CBS and CNN Could Be Making News Together 124
crimeandpunishment writes "More proof of the profound impact cable, the Internet, and other outlets have had on broadcast news organizations. CBS and CNN, who have danced around the idea of a partnership for years, may be ready to move forward. Both news organizations have a lot at stake. Broadcast network news has a gloomy financial outlook, and CNN's ratings need a jump-start."
News (Score:5, Insightful)
Maybe CNN could start reporting actual news instead of relying on their viewers to tweet "interesting" information about the latest celebrity breakups so they can read it out on air.
Re:News (Score:3, Insightful)
When you primarily limit yourselves to news stories that occur within the US it makes it that much more difficult to fill 24 hours with actual news.
Re:News (Score:1, Insightful)
What's also annoying to me is how their Headline News channel seem to be increasingly populated by talk shows.
FWIW - Fox had Rupert Murdoch on the other day as a commentator on the dufus car bombing incident. As if *HE* were some sort of expert on terrorism.
Of course all he did was mouth the same old fear-mongering bullshit, but I have yet to see CNN interview Ted Turner for his expert opinion on anything - gossip or otherwise.
Clone Walter Cronkie from his DNA. (Score:4, Insightful)
Re:CBS news = NNS (Score:3, Insightful)
CNN, time to do *something* (Score:4, Insightful)
A large percentage of the links off the CNN homepage these days are to the ireport web site, and they don't even differentiate them anymore like they used to. As a general rule, I don't care to see amateur news reporting, and this has been one reason I've used CNN less lately. I'd rather have less news but have it be high quality.
Re:News (Score:3, Insightful)
Wait, the C doesn't stand for Celebrity?
I can handle the HLN format, it at least is quick and you know when there is news and when there is fluff based on the time. CNN is to news what MTV is to music videos, sure they have it but it seems to not be the focus. Fox is too flashy and the networks are too slanted to provide reporting. The state of broadcast news has forced many of us to use the internet sources that gather it all up in one area (google news is my primary but I will bounce to Drudge for fun)
Making news by omission (Score:4, Insightful)
When things go wrong, journos are quick to point out that they only report what is happening. That's the academic theory they've been taught, in any case.
Journos "make" news in what they choose to report and not to report. For example, which of the MPAA-controlled U.S. TV news organizations has reported on ACTA?
More To Viewership Losses (Score:1, Insightful)
"More proof of the profound impact cable, the Internet, and other outlets have had on broadcast news organizations..."
The fact that their hard news as well as their editorial/opinion shows/segments have also become increasingly-shameless cheerleaders for the Progressive agenda and the Obama administration has also heavily contributed to their viewership losses as ever-larger numbers of people look elsewhere for more objective sources.
Strat
Good luck to them (Score:5, Insightful)
I hope they succeed at making news by merging, because they sure as hell can't report it. Using the words "journalism" and "CNN" in the same sentence has got to be the oxymoron of the year. And CBS isn't that much better any more.
Re:News (Score:3, Insightful)
There is a lot of news that happends in the United States that can make a good 24 hour plan. However the fact is that CNN is trying to get the most audence. So they are filling it with entertainment flufff. And the meaningless comentaries that just get people routing for them or going online to critize them.
New name? (Score:3, Insightful)
So are they going to call it "CNNBS"?
Re:News (Score:3, Insightful)
Mod Parent/GP UP!
We have CNN in our cafeteria at work, and it sickens me to see nothing but "entertainment news". I really don't give a shit what Paris, Lindsey, Madonna, Brad, J-Lo, and the rest of them had for breakfast.
Until one of these "news" organizations gets it, I'll be reading mine online.
all of these mindlessly negative comments (Score:1, Insightful)
folks:
there was never a fabled era where news media was unbiased or high quality. look up the term "yellow journalism" from a century ago. the spanish american war was started with the "bombing" of the uss maine in havana that was just as much bullshit as iraq's supposed nuclear program. the newspaper "reporting" from a century ago makes fox faux news blatant warmongering agenda look like amateur hour
additionally, there never will be such a thing as unbiased news media. ever. here. in russia. in china. in europe. never, anwyhere
all news media has a bias. GET USED TO IT. accept it, and shut up with the bogus complaints
to criticize news media from a judgment of its bias or not simply means you yourself are hopelessly naive and ignorant about the reality of what news media is or ever could be. furthermore, it presupposes a frightening concept: that, in some magical realm, news media actually somehow could be completely unbiased... which means everyone would trust it implicitly. obviously, complete trust in your news media is far more frightening a concept than the fact news media has some bias
so the solution? get your news FROM VARIOUS SOURCES. read nytimes, bbc, npr, msnbc, cnn, hell even fox news, china daily, and the tehran times:
http://www.tehrantimes.com/ [tehrantimes.com]
its all propaganda, its all biased, every news source you could ever possibly find. the only error you could ever make is trusting one and only one source of news: then you have failed
in this way, you will train yourself to have a good bullshit meter, and you learn to trust nothing. THAT's the only valid and intellectually coherent approach you could ever possibly have to news media, in this lifetime or any other
so please, shut the fuck up with complaints about quality and bias: such a basis for complaints only reveal your own inadequate grasp of the topic: what news media is, and how it should fit into your life
CNN's ratings need a jump-start? (Score:5, Insightful)
That's the problem. CNN cares about ratings. That means they care about the short term at the expense of their reputation as a viable news organization.
Here's a quick fact for all of you TV executives: YOUR RATINGS ARE GOING DOWN BECAUSE PEOPLE HAVE MORE OPTIONS. Quit trying to build this 'one size fits all morons' news channel and start actually reporting news. Hollywood gossip belongs on the Entertainment channel. Quick one-liners and talking heads belong on the Commentary channel. Crazy banners trying to get me all worked up over the world's dumbest terrorist (ya.. that guy from Pakistan recently) belong on the Fear channel. Instead, CNN includes all these things and then calls it the News channel. Seriously? CNN, right now, you are stupider than your audience. You target an audience of stupid people with even stupider content. Even stupid people want to get smarter.
Right now, if you watched CNN all day 24/7, you would not know who your lawmakers are, you would not know which countries are where or what their political system is, understand any non-simplistic political or social situations, understand social and market changes or direction, hear more than a single sentence from a single person at a time without her being interrupted, hear about any real dirt or corruption involved with any affiliated corporation, or understand the real 'world situation.' So, it's entertainment - not news.
And, you talking head assholes (that's pretty much every CNN reporter except Jack Cafferty), IT'S NOT YOUR FUCKING JOB TO SET THE AGENDA FOR THE AMERICAN PEOPLE. Quit trying to tell people how to think. Quit identifying any political candidates as 'non-viable' or 'a longshot' or 'fringe' before you talk about them without letting people decide for themselves. Quit having opinions on everything. Quit being condescending to less educated people trying to make a difference in less affluent areas. Quit fabricating shit out of nothing - If there was a device that people thought was a bomb, but was determined not to be a bomb, don't report that it was a bomb! Quit talking only about buzzword political issues like abortion, gun control, and prayer in schools - like they are the only political problems facing the US. Quit wasting our time.
Re:New name? (Score:3, Insightful)
So are they going to call it "CNNBS"?
That would be appropriate, since CNN has been spewing nothing but BS for years now.
Re:News (Score:3, Insightful)
However, CNN fell to third in ratings behind MSNBC and Fox News, proving that the American public prefer to be spoon-fed biased opinion shows that they know they'll agree with.
I'm sure that's part of it, but speaking for myself I stopped watching CNN because they replaced hard news coverage with gimmicks like iReport, floating pie charts and Star Wars holonet knock offs.
The only serious American television newscast that's left is the PBS Newshour.