Here's Anderson Cooper taking a break from over-analyzing the DNC to uncomfortably chat with HuffPo's Rachel Sklar about his invented Jewish identity. Silver Fox says when he was a kid, he always wanted a bar mitzvah because all the other kids were having them. A few short years later, all the other kids were also having sex with women.
[HuffPo]
The cable nets were fishing for a "buyer's remorse" story last night, and their hook caught something.
Leading up to Hillary Clinton's speech, anchors and pundits were wondering whether the ex-candidate was going to 1) heal and unite the Democratic party; 2) get fully behind Obama; 3) remind Democrats of what could've been. She accomplished all three, and CNN found this Hillary supporter to make the case that after seeing Clinton's speech, some Democrats still aren't behind Obama and wish it would be Clinton heading to the White House. An even better "get," of course, would've been an Obama supporter who listened to Clinton speak last night and suddenly turned to her side, casting off his Obama vote and wishing Clinton had been named the nominee. But we can't make ratings miracles, people.
Fox News just wants to make sure you knows who loves you, baby. The network took out a page in the Chicago Tribune yesterday to print this CNN attack ad, which references the historic Gerald Ford smear campaign.
Despite this, and vocal criticism from the media that CNN's "expansion" project is just another word for cutbacks, the network is doing just fine: Its Biden-Obama announcement coverage on Saturday was 137 percent ahead of Fox in the ratings, and with 743,000 viewers in the coveted 25-54 demographic, was the highest-rated hour on cable.
A difficult feat, considering Fox won the lottery to provide all the raw footage from the DNC to the other networks. This is one of those scenarios where the numbers speak for themselves; flies, honey, vinegar, and all that.
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When it comes to finding a cable news bar to drink at while "reporting" from Denver, there are, like the cable news offerings, options for liberals, conservatives, and people with no opinion whatsoever. [Gawker]
Despite its attempt to spin things another way, CNN is, like most American news organizations, in some financial trouble. But what the Olympics did for NBC, CNN is hoping the national conventions will do for them.
That's why, despite belt tightening, CNN is gambling $100K on a specialty camera that can capture a bird's-eye-view for the Denver DNC this week. Skycam is an aerial camera that is accessed on remote-controls, and is mounted on wires that will criss-cross the top of the Invesco Field where Barack Obama will accept his party's nomination. (Other networks eventually agreed to split the cost of the cam, after realizing their own coverage would look completely amateur by comparison.)
The clever device is typical for a giant sports event like the Super Bowl, but a little odd for political coverage. The pay-off, though, might be worth it: Obama's acceptance will coincide with the 45th anniversary of Dr. Martin Luther King's "I Have a Dream" speech, only adding to the expected ratings bonanza.
There were no Skycams back in MLK's time, however, and you have to wonder about the decision to spend that kind of money when you might be better off just hiring some better TV execs who understand the concept of subtly when introducing a gimmicky PR stunt: CONTINUED »
Congratulations, CNN! Thanks to your contention that gay marriage isn't real marriage — even though California agreed it is — you've slung yourself into the same category as the right-wing American Family News Network.
This week we brought your attention to CNN's placement of "marries" in quotation marks in a headline about Ellen DeGeneres and Portia De Rossi getting married.
Know who also likes to put the gay version of marriage in quotes? OneNewsNow.com, the Christian-focused conservative site that the AFNN runs. CONTINUED »
CNN's "expansion" program, which they've heralded by introducing all-platform journalists (read: less than bloggers), actually involves cutting staff and headquarters. Crazy, huh? The Chicago HQ will be closed, and the journalists there will answer to the LA office. Likewise, CNN staff in Dallas will answer to their Atlanta office. Which makes tons of sense, even though "Chicago is closer to Atlanta and farther from Los Angeles than Dallas is." You have to give props for ingenuity though; by calling their cut-backs "expansions," CNN is trying to reassure Time Warner shareholders, and media onlookers like us, during a particularly trick time in the news where everybody is forced to cut staff, yet the upcoming elections require a more constant news cycle. The solution? These all-platform journalists will work for basically pennies just to see their name on the screen, even if it means working by yourself as the only CNN operative in Boise, ID.
It's as if Lou Dobbs is writing the website's "news" headlines. [CD]
Just when you thought you had licked the cyber-terrorists that were ruining Facebook (MySpace is a lost cause now), you are hit by these bastards in your very home(page). A spambot called Rustock has been flooding inboxes with what appears to be CNN's top stories of the week. When people got wise to that ruse, the virus morphed from fake headlines at CNN to fake headlines at MSNBC. You will recognize these spam headlines because they are equally as sensational, but namecheck Michael Phelps.
It's so easy to find mean things to say about CNN, though they do open themselves up wide for it. But there's one thing we're kind of loving about the network, and that's its (new?) Backstory feature. Trying to research Bruce Ivins death but not sure about when that post-9/11 anthrax scare started or who received tainted envelopes? CNN's website offers a slideshow panel of the articles leading up to present day — a veritable visual Lexis search of on-going developing stories.
Of course, finding the Backstory on the John Edwards love child scandal might be a little tougher, because, ya know, CNN is kinda just getting on that.
CNN has plans to supplement their staff with non-traditional (read: not real) reporters, who will gather all their newsiest news armed only with a laptop and their bookmarks to The Drudge Report. Typically we call these people bloggers, but what do we know, we would never have called Richard Quest a reporter either and apparently he is.
CONTINUED »
Remember when CNN's Jack Cafferty calling the Chinese "thugs" and "goons," spent a week clarifying his statements — he was talking about the government, not the Chinese people — and then, like Sharon Stone, got slapped with a lawsuit wanting more than $1 billion in damages? It was an incident that the cable network hoped would live and die in April. And it should have. But then the Olympics happened, and CNN had to send correspondents to Beijing to, like, cover it and stuff. But while the media may have moved on to more substantial scandals, the Chinese have not. Which is why it sucks to work for CNN while working in China right now. CONTINUED »
If you're among the 11 people paying attention to Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank leaving MSNBC for CNN, then these are the facts you know so far — and let's put facts in quotes, like this: "facts" — Milbank penned a Post piece that wasn't too Obama friendly; because of the article, he got slammed by the web ring of left-ys who said his reporting was, at best, lax, and that he took quotes out of context; after four years of MSNBC appearances, he suddenly showed up on CNN opposite Keith Olbermann's Countdown program; Obama-lover Olbermann explained in a Daily Kos blog post that MSNBC had been "waiting for [Milbank] to offer a correction or an explanation for his column," which never arrived, before letting him back on the air; and lastly, Milbank announced he inked a deal with CNN.
Except maybe that's not exactly how the "facts" went down? CONTINUED »
CNN anchor Anderson Cooper told Gossip Girl Blake Lively she “smells good,” while co-hosting Regis & Kelly today. He sort of looked like he wanted to touch her hair, but then managed to restrain himself to have some girl talk about shoes, diamonds, Willy Wonka and other such things.
Countdown regular Dana Milbank will no longer appear on the show. After appearing on MSNBC for the past four years, the Washington Post columnist signed a deal with CNN. Last night he appeared on CNN Election Center with Campbell Brown, which airs opposite Keith Olbermann's show. Of course none of this had anything to do with MSNBC temporarily ejecting Milbank after he wrote a piece about Barack Obama that took quotes out of context and called the candidate the Democratic party's "presumptuous nominee." [Daily Kos]
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