CNN laid off its four web video anchors today and announced that continuous live video production for CNN.com will end. Thus dies "one of the Internet's biggest news experiments." (NYT, via Andrew Baron)
CNN ends a web news experiment
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Not really suprising- after years of free content, we're finally seeing a reverse in this. Looks like we might have to start paying for the internet a bit more..
As b!X pointed out elsewhere, "web anchors" are too unimportant to have their names mentioned in the story.
CNN has grasped a bit of reality. Trying to reproduce one medium - TV - in another is not very likely to work. Each medium has its own form. For news on the Internet, that's text, with pictures and video of actual news events, rather than of people talking about them. Listening to an "anchor" talk is just too time-consuming; reading is quicker.
Agreed, John Dallman. I turn to the web for the news quite a bit anyway, but it always trumps TV news when I am in a hurry and want to know what's going on right now. For that, text is king.
Plus, web video, which is done quite well by few (netflix, for example), is done poorly by most. TV news transplanted into the web video realm largely falls into the latter category.
I actually enjoyed watching the CNN web feed while I worked--I didn't mind having the anchors there at all, providing the glue. Since I was usually doing other work, I didn't mind having it on in the background in that passive mode where anchors work better than having text/pictures/video that you have to be active with.
@#1 - didn't know Rupert Murdoch read Boing Boing!
Free content always makes me chuckle. This seems to imply that the Internet is free. It certainly isn't for me; like many, I pay my local ISP for access. So, for me, the Internet is like cable television; you have a lot that comes with the base price. To a degree, I understand where companies like Newscorp, and to a lesser degree CNN, are coming from. Only to a degree, mind you.
On the other hand, paradigms shift. Not keeping up sometimes exacts a heavy toll.
I also agree with Dalman. The message must fit the medium.
Oh and don't forget the ads. tv is a 'free' medium that is paid for by advertisers.
Web ads don't make them any where near as much, but then again with tv viewers in decline and 500 channels to pick from tv ad money is getting smaller too.
How tv execs think they should stay the same on one hand (bad shows) and totally change on the other hand (charge more directly) would seem so baffling if it wasn't for the one unifying factor in both motives.
grab the money and run.
i enjoyed cnn.com live. I not only read, but also listen to different news media, have to say CNN.com live was doing a great job by bringing journalism to a whole new dimension - interaction.
Thus, it provided a great deal on perspectives and a peek into the underlining problems that still prevails in our societies. The anchors were great mediators without silencing the much needed dialogue.
Great that CNN has been providing this service for 'free', however, laying off anchors and production crews simply in this manner is not acceptable, CNN has not even offered an official explanation, thus leaving their viewers scratching their heads.
Without this bad management, I would have paid to keep CNN on because of the perks and elements the previous format displayed.
What a shame.