You can tell a lot about a news operation by how it responds to a breaking news story on a holiday or weekend when the A-Team is away.

I first wrote that in November about cable coverage of the Mumbai attacks and the sorry performance by MSNBC, which mainly stuck to its canned lineup of prison documentaries while CNN and Fox scrambled to cover the story live.

Well, Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin dropped a political bombshell late Friday afternoon in announcing that she would resign only two and a half years into her term, and it was fascinating to watch the 24/7 channels already in holiday mode chase the story.

MSNBC responded this time. Even though the program guide had a prison documentary slated for the 4 p.m. hour, MSNBC had Alex Witt at the anchor desk and such analysts as A.M. Stoddard, of The Hill, dissecting Palin's resignation.

Continue reading "No holiday for TV channels chasing Sarah Palin news" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 5:42 PM in Cable and Network News | Permalink | Comments (23)
        

MSNBC's Keith Olbermann took offense to a post I wrote Saturday that referred to him as "slumping." He didn't dispute any of the facts in my piece, he just went on the attack with his usual innuendo, slurs and bombast over my characterization of his performance in the ratings. 

Here are two graphics from tvbythenumbers.com tracking Olbermann's ratings the last six months. Read them and judge for yourself whether the adjective "slumping" applies.

No spin, just the facts. Especially note the one that shows him down 50 percent since the last quarter of 2008 in the key news demographic of viewers 25 and 54.

Continue reading "No spin, just the facts on a slumping Keith Olbermann" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 5:37 PM in Cable and Network News | Permalink | Comments (26)
        

Today is the day that they start measuring TV audiences differently in Baltimore. As one general manager of a Baltimore TV station put it in a memo to his staff: "Television starts anew in Baltimore today! Let’s move out of the past – and position ourselves to be the leaders of the future!"

What's new is the use of Local People Meters, an electronic device, to measure viewing patterns of Baltimore area residents.The new Nielsen system replaces a way of counting viewers that relied in part on diaries that some researchers considered unreliable and out of date given new digital technology.

The general manager's memo went on to succinctly described the advantages of the new technology this way: "The local people meters include a larger sample and daily extensive demographic data that was not available under the traditional set meter ratings. The new LPMs allow multiple individuals in the same household to record their television viewing simultaneously. The sample includes for the first time cell phone only homes...."

But the meters have also brought shakeups in the ratings and controversy in some other cities, like Miami where they introduced this spring.

Continue reading "People meters start today - a new era in Baltimore TV" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 6:51 AM in Baltimore Television | Permalink | Comments (5)
        

If you think there has been too much Michael Jackson on TV, wait until the funeral. Or, how about Matt Lauer and NBC's Today show getting inside Neverland for a Thursday morning tour? And then, Larry King offering the TV tour of Jackson's ranch in prime time at 9 p.m. Thursday. Matt Lauer, Larry King and Neverland -- isn't American TV fabulous?

But for my part, so far, I really do not think the coverage has been excessive. I am pleased, in fact, to see TV serving so effectively as a medium for the ritual of public mourning. (Not bad for a so-called dinosaur, is it?). Furthermore, TV is providing the forum for an illuminating discussion of race in connection with the dead entertainer -- and I think that matters in an important cultural way.

The latest entry on that front came Tuesday night with Katie Couric interviewing filmmaker Spike Lee for a CBS special on Jackson. The program, which aired under the 48 Hours banner, won the time period with 8.15 million viewers -- one of the largest audiences of the year for 48 Hours. (Pictured Spike Lee at a Michael Jackson tribute. AP)

Continue reading "Michael Jackson's death sparks TV discussion of race" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 1:32 PM in TV and race | Permalink | Comments (11)
        

Two weeks ago, I praised Fox News for being one of the only TV news operations seriously questioning the administration of President Barack Obama as it pushes an agenda of massive social change not seen since Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal.

Whatever the reasons for Fox's tenacity, I said, it is the one channel that seems absolutely committed to being a watchdog on the White House -- a job crucial to any notion of press responsibility. My post was inspired in part by Obama's petulant sounding complaint about Fox made in an interview with CNBC.

Now comes the ratings data this week showing that Fox, which has long ruled in cable TV news ratings, has entered another league altogether of near-total dominance. I believe this current ratings surge is related to the relentless watch Fox News is keeping on the White House. Viewers are responding to Fox as the cable channel speaking most effectively to citizen questions and concerns about the breakneck pace at which American life is being tranformed. Meanwhile, few hard questions are being asked of the administration elsewhere on television.

Continue reading "Fox News -TV's White House watchdog soars in ratings" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 9:14 AM in Cable and Network News | Permalink | Comments (19)
        

In an earlier post Tuesday that raised questions about gatekeeping in the world of new media, I said I was trying to get an explanation from CNN of its role in the Rick-Astley-is-dead hoax Monday night.

The key point to understand in the explanation from CNN spokeswoman Jennifer Martin is that information posted on iReport.com only is carried on such outlets as CNN and cnn.com after it is vetted. That means gatekeepers and filters have been applied to anything that appears on the cable news channel CNN or the cnn.com online site -- but not on iReport. com.

That's a big difference, as CNN is relying on what it calls the iReport "community" to police iReport.com. Once something on iReport.com is vetted and found suitable for CNN or cnn.com, it then carries the stamp, "On CNN," according to Martin. The Astley material did not make it onto any of the CNN platforms.

Continue reading "CNN explains the role of iReport in Rick Astley hoax" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 5:09 PM in New media | Permalink | Comments (6)
        

Last week, I wrote about AP having to correct a report it published saying Jon and Kate Gosselin had been living apart for the last two years. It troubled me to see a news organization that fomed the bedrock of fact-based journalism losing its way for a moment amid the Jon & Kate frenzy and all the enthusiam over the near-instantaneous news cycles made possible with the growth of social media, iReports and Twitter.

I wondered if anyone was acting as gatekeeper in the mainstream media any more. Well, here we go again with the Rick Astley is dead story that swept across cyberspace last night.

The 43-year-old singer who gained online noteriety singing "Never Gonna Give You Up" is not dead. It was just a hoax and a weird replay of the online geeks' game of "Rickrolling" people online. (You click on a link thinking it is going to take you to, say, BBC News,and instead it takes you to a video of Astley singing "Never Gonna Give You Up." Aparently setting up a Rickroll is what passes for a life for some people).

But what matters with this false story -- and all the others about such celebrities as Jeff Goldblum and George Clooney last week in the wake of the real deaths of Farrah Fawcett, Ed McMahon and Michael Jackson -- is how susceptible we have become to bad information sweeping through our lives.

Continue reading "Rick Astley: Where did all the media gatekeepers go?" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 10:27 AM in New media | Permalink | Comments (10)
        

Garrison Keillor: The Man on the Radio in the Red Shoes, an American Masters PBS documentary about one of the nation's most distinctive and beloved humorists, doesn't debut until Wednesday night. But I am writing about this remarkable American Master film now to give you time to clear your schedule or set your TiVo to make sure you do not miss it.

Nobody does biography like American Masters, the PBS signature series founded by Baltimore native Susan Lacy. In recent years, some entries in the series have a felt a little rushed and thin, but when this series gets it right the result is stunning. American Masters has not gotten a biography this right since its dazzling film on Leonard Bernstein that Lacy herself directed.

The producer and director here is Peabody and Emmy Award winner Peter Rosen, and he and his crew foillowed Keillor and his Prairie Home Companion crew around the country for most of a year to make the documentary. The power of this film is in the revealing -- and even transcendent -- moments that Rosen captures with his lens.

Continue reading "Don't miss this inspired PBS film on Garrison Keillor " »

Posted by David Zurawik at 8:41 AM in PBS | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

In 25 years of writing about TV award shows, I have never seen one with the energy of Sunday’s BET Awards Show. Refashioned in the wake of Thursday’s death of Michael Jackson into a tribute to him, the live telecast brilliantly tapped into the wellspring of admiration, love, hurt and shock over his death that engulfed the show business community – particularly among Jackson’s fellow black performers.

Race was a part of the energy in Sunday’s tribute – let’s not ignore it. Host Jamie Foxx certainly put it out there on the table from his first words.

Following a show-stopper of an opening that featured New Edition doing a medley of Jackson 5 songs as images of the Jacksons flashed on giants screens behind them, Foxx opened the event by telling the audience at Los Angeles’ Shrine Auditorium, "We want to celebrate this black man. He belongs to us. We shared him with everybody else."

Continue reading "BET Awards soar on memories of Michael Jackson" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 11:23 PM in TV and Pop Culture, TV and race | Permalink | Comments (24)
        

HBO continues on its erratic journey of trying to find winning Sunday-night dramas in the post-Sopranos era with the premiere of Hung Sunday night at 10.

The series is smarter  than its title, but not nearly wise enough to be judged a keeper based on the episodes made available for preview.

Hung is the chronicle of a former high school sports star, Ray Drecker (Thomas Jane), now working as a third-rate high school basketball coach in suburban Detroit. His wife leaves him for a plastic surgeon. His kids move out after a fire that wrecks the house he inherited from his parents. Living in a tent on his front lawn and increasingly losing his grip, he takes the words of a motivational speaker to heart and decides to try and make a new life based on exploiting his "best tool." That asset is the size of a certain body part referenced in the slang title.

Continue reading "Preview: HBO's new Sunday drama better than its title" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 11:28 AM in HBO | Permalink | Comments (0)
        

There was big news on Thursday night, and CNN was far and away the cable channel most Americans tuned to.

The 24/7 news channel, which usually trails its opinion-dominated competitors on Fox and MSNBC in weeknight viewing, doubled and tripled MSNBC's audience at times as viewers sought information on the deaths of Michael Jackson and Farrah Fawcett. Just as it was during last fall's election, CNN is still clearly the channel of choice when viewers want reliable, fact-based information on major events.

MSNBC, meanwhile, which no longer bothers to even cover news on the weekends, was the most ignored major news channel from 6 p.m. to 2 a.m., the Nielsen window of measurement. The NBC sister channel also finished a deep last in prime time -- the time period in which it rose and is now starting to fall with a slumping Keith Olbermann.

Continue reading "CNN rules on night of Jackson, Fawcett death news" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 2:06 PM in Cable and Network News | Permalink | Comments (13)
        

MTV is the place be Friday night if you are looking to make a TV connection to feelings of loss for Michael Jackson. Since the announcement of the singer's death on Thursday, the one-time music video powerhouse has been using its vast archive of Jackson music videos to create a profoudn Tv space of mourning and celebration. Read my review here.

But the Jackson beat will continue throughout the weekend on many channels and networks.

Here are some of the highlights and potential lowlights. That's the way it is with popular culture at moments like this -- not all of it is great.

Friday night at 8, TV one shows Michael Jackson: 30th Anniversary Celebration produced by David Gest. It will replay at 11 p.m.

Friday night at 10, NBC will replay Michael Jackson: King of Pop, the Dateline special it aired Thursday.

Continue reading "A weekend of Michael Jackson TV programming" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 5:20 PM in TV and Pop Culture | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

MTV is the place to be as the cable channel extends its non-stop, wall-to-wall Michael Jackson tribute with a stunning array of Jackson music videos and music performances though 8 p.m. Friday. What's going on at MTV in the wake of Jackson's death is nothing short of a profound cultural experience.

In addition to the endless stream of music videos, there are cut-ins from mtvnews.com featuring music journalist Kurt Loder who started at the cable channel in the 1980s. He brings instant credibility and history. There is also a Twitter crawl across the bottom of the screen with fan thoughts and tributes for a strong new-media, multi-media thread of consciousness.

But it's the music videos that really resurrect the greatness and spirit of Jackson's work. If you are near a TV and feeling the loss of Jackson, get over to MTV for comfort, solace and, perhaps, even  a melancholy re-connection with your own past. This is televisual collective mourning -- and celebration --at its best.

(Pictured Michael Jackson with his 2006 MTV Award)

Continue reading "MTV the place to be for Michael Jackson TV mourning" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 1:37 PM in TV and Pop Culture | Permalink | Comments (14)
        

The Nielsen Media Company is reporting that online talk about the death Michael Jackson is more intense than it was for the historic inauguration of President Barack Obama.

Here's a link to the actual numbers from the national audience measurement service -- including a list of the Top 10 TV shows involving Michael Jackson. It's a fascinating list topped by an ABC report from Martin Bashir and a 60 Minutes interview by the late Ed Bradley.

http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/online_mobile/michael-jackson-news-dominates-web-buzz/

Posted by David Zurawik at 12:20 PM in New media | Permalink | Comments (7)
        

The death of Michael Jackson has driven traffic on CNN's iReport site to record levels.

The program set up in 2006 to encourage viewers around the world to become citizen journalists filing videos and reports to CNN received 660 iReports in the 6 and 1/2  or so hours between the announcement of Jackson's death and midnight Thursday (the internal measuring device used by CNN only counts midnight to midnight).

A total of 29 were approved for air on CNN and posting on cnn.com after going through a vetting process that I write about in my column in the arts section of Sunday's Sun. (The Sunday piece focuses on user generated content and Iran.)

One of the most timely pieces received in the immediate wake of Jackson's death was a video of Times Square as the announcement was first posted high above the crowd. It is the only video I have seen so far of that moment in time, and it offers an evocative sense of the stunned reaction. This is exactly the kind of thing citizen journalism can offer -- a record of an important moment captured by someone in the right place at the right time before the mainstream press gets there.

Continue reading "Fans flood CNN with Michael Jackson iReports" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 11:39 AM in CNN | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

Actress Farrah Fawcett, who was launched into instant pop culture stardom in 1976 with a best-selling wall poster and a featured role in a new ABC series Charlie's Angels, is dead at 62. She was a TV presence in our lives right to the end.

Fawcett, who battled anal cancer for several years, was seen last month in an NBC documentary that she herself produced and helped tape with a digital camera. The film, Farrah's Story, which chronicled her struggle with the disease, was a ratings success for the network, and she vowed to continue with a second TV documentary.

More than any other actress I knew -- and I first interviewed her in 1976 for a story on that poster -- Fawcett was a creature of the medium. It made her famous, and I was not surprised to see her final days depicted in a self-produced TV special. Nor was it surprising to hear from her longtime companion, Ryan O'Neal, that as sick as she was, the first thing Fawcett asked on the morning after her special aired was how it did in the ratings.

(Pictured: Farrah Fawcett as she appeared in 1977 ABC publicity photo) 

Continue reading "Actress Farrah Fawcett -- a TV presence to the end" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 12:57 PM in Network TV | Permalink | Comments (17)
        

Let's make one thing clear right from the start: ABC News did not give President Barack Obama a free pass in its prime-time special Wednesday night to sell his plan for a radical overhaul of the health care system.

There were people in the town hall setting who asked pointed questions, and if you listened very closely, it was obvious after a while that Obama did not have any very good answers when it came to specifics. Furthermore, anchorman Charles Gibson, who moderated the discussion, asked solid follow-up questions of the president.

But, ultimately none of that mattered much, because the majority of viewers can't or don't listen very closely when such vast amounts of information, opinion and statistics are thrown around as they were Wednesday night on ABC. Television does not work like that. In the manner that TV does work, Obama had his way from early morning to latenight on ABC Wednesday to push his agenda for massive social change on healthcare. In short, he owned ABC's airwaves.

Continue reading "ABC News tried, but Obama ruled on health care pitch" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 11:00 PM in TV and Politics | Permalink | Comments (21)
        

Last week, I wrote about the upcoming ABC News town-hall-style health care special featuring President Barack Obama, and warned about the TV press being used by the White House.

The special, titled Questions for the President: Prescription for America, will air Wednesday night at 10, and I will be here at Z on TV afterward writing about it.

The program broadcast from the White House will feature Obama answering questions on health care posed by audience members selected by ABC News. Republicans have been up in arms about what they see as their exclusion from the conversation.

Tune in Wednesday night after the telecast to Z on TV to see how I thought it played on the screen.

Posted by David Zurawik at 3:49 PM in TV and Politics | Permalink | Comments (4)
        

In a post Monday night, I suggested that viewers stop watching Jon & Kate Plus 8 if they really want to help the Gosselin kids. With the divorce of these two self-absorbed parents, there is no way for viewers to justify tuning in any longer. It's nothing but debasement and voyeurism from here on out.

But with the show going on hiatus until Aug. 3, let me further suggest that we in the mainstream press also step back, slow down, take stock and try to wean ourselves off the narcotic of Jon & Kate page views unlike anything we've seen since Sarah Palin's vice presidential candidacy.

I say this after the embarrassing story put out by the Associated Press Tuesday that Jon and Kate Gosselin had been living "separate and apart" for the last two years while acting as if they were living together on their TV show. Had that fact been verified and true, it would have been the basis of a very big TV story -- a story just a few of cuts below the quiz scandals of the 1950s in terms of deception on the part of those who make American television.

But it wasn't verified and true, according to a correction the news service sent out later in the evening saying the couple had been apart only a week or two, according to lawyers involved in filing the very papers the AP cited as evidence for its first report. It appears that even AP, one of the bedrocks of mainstream fact-based journalism, was caught up in the Jon & Kate frenzy of getting it out there first before getting it right. Does anyone in the land of new media know what the word gatekeeper means anymore?

Continue reading "It's time for press to take stock of itself on Jon & Kate" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 12:07 AM in Reality TV | Permalink | Comments (19)
        

Ed McMahon, who for 30 years rode shotgun to Johnny Carson on NBC’s legendary Tonight Show and became the model for a generation of talk show sidekicks, is dead at 86.

Mr. McMahon died at the Ronald Reagan Medical Center in Westwood, Calif., according to NBC, the network for whom he worked more than three decades. The entertainer and TV pitchman had been seriously ill for several years. He had been at the UCLA medical facility for the past three weeks being treated for pneumonia, according to a spokesman. He also had been diagnosed with bone cancer.

With all the change in late night TV theses days, it is hard to remember what a reliable, inviting and reassuring place Mr. McMahon and Mr. Carson made their faux couch and desk set seem like from 1962 to 1992 — one of the longest and most successful runs in TV history. Mr. McMahon played a large role in that popularity with his deep voice, ready laugh and trademark "Heeeeeerrrrrreeee’s Johnny" nightly introduction.

Continue reading "Ed McMahon dead at 86: He was model for TV sidekicks" »

Posted by David Zurawik at 11:10 AM in Network TV | Permalink | Comments (12)