Sam Donaldson Pronounces Network News Dead

There was also some praise for bloggers along the way. Heh!

"I think it's dead. Sorry," he said during a breakfast panel Tuesday at the National Association of Broadcasters' convention in Las Vegas.  "The monster anchors are through."

"God forbid, if someone shot the President, which network would you turn to? It will be cable, the Internet--something other than General Hospital being interrupted."

Jeff Greenfield and Charles Osgood were also in attendance and less pessimistic on the topic - but not much. They still have to make a living there, after all.

"If  it's dying, it's dying a very slow death," Greenfield said. Although the network news monopoly was "smashed" by cable, broadcast news will redefine itself, thought he didn't yet know how.

The three also agreed that that Internet bloggers have had a generally positive impact on news because mainstream reporters are forced to better verify their information and pare opinions out of their work or face he wrath of scrutinizing critics.

Osgood said the network news can remain competitive with other platforms but must be constantly reevaluated to remain competitive--a fact that makes him glad he's at the tail end of his career rather than the beginning. "It used to be when we wanted to make a show more appealing to more people, the first thing we did was design a new set."

Even though 30 million viewers still turn to networks news each night and garner ratings well above CNN and Fox News, networks news operations long ago lost their role as the sources Americans rely on during time of major breaking news, said Donaldson

From The Business of Television via Drudge.

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Comments

[Pile On®]

Well that does it, I am done blogging it is dead, might as well go turn on the evening news.