On Tuesday, July 1, 2014 12:44:04 PM UTC-4, Kevin M. (RPCV) wrote: > > > > To me, it isn't about who the better anchor is. It's about which network > is in the best position to provide on-the-ground coverage of breaking news. > By virtue of the fact NBC news has to provide news coverage to the main > network as well as MSNBC (and, to an extent, Univision), they have a slight > advantage in terms of the budget they can set aside for reporters and > bureaus. Their affiliates have also been the least likely to farm work out > to other cities (I think I read there's now a Fox affiliate in Florida > somewhere whose newscast is produced almost entirely in Maine), so they > have local "talent" to draw from when things occur. > > Prior to the death of Peter Jennings (let's all pause and sigh about that > for a moment), I think ABC did the best job of allocating resources. > Network news did the wraparounds, Nightline provided in-depth analysis, and > 20/20 did investigative (albeit biased) reporting... there was a balance to > it all, and an ability to borrow from each branch as needed. CNN may have > had more experts back then, but they weren't as strategically positioned. > But all that has dramatically changed. I wouldn't trust ABC to tell me the > time of day. > > > Agreed. I was a loyal viewer of ABC News from the Frank Reynolds era until the retirement of Charlie Gibson. Shortly after Diane Sawyer took over, ABC had a big round of cost-cutting where they let several reporters go - including Brian Rooney, who seemed to be in every California city at once. Rooney took an early retirement package, and his job was not filled. When I read that, I realized that ABC was now giving me less news than it used to. So I switched over to Brian Williams, because he works for a network that's able to devote more of its resources to news.
I think ABC did very little to diminish their news-gathering capability in the Jennings/Koppel era. After Jennings died in 2005 and Koppel retired a few months later, things started to slide. -- -- TV or Not TV .... The Smartest (TV) People! You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TV or Not TV" group. To post to this group, send email to tvornottv@googlegroups.com To unsubscribe from this group, send email to tvornottv-unsubscr...@googlegroups.com For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/tvornottv?hl=en --- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "TVorNotTV" group. To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to tvornottv+unsubscr...@googlegroups.com. For more options, visit https://groups.google.com/d/optout.
