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But if they're moving away from commentary (progressive or otherwise), how are they going to fill their schedule with "hard news" while also not over-hyping?

But if they're moving away from commentary (progressive or otherwise), how are they going to fill their schedule with "hard news" while also not over-hyping? Lack of real news is the whole reason they started over-hyping and also why they pad out their schedule with commentary. The announcement reads like "We're going to have our cake, and eat it too." Sounds great! But is that actually possible?

tpmx 4y ago
There's never a lack of relevant news. There is a lack of news that's interesting as a form of entertainment. That's why it would be such a challenging turnaround. I don't think a competent and serious news channel can work as a profit center. I guess CNN worked really well economically in the 80s/90s when there weren't many options for people to get news fast, and then gradually declined after people got online.
- theonlybutlet 4y ago
  There's plenty of news sources internationally that provide interesting articles without "progressive" commentary, with instead say maybe an editorial and some explainer: Financial Times, The Economist, amongst other local sources. Or perhaps I'm just dull.
  - tpmx 4y ago
    They're primarily in text (print/web) though. I'd watch a news channel with FT/The Economist style content translated to TV, I think...
- robonerd 4y ago
  > There's never a lack of relevant news. Some news is relevant to everybody, but I think most news is not relevant to most people most of the time. And most news that is relevant to some people won't be relevant to most people. "Six-car pileup on I-whatever" might be very relevant to me if I'm commuting on that road, but it's irrelevant to most people. There's nothing wrong with the media running this kind of news story, a story that's relevant to some but irrelevant to most. The problem occurs when the decision is made to sensationalize the coverage of the incident, to make it interesting to everybody it isn't relevant to. And since very little is relevant to everybody, just about everything ends up getting sensationalized.
- yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
  > There's never a lack of relevant news. Really? Unless you're using a much broader definition of "relevant" than I use, I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw something on mainstream media that had any impact on my life whatsoever.
  - majewsky 4y ago
    > I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw something on mainstream media that had any impact on my life whatsoever. I'm in Germany. Just this week, the news have been full about new policies that went into effect on June 1 to reduce cost of living amidst inflation and energy price hikes in particular (a tax rebate on fuel, and subsidized public transit passes). There is also news about shortages of particular food items like sunflower oil and mustard. (I actually wanted to purchase mustard last week and was confused why there was so little of it. Turns out that Ukraine used to be a major supplier of mustard seeds.) Also, Coronavirus policies for the next winter are being discussed, which admittedly does not have impact on our daily lifes right now, but there will be an impact when the policies go into effect. I don't disagree with your notion. There really is a lot of news that is non-actionable and can therefore be considered superfluous, but "I can't remember the last time" is taking it way too far in my opinion.
- pavon 4y ago
  Agreed, but apparently not completely impossible, depending on your definition of news. C-SPAN somehow manages to have three channels of content, while mostly avoiding the hype and bias that CNN has.
  - lupire 4y ago
    CSPAN is basically just a collection of webcams pointed at Congress. They are a nonprofit that get paid 6cents/yr/cablebox.
- mc32 4y ago
  You're right. There is plenty of subject matter for news. What I think there isn't much of is the above in easily mined form. Serious news consumes resources (reporters, investigators, supporting crew, etc). What passes for news today (opinion from Twitter) is virtually free and pretty endless so it's the option most go for because the other option costs serious money.
tablespoon 4y ago
> But if they're moving away from commentary (progressive or otherwise), how are they going to fill their schedule with "hard news" while also not over-hyping? Lack of real news is the whole reason they started over-hyping and also why they pad out their schedule with commentary. Yeah. IMHO, one of the major contributing factors to America's problems is there's too little news, and too much time and space to cover it. If they're not going to fill the time with news, they'll probably just fill it with obsessive coverage of scandalous crimes (which will, in some cases, probably create conditions for more scandalous crimes by giving people ideas). Though I suppose there's a third option that might work, but it's not news: documentaries. Air stuff that's not news, but has some newsworthy aspect (e.g. Vladimir Putin's political career, the Russian military).

tpmx 4y ago

There's never a lack of relevant news. There is a lack of news that's interesting as a form of entertainment. That's why it would be such a challenging turnaround. I don't think a competent and serious news channel can work as a profit center. I guess CNN worked really well economically in the 80s/90s when there weren't many options for people to get news fast, and then gradually declined after people got online.

theonlybutlet 4y ago
There's plenty of news sources internationally that provide interesting articles without "progressive" commentary, with instead say maybe an editorial and some explainer: Financial Times, The Economist, amongst other local sources. Or perhaps I'm just dull.
- tpmx 4y ago
  They're primarily in text (print/web) though. I'd watch a news channel with FT/The Economist style content translated to TV, I think...
robonerd 4y ago
> There's never a lack of relevant news. Some news is relevant to everybody, but I think most news is not relevant to most people most of the time. And most news that is relevant to some people won't be relevant to most people. "Six-car pileup on I-whatever" might be very relevant to me if I'm commuting on that road, but it's irrelevant to most people. There's nothing wrong with the media running this kind of news story, a story that's relevant to some but irrelevant to most. The problem occurs when the decision is made to sensationalize the coverage of the incident, to make it interesting to everybody it isn't relevant to. And since very little is relevant to everybody, just about everything ends up getting sensationalized.
yjftsjthsd-h 4y ago
> There's never a lack of relevant news. Really? Unless you're using a much broader definition of "relevant" than I use, I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw something on mainstream media that had any impact on my life whatsoever.
- majewsky 4y ago
  > I'm struggling to remember the last time I saw something on mainstream media that had any impact on my life whatsoever. I'm in Germany. Just this week, the news have been full about new policies that went into effect on June 1 to reduce cost of living amidst inflation and energy price hikes in particular (a tax rebate on fuel, and subsidized public transit passes). There is also news about shortages of particular food items like sunflower oil and mustard. (I actually wanted to purchase mustard last week and was confused why there was so little of it. Turns out that Ukraine used to be a major supplier of mustard seeds.) Also, Coronavirus policies for the next winter are being discussed, which admittedly does not have impact on our daily lifes right now, but there will be an impact when the policies go into effect. I don't disagree with your notion. There really is a lot of news that is non-actionable and can therefore be considered superfluous, but "I can't remember the last time" is taking it way too far in my opinion.
pavon 4y ago
Agreed, but apparently not completely impossible, depending on your definition of news. C-SPAN somehow manages to have three channels of content, while mostly avoiding the hype and bias that CNN has.
- lupire 4y ago
  CSPAN is basically just a collection of webcams pointed at Congress. They are a nonprofit that get paid 6cents/yr/cablebox.
mc32 4y ago
You're right. There is plenty of subject matter for news. What I think there isn't much of is the above in easily mined form. Serious news consumes resources (reporters, investigators, supporting crew, etc). What passes for news today (opinion from Twitter) is virtually free and pretty endless so it's the option most go for because the other option costs serious money.

tablespoon 4y ago

> But if they're moving away from commentary (progressive or otherwise), how are they going to fill their schedule with "hard news" while also not over-hyping? Lack of real news is the whole reason they started over-hyping and also why they pad out their schedule with commentary. Yeah. IMHO, one of the major contributing factors to America's problems is there's too little news, and too much time and space to cover it. If they're not going to fill the time with news, they'll probably just fill it with obsessive coverage of scandalous crimes (which will, in some cases, probably create conditions for more scandalous crimes by giving people ideas). Though I suppose there's a third option that might work, but it's not news: documentaries. Air stuff that's not news, but has some newsworthy aspect (e.g. Vladimir Putin's political career, the Russian military).