CBS inadvertently made a clever little visual pun for those trying to watch Sarah Palin's speech from last night on itswebsite.
Subversive use of advertising dollars to draw the connection between the Alaskan governor and the black gold under her feet, or just a poorly executed design mishap?
Put your answer in the basket along with two dollars for the Yikes toll, then just drive on through.
David Letterman, the CBS Late Show host who's being bested in the ratings by Nightline, doesn't "know why, after the job Jay [Leno] has done for them, why they would relinquish that."
"They," of course, being NBC, which wanted to badly to hold on to Conan O'Brien they promised him the premiere Late Show spot, effectively ousting Leno — according to everybody — prematurely.
Letterman is speaking to Rolling Stone, supposedly his first real print interview since 1996, and it'd be easy to assume that he's taking a sarcastic cheap shot at his former friend-cum-nemesis, who beat him out for the Johnny Carson slot in 1993, forcing him to the less stellar CBS. The two don't exactly speak anymore, and they sometimes trade barbs. But such is the nature of the tiny world of comedy. And Letterman's comments about Leno don't come across as carpet bombs, but as a genuine olive branch to the only man who arguably makes him try harder at his own job. CONTINUED »
Ah, CBS. We were expecting for Big Brother to not air preacher's son Ollie's homophobic rants that were captured on the live feeds — but during last night's episode, the show completely fabricated the entire scene.
"I feel weirdly more comfortable and relaxed when I'm out of the studio, which is a sanitized environment. You pick up on the energy of your surroundings. . . . It's much more like my old job. I can really loosen up." (That's here, there, on the right doing yoga at HuffPo's Oasis in Denver.) [WaPo, HuffPo]
'Couric's broadcast is starting to make some modest audience gains. In Baltimore, for example, the CBS Evening News grew by about 2.2 ratings points or 28,400 viewers from May 2007 to May 2008. The pattern extends to such other mid-sized markets as San Diego; Hartford, Conn.; New Orleans; Pittsburgh; and Kansas City, Mo. None is New York or Los Angeles, and the gains are not huge, but analysts say that in this era of eroding audiences for all traditional media, a gain of that size in a highly competitive, East Coast market like Baltimore is noteworthy. "Katie Couric is actually getting ratings - there's a headline," says Douglas Gomery, University of Maryland media economist. "But, seriously, CBS and Couric should be pleased. Who wouldn't take an audience gain of 28,400 viewers these days and feel good about it?"' [B-Sun]
Despite what the T-shirt says, Larry Mendte is a criminal. He's even admitted to it. The axed former Philly CBS 3 anchor today pleaded guilty to illegally accessing former co-anchor Alycia Lane's email and spreading around his findings to the gossip columns, all part of a plan to take her down.
Which he masterfully accomplished.
Except by reaching a plea deal with prosecutors, Mendte isn't going to have to pay for it — he's being handed a probation sentence, and isn't required to make any restitution.
And that, say some, isn't fair: CONTINUED »
D.C. gossip sheet Politico got all up in the New York Times derriere when, in reporting on MSNBC, Bill Carter failed to mention his newspaper's relationship with the network. (They've partnered for an irregular political roundtable show.) In scolding the Times, Politico's Michael Calderone then went on to realize his own employer has a partnership with CBS, which he's also failed to disclose.
A funny thing happened on the way to ruining John Edwards reputation: The National Enquirer graduated from slippery checkout aisle gossip trash into a bonafide news source. Sure, the rag has broken legitimate news before — O.J. Simpson, and just recently, Patrick Swayze — but only since its John Edwards coup, where it forced the ex-senator and VP possibility into admitting an affair, has it attracted the respect of the mainstream media. Okay, maybe not respect, but at least the attention. CONTINUED »
How does a cable news anchor who's bathed in gutter water the past couple years try to show she's still hanging in there? By still hanging in there. Katie Couric, the CBS Evening News anchor still seen at 6:30pm every night though you wouldn't know it, will shut down her primetime convention coverage broadcast and pick up where she left off with a live Internet webcast at 11pm. Viewership will be even slimmer, of course — before the best parts are spliced into YouTube clips for everyone to enjoy.
Joe Ahern, the general manager of a CBS O&O station in Chicago, threw himself a 63rd birthday bash, and then demanded his department heads pay for it. [CS-T]
Yikes, America's Sweetheart of Journalism is looking a little bit weathered recently. Could it be a few sleepless nights worrying about her position at CBS? Or is it because the channel's recent decision to switch to HD (despite a whoops moment at launch) makes the anchor look like she's wearing some sort of Katie Couric Halloween mask?
The past several years has seen a boom in HD programming, since higher resolutions not only make television watching more cinematic, but also justify Time Warner's increasing fees. But television is not film, so while Mad Men might look fantastic in HD, and the outline of Michael Phelps' bulge at the Beijing Olympics will be on parade for everyone, not everyone can hold up under the scrutiny of digital broadcasting. Let's zoom in, shall we? CONTINUED »
When CBS televised the 1998 Winter Olympics in Nagano, Japan, some 170 hours of coverage were broadcast over 17 days. When NBC wraps up its coverage of the 2008 Beijing Olympics, it will have broadcast 3,600 hours. [FT]
Since when did Katie Couric find herself in Conan O'Brien territory? Or, actually, when did O'Brien find himself in Couric territory?
The two A-list network faces — she of CBS, he of NBC — find themselves at various ends of their networks' mixed feelings about them.
In the case of O'Brien, NBC promised him Leno's timeslot in 2004, making O'Brien a sweetheart deal to keep him around, or keep him from going to a competitor, and give him the 11:30pm time slot in 2009, when Leno would move on. Now they've got buyer's remorse; in NBC's work to keep Conan, they're ditching Jay, who continues his ratings dominance and has no intention of going quietly into retirement — he'll likely go to another network and compete with NBC.
With Couric, CBS put her in the anchor chair in September 2006, only to watch her ratings sag. What they thought was a sure bet to revamp their news broadcast has turned into a short-lived evening news revolution that's sunk back to standard fare and fewer viewers.
So what if either network wants to go back on their decision? CONTINUED »
Yesterday morning, Joe Scarborough ranted on about a certain cable news anchor who made a big deal about Katie Couric's edited John McCain interview, which, when it aired, cut out the part where he flubbed the timeline of the U.S. troop surge in Iraq. Scarborough wanted to cut CBS a break, because really, who would know the exact dateline of when the troop surge took place and when the Sunni awakening in Al Anbar Province took place. But then who was Scarborough criticizing for making such a big deal out of the story? Fingers began pointing, and the gossip-worthy conclusion that Scarborough was attacking MSNBC colleague Keith Olbermann was built.
Not so!, says Scarborough. In a way that doesn't quite convince us. CONTINUED »
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