how would you fix 24-hour cable news?

[wedgewood]

I can't stand it anymore. All three networks suck in their own way. How many times do you flip over to MSNBC, eager to catch up on some world events, and freaking John Siegenthaler is doing some hourlong special on serial killers or prison sex?

Fox has one legitimate hour blocked off for what could pass for straight news, and that's Brit Hume. I'm not a fan of Fox by any means, but that's the one show I can watch and not feel dumber for doing so.
The rest of it is O'Reilly making light of child molestation, Chuck Norris filling in for Sean Hannity, and oh Christ, Greta Van Vin Scully, who God knows how long will lead every night with this Anna Nicole horse****. I guess until Britney OD's on coke while eating out Paris.

CNN is equally unwatchable. Every time I hear that voice, I want to jump inside my screen and kick Wolf Blitzer in the scrotum. He just takes me there. He reminds me of that shaky principal on Beavis and Butt-head, as if he's gonna diarrhea all over himself at any second. 'Let's check in with Dana Bash at the Capitol and watch her blink 287 times in a 45-second segment.' Yuck.
Then we get those two guys from the Muppets that sit on the balcony and ***** about everything, Lou Dobbs and Jack Cafferty. When did this happen to Lou Dobbs? He used to be the boring old business guy, but now he's on this mission to be a bigger loudmouth douche than O'Reilly.
And then of course there's Larry King. Where else could John Mark Karr or Miss Nevada milk every last drop out of their 15-minutes of fame?
Lastly, I hope whoever had the idea for this Headline News makeover gets fired. I think we're all dumber for the Glen Beck/Nancy Grace hour.

I don't hate everything. I like Olbermann because he makes me laugh. But half of his show is dedicated to making fun of O'Reilly, and it is pretty juvenile. Everything else on MSNBC is pure ****e.

OK, enough bitching. What would you do to fix cable news? Or do you think it needs fixing? Say you were hired as CEO of NBN (the No Bull**** News network, the new 24-hour cable outlet to take on the other three.) You're given free rein to hire whomever you want, producers, on air talent, etc. What would your vision be for the 24-hour news cycle and what would do to compete with the others? Would you open bureaus all over the world, focus on Iraq, or run six hours of Anna Nicole?

 

[PressBoxJunky]

Porn clips & snippets. On the 2's.

 

[Rufino]

Greta Van Vin Scully, who God knows how long will lead every night with this Anna Nicole horse****. I guess until Britney OD's on coke while eating out Paris.

So that's Thursday, then?

 

[tyler durden 71351]

If I ran NBS....I would do what CNN was doing 10-15 years ago. I would have some real people with gravitas handling the news in the middle of the day and at night. I would throw a ton of money at Charlie Rose, give him the primetime spot and tell him to do exactly what he does on PBS. I would do a lot of "60 Minutes" and "Frontline" style documentaries on the weekends. I would hire people because they were smart and competent, not because they were "shocking" Mainly, I would try to avoid the trap of following tabloid **** because it ate up time...my attitude would be to present the things that the typical American need to know about in a decent summary.
Of course, this would fail miserably, and I would get destroyed every day in the ratings until NBS went the way of the Edsel.

 

[NoOneLikesUs]

Fox's new show called Red Eye is the worst thing on TV by a country mile. I'd get rid of that.

 

[zeke12]

ATM on the 8's.

Only way to salvage their dignity.

 

[pallister]

Follow ESPN's lead. Writers on TV. Yeah!

 

[leo1]

great topic. books have been written about this so it's not easy to fix.

the fundamental problem with 'fixing' it is that better news and higher overall quality might not equate to better ratings, so the balance has to be drawn somewhere.

my ideas are more documentaries, more local news - smaller stories other than iraq - so long as they are kept in perspective and not turned into a massive national story and less of the inane rantings of side A and side B in which it's presented as fact that there are only two sides of an issue and that's that. (or on fox one is clearly correct and the other is wrong).

presenting all issues as a dichotomy of two opinions is an insidious problem that TV news created - and newspapers don't help solve - that has moved well past TV news. when just about all experts know terri schiavo was in a persistent vegetative state but a total of 17 or so (qualified) people in the entire world claim otherwise, we don't have a difference of opinion. we have fact and then 17 cranks. but the way TV news presents it, it's as though there are two sides to the issue. this polarization on TV makes the polarization seem real in real life. this is a problem.

 

[sportschick]

Ban all coverage of pretty white women who are dead or in peril.

 

[Mystery_Meat]

Strong, smart morning show aimed at Today-heads. Old school CNN Headline News (not today's bull****) during the midday. Obviously a good business hour or two after the bell. Evening of thoughtful, smart analysis shows. More CNN Headline News for the overnight. A lot of what Tyler_Durden proposes. There's a niche for News Hour/NPR-style news coverage on TV. MSNBC should try to fill it, because Fox and CNN aren't making big changes, and there's little room at the inn for a fifth 24-hour news channel.

 

[Mystery_Meat]

Ban all coverage of pretty white women who are dead or in peril.

So we can still cover your kidnapping? </pleasedon'tkillme>

 

[sportschick]

Ban all coverage of pretty white women who are dead or in peril.

So we can still cover your kidnapping? </pleasedon'tkillme>

Dead. To. Me!!!!!

Seriously though, that's why I quit watching the 24-hour news channels. The constant coverage of Chandre Levi just pissed me off to no end.

 

[JackS]

The rest of it is O'Reilly making light of child molestation.

Making light? Exploiting for ratings, maybe, but certainly not "making light." He takes the child molesting more seriously than anybody on TV. He basically wants to hang child molesters by their nuts.

As for the question at hand, there is no way to "fix" 24 hour cable news. The ratings are bad enough as it is. Ratings for "NBN" would be in C-SPAN range or lower.

I will say this though. I think CNBC and MSNBC should merge, with the business stuff all day and as many good talking heads as you can get at night. That would probably be the news channel with the most potential.

 

[beardown]

There really needs to be an hour-long "issues" broadcast every night similar to 60 Minutes. Take about 15 minutes of good reporting, 20 minutes of analysis and ther rest of the show for phone calls. Kind of like an expanded version of "Between the Lines." I will give ESPN credit for that one.

We suck at any international reporting not connected to Iraq. We completely have missed the boat on Russia's resurgence, and unless there's a bombing somewhere, we wouldn't know where Europe is on the map. Business reporting is horrible. Little to no depth on Washington reporting, just speculating on the next election cycle.

It's basically, let's beat the ****e out of a hot button topic and then go to the next one. It's shallow at best. Unfortunately, that's what our society has become.

 

[Clerk Typist]

BBC World is solid. The usual format is a half-hour of hard news (00 to 30), followed by a half-hour interview, or documentary, or magazine show. Sometimes it's two 15-minute segments, especially during London business hours. World weather the last few minutes of each half-hour. Breaking news appears to really be news, as well.

 

[IGotQuestions]

Agreed, clerk typist - I'd fix 24-hours news by canceling all those shows and only allowing BBC on air, maybe commission BBC to have a BBC U.S. format.

 

[SportsDude]

Get rid of 24 hour news. We didn't need it 30 years ago. If they had enough to fill their cycles, we wouldn't be subjected to 'missing white girl of the month,' Jonbenet and the rest of the tabloid crap.

 

[Ike Broflovski]

The problem with 24-hour news is that these networks don't have the money or manpower to truly fill 24 hours with news, so everything looks stretched out and tarted up.

 

[scribe21]

focus on the issues instead of trying to make the issues. ... reporting the news and doing both sides of it. I always thought as journalists, we cover both sides. There were no liberal or conservative. CNN bugs me to death with their liberal views. FOX is sometimes too conservative. Can't we have a middle ground? To me that would be a great way to innovate news on television? What do you think?

 

[wickedwritah]

Whoever said that there's nowhere near enough news to fill up 24 hours, they're darn right.

CNN was at its best 10 years ago, when it was balanced -- Moneyline, before Lou Dobbs decided to rant on border safety **** 24/7, was a really good business news show. Late-night hours were filled with sports stuff, which provided fresh material and allowed a different audience to be exposed to the network. CNN Headline News also was wicked good, too, in the sense that you knew when what was coming up. Want stocks? Tune in at :15 and :45. Want sports? Tune in at :20 and :50.

But, as someone else said, it's all about ratings. Think any of these companies care about quality of product? The post-9/11 gravitas dissipated, quickly.