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But with news available more places than ever, on cable channels and Internet sites, and with revenue challenged by heavy dependence on shrinking advertising dollars, the future for the news divisions at ABC and CBS remains deeply insecure. What has to scare them is something that happened over the weekend. if you had tuned in during the first hours of the aftermath of the Chilean earthquake you will have noted a couple of things.

1. That only CNN dropped their prerecorded BS and carried TV Chile's live feed, which I watched via live streaming video on the internet. The rest for the first couple hours just did cut ins. Once they all went live they relied heavily on people's cell phone/downloaded video and twitter reports. To those of us with the knowledge and capability we got news from the scene faster then the cable news and regular networks could provide and without it being filtered through a bunch of helmet haired anchorpeople.

“Long term, it’s going to get harder for these guys to exist as they are currently constructed, with the exception of NBC because it can offload the costs on MSNBC,” Michael Nathanson, an industry analyst for Sanford C. Bernstein & Company, said.

Michael Nathanson is wrong. NBC Universal can not afford it any more then any of the others. The only "black" at MSNBC is the black hole the money is getting sucked into. If the Comcast deal goes through I would suspect that MSNBC will fold. The problem for all of these entities is that the business model they are operating on is about as outdated as the horse and buggy. My broadcast production professor told my class the very first day (many moons ago) that broadcasting is probably the worst managed business in the world because it makes money no matter what and making money provides cover for very bad business practices. Well, those days are over and the accountants are telling them that something has to give and alot of people have to go. Under the "current" model (which has not changed much from the 1960's) they have crap tons of assignment desk editors, video editors, camera crews, ENG/SNG truck operators, associate producers, etc.-a virtual Versailles of servants that are no longer needed. The days of reporters going on assignment with a cameraman, an audio operator, a ENG truck and a producer are over. As Chile proved they will get their butts kicked by someone with a cell phone or a video camera and a YouTube account.

Another thing that is over are the days of the overpaid anchors and reporters. They can no longer afford the exorbitant salaries they pay these people because they no longer bring in the viewers, in fact they have served to turn off many viewers with their condescension and arrogance. Money talks and right now what the owners of these entities are hearing from their accountants is that bubble headed bleach blonds like Katie Couric and rabid Keith Olberman are not worth what they are getting paid.

The one big question is how long will it take the owners and management of the networks to figure out that their biggest problem with their news divisions is their overt bias which is so bad that no one trusts them anymore to report the facts. I am going to guess that they will never figure it out-they, like their news staffs, all live in the gated community of the mind that exists in Hollywood and the upper west side of Manhattan. They simply can not understand why the rest of us do not see the world the way they do-these people know more about tribes in Africa then they do about the majority of the people in this country. For most of them we might as well be Martians, that is how little they know and understand us. They also can not understand why we do not bow before and blindly follow them-after all, in their minds they are our "intellectual betters" and we should blindly believe them and follow them.