WILL ARMSTRONG INTERVIEW SAVE OPRAH’S CHANNEL?

Analysts are speculating about the effect of Oprah Winfrey’s interview with Lance Armstrong on lifting the public’s awareness of her OWN cable network. In today’s (Wednesday) New York Post, media writer Michael Starr commented that it “could go a long way toward putting her cable network, OWN, on the map after two mediocre, money-losing years.” […]

CBS’S RYAN/ROMNEY INTERVIEW BLASTED LEFT AND RIGHT

The predicament television networks find themselves in during an increasingly polarized political environment was brought home following Sunday night’s 60 Minutes feature in which Bob Schieffer interviewed Mitt Romney and his recently selected running mate, Paul Ryan, for the first time. On today’s Fox & Friends on the conservative Fox News channel, Co-host Eric Bolling […]

BRISTOL PALIN’S REALITY SHOW FLOPS

Lifetime channel’s hopes of cashing in on the notoriety surrounding Sarah Palin’s daughter Bristol by mounting a reality TV series around her decision to move to Los Angeles to rear her toddler son Tripp were dashed Tuesday when Bristol Palin: Life’s a Tripp attracted just 726,000 viewers for its season opener. That’s a far cry […]

NBC APOLOGIZES FOR DOCTORED 911 TAPE IN TRAYVON MARTIN REPORT

NBC has ignited a furor over what it admitted was “an error made in the production process” on its news programs last week, when a tape of a police dispatcher’s conversation with George Zimmerman, the accused killer of Trayvon Martin, was edited in such a way as to make it sound as if Zimmerman might […]

OLBERMANN RETURNS — AS IF HE NEVER LEFT

The oft-fired/oft-hired Keith Olbermann, lastly with MSNBC, returned to the cameras Monday night on Al Gore’s cable channel Current TV — and television critics agreed that it was as if he had never been gone. “He is the same fast-talking, hard-charging, unapologetically self-righteous defender of his version of liberal ideology that he always was. Only […]

PELLEY MAKES LOW-KEY DEBUT ON CBS EVENING NEWS

Scott Pelley took over the anchor chair on the CBS Evening News Monday and relegated the story that most newspapers headlined and NBC led with — the Anthony Weiner sexting scandal — to No. 3 on his list of top stories, nine minutes into the newscast. “Good for Pelley and CBS News and their sense […]

PELLEY SAYS HE HAS NEVER ANCHORED A NEWSCAST

CBS could be repeating with Scott Pelley the same mistake it made with Katie Couric — failing to recognize that a television anchor is principally a performer (or a “presenter” as he or she is called in most other countries), someone who can help convey with intonation, cadence, and sometimes with gesture the drama behind […]

TWITTER SCOOPS TV ON BIN LADEN DEATH

On Sunday, a day when broadcast and cable news operations are notoriously lean and lacking, it was Twitter that initially spread the word that Osama bin Laden had been killed during a 40-minute military operation at his secret residence in Abbottabad, Pakistan. The Twitter frontier was ablaze with the news more than an hour before […]

CBS WAVES GOODBYE TO COURIC

CBS News issued a surprisingly terse statement about Katie Couric’s departure: “There’s a lot to be proud of during Katie Couric’s time at Evening News. CBS News, like Katie herself, is looking forward to the next chapter,” the statement said. Also surprising was that Couric made her decision “official” in a statement to People magazine […]

MARYLAND BOOSTS TAX INCENTIVES 750 PERCENT

Hoping to lure more TV and movie productions to the state, Maryland has increased the amount of tax incentives it is offering to studios from $1 million a year ago to $7.5 million this year. Writing in the Baltimore Sun, TV columnist David Zurawik observed today (Thursday) that the boost in incentives arrives “in time […]

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