BET Awards from the Nokia Theatre on June 30.

Read more

With the 2012 BET Awards in the books, the cable network has already turned their attention to next year’s show — a three-day celebration at L.A. Live in partnership with AEG.

The BET Experience at L.A. Live will take place June 28-30, 2013. According to the press release, attendees at the BET Experience ”will enjoy great performances, participate in TV show tapings, attend thought provoking seminars, interact with sponsor exhibits and connect with their favorite BET programs.” Staples Center will host three nights of megastar concerts as well.  Read more

Rihanna‘s been taking plenty of heat for her new music video, in which the singer portrays a rape victim who kills her attacker. Outraged media watchdog groups have gone so far as to demand the video be banned. But media outlets remain largely unmoved by the hysteria.

BET premiered the video last week and has refused to stop airing it. The network issued a statement in response to the controversy:

BET Networks has a comprehensive set of standards and guidelines that are applied to all of our content. The Rihanna “Man Down” video complied with these guidelines and was approved for air.

MTV has not yet aired the video, but noted on the MTV.com blog that their “Facebook poll asking whether the video goes too far had the “no” votes leading the “yes” votes by a margin of three-to-one.”
Read more

Hot Network Mess: Reporter Greg Braxton describes how far BET has to go to undo its image as a bad-taste maker in the black community.

What’s It Worth? Columnist Patrick Goldstein has a great piece today about the randomness of the price of anything these days (which you can read, for free, online). Apparently the writers’ strike has Goldstein in an economic existential crisis. It makes for a good read (again, for free).

Do You Yahoo? The company that isn’t Google is busy plotting for world domination in its Santa Monica office. And Scott Moore, a senior vice president who is now in charge of all Southern California-based projects, is apparently the guy who is going to lead the attack. Except … wasn’t that what Lloyd Braun was supposed to do?