We’ll Return To The Tragedy In Oklahoma And Our A List Team Of Crack Reporters In A Bit…Now Here’s Jodi…

This morning saw CNN put its A team on the ground to cover Oklahoma’s tornado damage. There were Chris Cuomo and John Berman doing marathon shifts from the scene. Almost all of CNN’s morning programming originated out of Oklahoma. Brooke Baldwin cut short her vacation to head to Oklahoma. Anderson Cooper is in Oklahoma.

CNN wants to emphasize big news and a natural disaster is as big as it gets. So it’s only natural to go wall to wall with your A Team because that’s what viewers want. That’s what viewers expect.

So of course CNN made sure that momentum didn’t last by bailing on Oklahoma to cover Jodi Arias addressing the court pleading for her life.

Yes, you read that right. CNN abandoned its mission, its duty, and Oklahoma in order to cover Jodi Arias.

MSNBC, which can’t get a breaking news rating to save its life these days, stuck with Oklahoma and its team in the field. FNC stuck with Oklahoma and its team in the field. CNN gave its team in the field a breather.

But CNN just had to cover Arias. CNN has been spending a lot of time in the courtroom lately. One day last week the network spent nearly the first 45 minutes of its 11am ET hour covering Arias and OJ in successive alternating segments. They have Ashleigh Banfield putting down roots in Arizona. I mean it’s not like there isn’t another network in the Time Warner empire available to cover Arias so this is all perfectly understandable. Oh wait…

If this wasn’t so sad it would be funny…the kind of thing one would expect to see spoofed on SNL. Apparently nothing must disrupt CNN in its quest for the sensational. It’s almost like the Postal Service’s slogan:

Neither snow nor rain nor heat nor gloom of night nor dozens dead in Oklahoma stays this network from the swift coverage of Jodi Arias.

April Numbers: CNN Digital…

CNN Digital is noting its April numbers…

Record-Breaking April for CNN Digital

CNN.com Takes Top Spot for Breaking News

As the events in Boston unfolded last month, the world turned to CNN on air, online and on the go. Topping every news and information competitor, CNN Digital posted its most trafficked week (536 mm page views) and story in history (87 mm page views, source: Adobe SiteCatalyst). April also marked CNN.com’s second highest month on record for global video starts (162.5mm) and the narrowest margin (15%) ever between the CNN Digital Network and combined Yahoo!-ABC News rollup in unique visitors. A record-breaking month for CNN, April highlights include:

#1 Site for Breaking News

Throughout the week of the Boston manhunt, CNN.com was the most trafficked news and information site online, topping Yahoo! News with an all-time high of 536 million page views:

Zoraid Sambolin Announces Breast Cancer Diagnosis…To Undergo Surgery…

Reuters’ Ian Simpson writes about Zoraida Sambolin announcing this morning that she has breast cancer…

Sambolin, who anchors CNN’s “Early Start” morning show, discussed her condition on the show while talking about Jolie’s preventive double mastectomy.

“I struggled for weeks trying to figure out how tell you that I had been diagnosed with breast cancer and was leaving to have surgery,” Sambolin, 47, said in a posting to her Facebook page. “Then .. Angelina Jolie shares her story of a double mastectomy and gives me strength and an opening.”

Sambolin told viewers she was scheduled to have the surgery on May 28.

Chris Cuomo Interview…

The New York Daily News’ Rachel Rosenblit and Don Kaplan have an interview with Chris Cuomo…

“If you want to get involved in controversy and if you want to be involved with news cycles, you can’t be shy. Controversy invites passion and big opinions. Amanda Knox is a hugely volatile case; that’s why it’s been covered the way it has been,” he said.

“I was brought in [to CNN] to have a much more central role. I was always on the team [at ABC]. But I’m a bigger part here. And that was part of the attraction for me. As you get better at this you want to have more influence if you can.”

Cuomo added he’s had some trouble adjusting to his new role at CNN.

“There have been huge growing pains,” he said.

CNN’s New “New Day” Promos…

Newscast Studio has CNN’s new “New Day” promo…

Jeff Zucker on CNN’s “New Day”

Yes, I’m late getting to this. Work swamped me yesterday. The Huffington Post’s Katherine Fung writes about CNN’s presser yesterday for it’s upcoming “New Day” morning program…

He added that the lesson he took from the Curry fiasco at “Today” was that chemistry between co-hosts is the key ingredient to a successful show. He said he had tested Cuomo opposite five different anchors before settling on Bolduan.

“When we put Kate next to Chris, you just knew and [the chemistry] was there and as it unfolded, you saw it,” he said. “And I’ll tell you about the first time I met Michaela. I was like ‘Holy shit, where have you been?’”

Zucker confirmed reports that he had talked to Erin Burnett about moving to mornings, but said they were unable to hammer out a deal. “I had two conversations with Erin about the morning and in the end we both decided that it was probably more important for her and more important for the network for her to stay where she is at 7,” he explained. Burnett also “preferred” not to wake up so early, he added.

As for the format of “New Day,” senior executive producer Jim Murphy said viewers can expect a “super newsy” show, but one that is “looser, a bit more fun, and hopefully a bit more interesting” than what he said CNN has been known for in the past.

CNN Teams Up With Robert Redford On New Series…

CNN announced that it will air a new series EP’d by Sundance Productions’ Robert Redford and Laura Michalchyshyn…

CNN to Launch New Original Series, CHICAGOLAND, With Executive Producer Robert Redford in 2014

Sundance Productions’ CHICAGOLAND is produced by BCTV ‘Brick City’ filmmakers Marc Levin and Mark Benjamin

Executive produced by Robert Redford and Laura Michalchyshyn of Sundance Productions, and award-winning filmmakers Marc Levin and Mark Benjamin of BCTV, CHICAGOLAND is a non-scripted, eight-part original series about a heartland American city. It is as authentic an American city as there is, and the series will explore where politics and policy meet real people’s lives – in a city generating change and innovation in social policy, education, and public safety – to meet national and local challenges.

Beginning in early 2014, viewers will watch the riveting, real-life drama of a city looking to unite at this critical moment in the city’s history. In the aftermath of a countrywide economic collapse, Chicago faces the challenges of improving its public education system, and neighborhood and youth safety. Can the city’s leaders, communities, and residents come together in ways that expand opportunities and allow aspirations to be realized?

Bart Feder Out At CNN

And the Jeff Zucker installed executive revolving door continues. The latest casualty: Bart Feder. TVNewser’s Alex Weprin has the scoop…

CNN senior VP of current programming Bart Feder is leaving the cable news channel, TVNewser has learned. His last day at the company will be May 24.

The New CNN…

The Wrap’s Jethro Nededog writes about the new CNN under Jeff Zucker. Most of it’s pretty conventional fare. But what is going to have some kibitzers going is who is the anonymous high ranking MSNBC executive who decided to stay in the shadows and lob bombs? I have my guesses. Do you have yours?

Critics and the online media were harsh about the “poop ship” coverage.

But Stephen Battaglio, TV Guide Magazine’s business editor who wrote a book about the “Today” show called “From Yesterday to Today,” says CNN “didn’t do it at the expense of news that would be deemed more important.”

But others would disagree. “Some things they do stupidly, like the ship, that was ridiculous,” the MSNBC executive said.

In its defense, a CNN executive said that the network’s coverage of the cruise ship led to some of its highest ratings, so clearly its audience was interested in the story.

Target: Howard Kurtz

Ohhh…the long knives are out for Howard Kurtz now. Politico’s Dylan Byers and Katie Glueck write about Kurtz…and yet manage to do so without talking to long time Kurtz nemises Eric Alterman and Mickey Kaus…

“People here have been groaning about Howie for years,” a source at CNN said. “He’s like the Dick Morris of media critics — just shoddy and out of the game.”

But perhaps the main factor that led Kurtz out the door, several sources said, was the same quality that had fueled his rise in the first place decades ago: a hyperactive work ethic that ended up dividing his attentions and ultimately proved unsustainable.

“It became clear to folks here that Howie had a lot of other commitments, and that that wasn’t working,” a Daily Beast source said.

On Twitter, some reporters criticized Kurtz for his sloppy errors. Josh Barro of Bloomberg wrote, “Between Dick Morris and Howard Kurtz, we’re seeing a dangerous trend where commentators lose their jobs for being bad at them.” Brian Beutler at Talking Points Memo said: “cc: H Kurtz RT @Pontifex My thoughts turn to all who are unemployed, often as a result of a self-centred mindset bent on profit at any cost.” And Dan Froomkin of the Huffington Post tweeted, “Read @kurteichenwald on how Howard Kurtz’s biggest mistake wasn’t writing drivel, it was lacking empathy.”

Carol Costello Robbed…

Costello wrote on her Facebook page this morning that she got mugged and robbed yesterday…

Good Morning. In retrospect, what happened to me yesterday is insignificant in light of what happened in the Boston.
Still, I feel the need to vent. And isn’t that what friends are for?
I was robbed.
And I am angry.
I was walking down a beautiful, leafy Atlanta street, talking on my IPhone.
Guess what happened next?
Three teenagers ran up behind me. One of them grabbed my IPhone. Stupidly I struggled to hold on-to it. But, he was a big guy. And he pulled out a chunk my hair.
I let go.
As he ran down the street, laughing, I hurled a few expletives his way.
I felt no fear at the time, I was just angry. Now I’m angry, shaken and sad. What a lousy life those kids have ahead of them.

Howard Kurtz “Under Review” at CNN?

The Wrap’s Sharon Waxman reports that CNN is reviewing Howard Kurtz’s Daily Beast gaffe from earlier in the week…

Howard Kurtz and his weekly “Reliable Sources” media talk show are under review after his firing from The Daily Beast over erroneous reporting, a CNN spokeswoman told TheWrap on Thursday.

“We are reviewing it,” the spokeswoman told TheWrap.

Kurtz has long been one of the most respected media critics in the country. He spent 29 years at the Washington Post before being lured to run the Daily Beast’s Washington bureau. CNN has aired the show on media since 1992 and Kurtz has hosted it since 1998.

But the show has had its critics, and Kurtz is vulnerable after erroneously reporting in the Beast that gay basketball player Jason Collins “didn’t come clean” about the fact that he had been engaged, and later amended his post to say that Collins “downplayed” the engagement.

My prediction: Nothing comes of this review. This based on the fact that CNN stood by Fareed Zakaria last year after far more serious plagiarism charges were leveled at him. How can CNN possibly drop Kurtz over this comparatively less significant incident when it set the bar so high with Zakaria, without having everyone revisit the Zakaria incident and the apparent double standard that will be underscored? My read is CNN can’t do it and won’t do it.

April Numbers: CNN

CNN is noting its April ratings…

CNN HAS BEST RATINGS MONTH SINCE NOVEMBER 2012

CNN Shows Most Growth of All Cable News Nets and Now Ranks #2 Year-to-Date

CNN Tops MSNBC in Key Dayparts for the First Time in Over a Year; MSNBC Slips to 4 th

April 2013 is CNN Digital’s Most Trafficked Month in History; Network Breaks Records with1.8+ Billion Page Views

During a month that saw breaking news and extended coverage from Boston, CNN had its best total day (6a-6a) delivery among total viewers and the demo 25-54 since November 2012 and posted double and triple-digit increases vs. a year ago in total day and M-F/M-Su prime in both total viewers and the key demo 25-54. April marks the first time CNN has outdelivered MSNBC in total viewers and the key demo 25-54 in more than a year (March 2011) in total day and in prime. MSNBC also slips to 4 th place (behind HLN) in total day, the morning, daytime (9a-5p), 6p, 7p and 8p in the key demo 25-54. CNN is now topping MSNBC year-to-date in total day– ranking second among the cable news networks in total viewers and 25-54.

April network highlights (thru April 28):

CNN Gives New Morning Show A Name….

CNN gave its new morning show a name today…one that will be open to much abuse by rival PR departments and creative headline writers if things don’t start off well.

It’s a “New Day” at CNN

“New Day” with Chris Cuomo, Kate Bolduan and Michaela Pereira Will Air Weekdays from

6-9 am, Beginning June 10 th

“Early Start with John Berman & Zoraida Sambolin” Will Air from 5-6 am

CNN announced today that its new morning show will be called “New Day.”

Kate Bolduan, with Michaela Pereira as news anchor, the program will launch Monday, June 10 th . It will broadcast live from CNN’s studios in New York City and air weekdays from 6-9 am ET. As was previously announced, Jim Murphy is the senior executive producer and Matt Frucci is the executive producer of “New Day.” CNN’s John Berman and Zoraida Sambolin will continue to anchor “Early Start” from 5-6 am

Since joining CNN a few months ago, Cuomo has helped lead coverage on all major news stories, including the Boston attacks, papal conclave, State of the Union address and Christopher Dorner pursuit. The award-winning anchor and correspondent came from ABC News where he anchored “20/20” and

Randi Kaye Off Of Weekend Anchoring?

CNN’s Randi Kaye put out a tweet over last Thursday which suggests she’s no longer going to be anchoring weekend mornings…

back reporting full time for @ac360. #lovingit

No Kidding…

“No one’s really written a great story about what happened,” he said. “It seems like [Erin] was unwilling to move from the evenings to the mornings.”

- Brian Stelter on HuffPost Live today regarding CNN’s aborted attempt to bring Erin Burnett to mornings. Yes, someone needs to write a good process story about that. Too bad most of the writers out there capable of doing just that no longer work the beat for one reason or another. We’ll probably never get the tic-toc we would have gotten by now if this had happened a decade ago.

Crossfire Won’t Solve Anything…

Salon’s Alex Pareene rips CNN for considering another Crossfire…

Cable news has become quite different since “Crossfire” ended. Fox made “Crossfire” irrelevant by parodying its model on “Hannity & Colmes” and then ditching Colmes in favor of a network-wide interchangeable cast of weak, milquetoast liberals and pseudo-liberals, for its Alpha Male ultra-conservatives to use as punching bags. MSNBC belatedly struck gold with a politer model in which reasonable hosts, some of whom are unabashed lefties, host non-argumentative discussions with guests representing a wider ideological (and ethnic and professional) range than cable news usually presents. (There is also still Chris Matthews and Larry O’Donnell shouting with and at people.) Those proved to be more popular models of political talking shows. CNN is constitutionally unable to imitate either, unfortunately. Still, the solution is pretty easy: Just don’t relaunch “Crossfire.”

CNN should abandon the political shouting-show model to those two other channels, the ones that thrive on cheap talking-head programming, and just do news. National news! Local news! Entertainment news and sports news and lurid crime news and trashy celebrity news. Investigative journalism and newsmagazines and documentaries. Environmental news and international news and funny animal news. Anything but another show where an equal number of Democrats and Republicans talk at each other. CNN should sometimes be “Today” and sometimes be “Frontline” and sometimes be “Entertainment Tonight” and sometimes be “VICE” and sometimes (often) be the BBC World Service (or CNN International, at the least). It doesn’t need to be “Crossfire” again. No one wants that. The sort of people who do already have two other cable channels to watch.

FNC Dominates Last Week…MSNBC Still Lags Badly…

TVNewser’s Alex Weprin notes that FNC was the #1 cable network last week and does so with a nice spiffy FNC PR supplied graphic…

Correction: TVNewser’s Alex Weprin says that the graphic is their creation and wasn’t FNC supplied. Well, it looked like the kind of graphic FNC would whip up but obviously I was wrong and I must apologize to both TVNewser and FNC for my lousy guess.

The bombing in Boston and the explosion in Texas dominated cable news last week, and the cable news channels saw ratings surges as a result. Fox News was the number one cable channel in both primetime and total day, the first time that happened since last year’s Presidential election, and the first time it happened in a non-election week since Hurricane Katrina in 2005. CNN meanwhile rose to 3rd among ad-supported cable channels (4th among all cable channels), its best placement in years.

FNC’s gratuitous victory lap chart aside, there is no denying this was a huge week for the network and underscores that even with its breaking news brand working in its favor, CNN is still in a very tough fight for the hearts and minds of TV viewers when big news breaks.

The other big takeaway from this item is how poorly MSNBC fared relative to CNN and FNC. This is underscored by what happened Friday night which this CNN release from yesterday illustrates…

CNN WAS #1 IN CABLE NEWS ON FRIDAY IN KEY DEMOS 25-54, 18-34

Network Has Best Delivery Since Election Day and Highest Non-Political Delivery in 10 Years

CNN Digital Posts Record Numbers; Highest Traffic of 2013, Among Top Days in History

According to Nielsen time period data for Friday, April 19, CNN was the top-rated cable news outlet averaging 2.47 million viewers in primetime and 1.34 million in total day in the key demo adults 25-54. FXNC followed with 1.93 million in primetime and 953k in total day and MSNBC posted 618k and 387k respectively in the key target demo adults 25-54.

CNN also ranked #1 in cable news among younger viewers 18-34 in primetime with 1.01 million and #2 in all of television (NBC averaged 1.22 million). CNN’s 18-34 primetime performance is +25% above ABC’s 808k, +60% ahead of CBS’ 631k, +140% over FXNC’s 420k, and +327% above MSNBC’s 236k.

On Friday, CNN posted its highest total day total viewer, 25-54 and 18-34 audiences since Election Day 2012 (Election Day total viewers 3.48 million, 25-54 1.70 million and 18-34 1.02 million). Across all demos (total viewers, 25-54, 18-34), Friday was the network’s highest total day performance (non-political) in 10 years (since the Iraq War).

Compared to the prior four Fridays, CNN had the largest total day growth in cable news – increasing +1168% in 25-54 and +788% in total viewers. FXNC was up +333% in the demo and +73% in total viewers, and MSNBC increased +231% and +220% respectively

If I’m Comcast and I’m looking at these numbers, I’m clenching my teeth at the fact that my cable news network is able to do well when news doesn’t break but gets trounced by its competitors when it does.

Crossfire with Newt Gingrich and Stephanie Cutter?

Politico’s Dylan Byers scoops that CNN is considering Newt Gingrich and Stephanie Cutter for a Crossfire re-launch. The term Lead Zepplin comes to mind here…

Sources now tell POLITICO that the network is in discussions with former Republican presidential candidate Newt Gingrich and former Obama deputy campaign manager Stephanie Cutter about roles on the show.

“They are talking to Cutter and to Gingrich,” a source familiar with the discussions said. “[Cutter] is in discussions; Newt is in discussions too,” another source confirmed.

This Bugs For You…

ICN Readers are nothing if not observant. Lately they’ve been observing CNN and its allegedly gratuitous Live bug usage. Here are two emails from different emailers that I’ve gotten in the past week or so…

CNN for almost two months now won’t take the “LIVE” bug off the screen during b-roll or taped interviews during its live shows.

it appears that they’ve permanently decided to keep the live bug on the air, even during taped reports and non-live images, which is absolutely deplorable and deserves more scrutiny. I wonder if this is another Zuckerism.

I’m sure it is another Zuckerism. It’s a concept that is implemented differently depending on the network. MSNBC, for example kills its live bug nearly every time tape or non-live images hit the screen. CNN, as my readers can easily see, has chosen a different track and now keeps the Live bug on the screen as long as the program is live regardless of whether what’s airing on the screen is live or canned.

I don’t feel too strongly about it. You can make a justifiable case for either option. The only time it is absolutely out of bounds is if the entire program is tape. I haven’t seen that happen although I did get one email that claimed CNN did just that and supplied screengrabs of two Piers Morgan shows showing the same person being interviewed at the same point in the show at 9 and 12. However, CNN had been double shifting Morgan at 9 and 12 at the height of the Boston story and it’s entirely possible that it was a pure co-incidence that the same person was chosen to be interviewed at that point in the show live. I can’t come to a definitive conclusion one way or another based on a screen grab…I would need actual video of both segments to get the proper context.

John King Talks About Corrections…

Politico’s Dylan Byers writes about John King talking on the radio about CNN’s incorrect reporting last week…

“The bigger part, beyond being personally embarrassing, is it’s tough for your viewers, who you want to trust you,” he continued. “So the one thing you do have to do is look in thecamera and say, ‘We were wrong,’ and try to explain why we were wrong. In this case we had two reputable sources — one of mine, one of a colleague’s of mine — who have been reliable in the past, who simply had bad information. We had two — you never do that with one — and we went with it, and we had to correct it.”

“As I said, it’s a shot to you personally, it’s a shot to your credibility. I think the best way to deal with it is to look people in the eye and say, ‘We made a mistake, here’s how we made the mistake,’ and then move on. Then, hopefully, people will look at the bulk of your reporting in that situation and find it to be quite good, he said. “But it’s my city, too, so it’s sort of a double kick-in-the-head to me.”

“Honesty is the best policy, and mistakes do happen,” the host said. “But you’re a perfectionist. I bet you didn’t sleep for a couple of days.”

Why Can’t MSNBC Keep Up Proportionally With CNN and FNC In The Demo ?

Looking at yesterday’s numbers for the Boston Marathon attack, I am struck by how low MSNBC’s numbers are in the Demo compared to CNN and FNC. Both of those networks were doing demo numbers in the million viewer range with CNN edging out FNC at 8, 9, and 10. By contrast MSNBC’s best showing was at 9pm and the best it could do is a little over half a million.

I wanted to compare yesterday to a “regular night” and after looking back the past couple of weeks I settled on picking April 4th for a comparison. It’s not a scientific choice but it is within MSNBC’s observed “trading range” for the past couple of weeks.

MSNBC essentially did a little better than doubling its April 4th demo. Sounds good at first until you see what FNC and CNN did. FNC did anywhere between double and better than triple its April 4th demo, depending on the hour. CNN did even better with upwards of 10x its April 4th demo number…again depending on the hour.

By comparison, Total Viewer increases were more uniform across all three networks which saw Total Viewer numbers essentially double, save for FNC at 9 and 10 which nearly tripled Total Viewers at those hours.

This suggests a proportional “breaking news demo gap” for MSNBC where, for some reason, the network can’t keep pace with its rivals’ proportional gains. The question is why? What is it about MSNBC that makes Demo viewers not tune in with the same proportial levels as they do on CNN and FNC? Is it because MSNBC viewers will instinctively tune in to NBC instead, something FNC and CNN do not have to contend with because their viewers have no similar outlet to deal with? Is it because MSNBC has heavily throttled back its dayside news operation in favor of POV analysis programming to a far greater degree than either FNC or (especially) CNN?

Whatever the reason, last night suggests that MSNBC has a breaking news scaling problem in the Demo that its rivals do not.

Related: Mediaite’s Joe Concha looks at the same numbers and argues that NBC News should take over breaking news stories.

Simply put, anchoring is one of the toughest white-collar jobs in the world. The good from the not-so-good are sniffed out by an audience quite quickly. In the cable news world, where great anchors are at a premium due to an overall shift to opinion journalism, there’s Shep Smith (FOX), Anderson Cooper (CNN), and everyone else.

And Monday’s numbers reflect that. In Cooper’s case—who has struggled on slow news nights—his ratings improved nearly 900 percent in the key 25-54 demo from his Friday night show to Monday night (155,000 vs. 1.393 million). In Smith’s case, he finished just a hair behind CNN in the demo but won the overall audience category handily at 5:00 PM with nearly four million viewers, or nearly four times the audience of Chris Matthews at the same hour.

So NBC can do two things:

(1) Simply concede breaking news to CNN and FOX.
(2) Pass the rock to another studio at 30 Rock

Option #2, of course, would mean to preempt its MSNBC programming in favor of NBC News and Brian Williams, who has been NBC’s face for news since 2004. His competitors—both steady and solid in the form of Diane Sawyer (ABC) and Scott Pelley (CBS)—are still relatively new to the big chair. Williams—a versatile, smooth, unflappable anchor who has proven he can deftly handle the kind of horrifying chaos we saw out of Boston on Monday—should be what MSNBC viewers are provided in situations like this.

It sounds good. On paper. But in practice it’s not that cut and dried. The problem with that strategy is it has been tried before in MSNBC’s distant past and it didn’t work then. Things have changed drastically since those days. MSNBC had no ratings then. It does now. But though the ratings have improved the breaking news problem is still a problem but for completely different reasons.

It all boils down to branding and network identification. MSNBC has carved out its niche as a POV analysis channel with occasional news bites. That’s what people tune in for the other 350 odd days a year when there isn’t big breaking news that sucks up multiple days. CNN’s brand has been hard news so naturally it’s a solid option people will tune in to when big news breaks. (though that may change drastically as Jeff Zucker continues to mold the network with his “everything is news” mantra). FNC’s dayside news operation is more news than opinion so it also remains a viable option for breaking news coverage in viewers’ eyes.

MSNBC, with its POV analysis brand, is apparently stuck with a network identification that does not serve it well when news breaks. It’s not just that brand that’s the problem. It’s also the apparent fear inside 30 Rock that to do news on MSNBC and to do it well risks undermining NBC broadcasts’ far more lucrative news properties.

This is why you never see a big get interview air on MSNBC first before NBC broadcast and when it does finally air it airs with NBC talent. This leaves MSNBC in the unenviable position of fighting for B-list gets for its exclusives; like Joe Biden. A list gets? They air on NBC first.

So you combine MSNBC’s POV brand with NBC’s reticence to make MSNBC a news destination, even in dayside, and you get a network that can’t draw proportionally comparable Demo viewers to CNN and FNC when news does break. Putting on NBC talent to handle the coverage will not fundamentally alter that forumula. The formula remains and the viewers know it. So they won’t follow Brian Williams over.

The only way they might follow Williams over is if NBC decides to alter the formula I just described; for example, beefing up dayside’s news bonafides with strong general news and A list get interviews with MSNBC talent. That would create a new identity for the network while not destroying what has been built in primetime and pre-prime. That, by the way, is more or less how FNC does it. But I don’t think NBC would dare go there.

More Jeff Zucker At The Atlanta Press Club

The Atlanta Journal Constitution’s Rodney Ho has more Zucker quotes from his appearance at the Atlanta Press Club yesterday. One thing that emerged in Ho’s article…Zucker has no intentions of doing interviews this year.

Other random quotes:

- “I play a lot of tennis and a lot of golf. I’m good at tennis. I’m bad at golf. I always play to win.”

- “Twitter is a frenemy. It’s something that often tells us what’s going on before anybody else. But it’s not always right. We use it as a tool.”

- On diversity, a questioner noted the departures of Soledad O’Brien and Roland Martin: “In the three months I’ve been at CNN, we’ve hired five correspondents and four of them have been diverse.” (He meant non-white. Monica Pearson asked him how many were black. He said two.)

- “The budget for newsgathering at CNN is enormous. Enormous! So it’s incumbent we utilize those resources properly.”

- “I’m always impressed with BBC. They operate in a different world. I will tell you CNN International is obviously superior to BBC’s offerings. But I think they do a good job.”

Jeff Zucker Speaks…

Maria Saporta writes about Jeff Zucker’s address to the Atlanta Press Club today…

When the new president of CNN Jeff Zucker addressed the Atlanta Press Club on Monday, he emphasized the importance of Atlanta to the 24-hour news organization.

“I know that people know that I’m the first chief executive of CNN not based in Atlanta,” said Zucker, who lives in New York and had spent nearly his entire career with NBC. “I did not make my first luncheon with the press club of New York. Atlanta will continue to be the home of CNN, and Atlanta will continue to be the backbone of CNN.”

Zucker did say that CNN does have a lot of programming based out of New York, and that is not going to change, but he went on to say that he is in Atlanta on a regular basis. And he added that we live in a virtual world.

“Nobody knows where I am anyway,” Zucker said.

His talk to the Atlanta Press Club was Zucker’s first since he began his new job “exactly three months ago today.” Zucker, who also hasn’t given interviews since it was announced he was going to CNN, said he wanted to be sure to give his first talk in Atlanta to show “how important Atlanta is to this organization.”

But Zucker also made it sound as though it was inevitable that he would end up at CNN. In fact, in October of 1996, Zucker was supposed to have interviewed with then-CNN President Tom Johnson for a job in Atlanta. And then he was diagnosed with colon cancer when he was only 31 years old, and he canceled that interview.

“That story has never been told,” Johnson chimed in from the audience.

CNN’s New Ad Options

AdAge’s Jeanine Poggi writes about the new advertising options CNN looks to pursue…

According to Paul Kagan & Associates, CNN ranked as the 23rd-largest basic cable network by gross advertising revenue in 2012 with $379.5 million. That puts it behind non-news networks like USA, Food Network, History, Syfy and Bravo. (ESPN was No. 1 with $2.08 billion.)

Under the new formats, CNN’s sales team will also be able to build promotions and sponsorship packages around show launches, which have historically been limited. Mr. Bourdain’s show has attracted BMW and MillerCoors as launch sponsors; the latter hasn’t bought time on the network in about five years.

CNN is also selling its “foundation brands,” like Mr. Bourdain, Anderson Cooper and Piers Morgan.

According to Magna Global, cable evening news receives 12% of total cable TV ad spending in the U.S. This is the third-largest cable daypart by spend, behind weekday prime time (17%) and late night (13%).

CNN also will be promoting its new research capabilities — All-Screen, a partnership with Nielsen and Arbitron, and Advanced Media Targeting — which give agency clients the ability to plan, measure and post their cross-platform campaigns more effectively, according to the company.

“The Lead” Gets “The End” For A Week…

TVNewser’s Alex Weprin writes that next week, CNN’s The Lead will get a 10pm repeat…

Tapper’s show currently airs at 4 PM ET, and does not get a replay. Placing it at 10 PM will give it significantly more reach than it currently sees at 4, when many potential viewers are still stuck at work.

“AC360″ will air at 11 PM following “The Lead” Monday through Thursday, with an Anderson Cooper special report airing Friday evening at 10 PM. “AC360″ is expected to return to 10 PM the week after next.

I’m going to hazard a guess that this means OutFront will lose its repeats again…for the second time in three weeks.

John Walsh To CNN?

TV Guide’s Michael Schneider writes that John Walsh is going to meet with Jeff Zucker…

America’s Most Wanted may be coming to a close, but John Walsh isn’t getting out of the crime-fighting business. In his first interview since TV Guide Magazine broke the news that Lifetime had canceled AMW, Walsh says he’s mulling several options for his next move in TV.

The host says he has a meeting scheduled this month with new CNN boss Jeff Zucker about possibly joining the news network. “He knows my passion,” says Walsh, who once hosted a syndicated talk show for Zucker at NBC.

“Maybe Jeff will say there’s room on this channel, especially with CNN’s international reach,” he says. “They ask me constantly to go on Anderson Cooper, Erin Burnett and Piers Morgan. Maybe I can come up with some kind of hybrid show that might serve those purposes… I hope that maybe with the blessing of Lifetime that I might be able to do something.”

Debating Jeff Zucker…

In a must read, the Washington Post’s Paul Farhi pens a mega opus on Jeff Zucker and CNN. There’s enough here for the kibitzer’s to chew on for a while…not the least of which is Phil Griffin chiming in about the (in ICN’s view) real timeframe to judge where CNN is going and why star buying isn’t not necessarily a winning recipe (which I agree with)…

“I wouldn’t read anything into his first two months,” says Phil Griffin, the president of rival MSNBC. “This is going to take years. They’ve got to figure out what works and what doesn’t. The idea that you can figure it out by April 1st is crazy. Check back on April 1st, 2014, and you’ll know the direction.”

If anyone can relate to Zucker’s challenge, it might be Griffin, a longtime NBC News hand who worked with, and then under, Zucker. A half-dozen years ago, MSNBC was languishing — unfocused, unpredictable, a grab bag of news and blab. Since then, it has stutter-stepped forward, surpassing CNN in overall ratings in 2011 and fighting to within view of the dust cloud kicked up by Fox News, the longtime leader.

The obvious thing about MSNBC was that it embraced a passionately liberal perspective, segmenting the audience from the conservative Fox and the middle-of-the-road CNN. The less-obvious thing, says Griffin, is how it did it: by patiently developing a roster of home-grown, out-of-the box personalities — Rachel Maddow, Lawrence O’Donnell, Chris Hayes and Joe Scarborough’s “Morning Joe” crew. All started as guests or contributors, he notes, not as established TV personalities hired for their star power.

In perhaps a veiled message to his old boss, Griffin offers a sports analogy: “When a team buys stars, you never know if the chemistry is right for the team or the fans. When you grow [from within], you know the chemistry is right.”

Then there’s this…

CNN still captures a premium from advertisers relative to competitors. Baine estimates that sponsors pay $5.96 to reach a thousand viewers on CNN, compared with $5.02 for a thousand on Fox and $4.19 on MSNBC.

Why? “It’s a safer place to be” for advertisers, says Gabriel Kahn, co-director of the media economics and entre­pre­neur­ship program at USC’s Annenberg journalism school. “It can be a more boring place to be a viewer, but for an advertiser, you’re not going to hear: ‘Obama was born in Indonesia. Let’s go to a commercial!’ ”

And then there’s this from a obviously semi-frustrated Farhi…

Zucker wasn’t available to discuss the lighter, brighter (and perhaps dumber) CNN he seems to be molding; he has declined all media interviews since his arrival. CNN also prohibited any of its senior executives from speaking for the record. The network’s chief spokeswoman, Allison Gollust, initially offered to answer a reporter’s questions on an off-the-record basis; she later had no response to a list of questions.

CNN Taps Stroumboulopoulos For New Friday Interview Program This Summer

CNN announced that it had tapped George Stroumboulopoulos to host a Friday interview show for ten weeks this summer. If I’m Piers Morgan, I’m not feeling too secure right now.

Stroumboulopoulos Comes to CNN in Summer 2013

Award-winning broadcaster to host weekly interview program

The man who has brought smart, savvy conversations to Canadian television audiences in his signature interview program for nearly a decade will bring his unique brand of intimate, insightful talk to CNN.

George Stroumboulopoulos says he doesn’t just ask questions – he creates space for his guests to share their human experiences. His fresh, thought-provoking style fuses big ideas, with art, pop culture, politics, news, sports, and celebrity. Stroumboulopoulos invites his guests to relax and his viewers to rediscover the power of the authentic interview. Ten episodes of new, one-hour shows with interviews have been picked up to air as a weekly series on Fridays beginning in early summer on CNN/U.S.

“We’re really pleased to bring this special series to CNN,” said Amy Entelis, senior vice president for talent and content development for CNN Worldwide. “It is a good example of the expansion of the CNN strategy to bring new kinds of relevant and engaging programming to a broad audience,” Entelis said.

Over-analysis…

Deadline’s Dominic Patten makes much out of nothing…

What is odd about the ad, besides its feeling of desperation, is who isn’t in it. There’s no Candy Crowley, no John King and no lead congressional correspondent Dana Bash. And no mention of Super-Size Me director Morgan Spurlock, who was announced last August as the host of the new documentary series Inside Man. Don’t they not need to be reintroduced, or are they being shown the door like Soledad O’Brien, Roland Martin and James Carville?

It’s kind of fun to try and read between the lines but sometimes you can go too far and overanalyze it. Take a look at that list. Every one of those people is a show host (or future show host). Now look at Patten’s list of the omitted, there’s only one show host on it. Morgan Spurlock? That’s a bridge too far.

What I am waiting to see is if anyone looks at that ad and starts making diversity noises again. When you put up an ad overwhelmingly dominated by caucasian Anglo Saxon types under the banner “Allow us to reintroduce ourselves” you are leaving yourself wide open for the diversity card to be played, valid or not.