ABC News to cut half its domestic correspondents, close bricks-and-mortar bureaus [Updated]

Los Angeles Times ^ | February 26, 2010 | Matea Gold

[george76]

As part of the deep cuts announced this week at ABC News, the network plans to close all of its physical bureaus around the country except Washington and halve the number of its domestic correspondents.

ABC News President David Westin confirmed in an interview Friday that the network's ranks of bureau correspondents, which currently number several dozen, would be cut in half and be replaced with "digital" journalists who would be expected to shoot and edit their own stories.

Although the network will keep a minimal staff presence in Atlanta, Chicago, Dallas, Los Angeles, Miami and Boston, it will shut down its bricks-and-mortar bureaus there and ask its remaining employees to work from the local affiliates. The Washington bureau will remain open, but its size will be substantially reduced.

The mood was grim in Los Angeles, the largest bureau outside of Washington. The 40-plus staffers were told this week that only a few producers would remain and only two correspondents would be assigned to cover the West, down from a total of six

[SmokingJoe]

FNC only has a few million viewers, and they still have far fewer viewers than the 6:30 newscasts

Couric has just over 6 million viewers per night, which is not that far removed from O’Reilley’s 4 million viewers on a good night. Plus the 3 million that watch Beck at 5 pm, are not the same 3 million that watch O’Reilley at 8 pm. If you add up all the viewers for cable news throughout the day, it will probably trump the 6:30 newscasts from the networks. People don't feel the need to watch the network news at 6:30, in part because they have already watched the news on the cable news(mostly Fox) earlier in the day.
Is Fox news taking viewers from the networks? Of course.

[GOP Poet]

bookmark

[OldDeckHand]

"Couric has just over 6 million viewers per night, which is not that far removed from O’Reilley’s 4 million viewers on a good night"

You realize that Bill O'Relley and Katie Couric aren't on at the same time, right?

Couric competes with Special Report, which manages about 2.4 million ever night, half of what Couric alone averages.

"Is Fox news taking viewers from the networks? Of course."

Who said that they aren't. But, whatever FNC is taking from the networks is only a TINY fraction of the viewers that network news has lost the last 20 years. Which underscores my original premise - Content isn't the problem for the networks, technology and simple demographics is the problem.

[namvolunteer]

The traditional media has been stupid not to go on the attack against Craigslist. We’ve seen their customers murdered, raped, ripped off, etc.
I would expose the Craigslist problems on a daily basis and make their potential customers extremely leery to do business that way.
After a few small, unsatisfactory purchases, I have avoided Craigslist for probably three years now.

[RightWingConspirator]

The internet has not "killed traditional media", it has been more of a mindless suicide by the traditional media, with the internet replacing it. So-called newsmen, such as Dan "Fake, but Accurate" Rather, Katie Couric, Peter Jennings and the like, have, through their constant liberal and anti-conservative bias, lost the 60%+ of Americans who are conservative for their network news.

When i go through an airport, I rarely see any teenagers or twenty-somethings reading a newspaper--they are either talking or texting on a cell phone, using a laptop or playing with a game boy or other electronic toy.

[AmishDude]

Funny. For many stations, local news is the moneymaker. Pittsburgh stations would go 24/7 local news if they could.

[Bernard Marx]

If the existing “news” organizations returned to real journalism instead of acting as naive cheerleaders for the socialist agenda ,they would have millions more viewers and readers .

That's probably impossible given the post-Watergate brainwashing of students in J-schools. Many J-professors were already liberal, if not flat-out Marxists. That crop of students now runs and reports for most domestic media operations. It was filled with young New Leftists determined to "change the world" using Alinsky's methods to condition the "masses." I hope that whole bunch goes down with the sinking ship!

[namvolunteer]

It’s a little more complicated than that. Of course, Fox hasn’t gotten most of the viewers from 20 years ago, graves did. This is a demographic problem in which the demo that grew up on TV news is dying off and the next two generations are less interested in TV news.
It’s hard to believe they took the left-wing ideological course that they did. If they had been on the side of the people, debunking global warming, and showing what Democratic proposals will actually cost, they’d be rolling in viewers and dough.

[SmokingJoe]

You realize that Bill O’Relley and Katie Couric aren't on at the same time, right?

The time slot doesn't really matter. What matters is that the people who are getting their news/opinion from O’Reilley may not then bother to tune in to Couric. That reduces the influence that the network news has on public opinion. its hardly a surprise 0bama's approval ratings collapsed in just a year, the Democrats have lost NJ, VA and MA, despite the network news people, being a propaganda department for 0bama and the Democrats.

“But, whatever FNC is taking from the networks is only a TINY fraction of the viewers that network news has lost the last 20 years. “

Add up the 3 million from Beck through to the 4 million for O'Reilley, 2.8 million for Hannity, plus Greta, plus the daytime Fox news programs, and assume that different people are watching Fox news at different times, and Fox news will parable trump any of the 6:30 network news programs in total viewership on a regular basis.
When there is breaking news, and people turn on the TV, they are likely to turn to one of the cable news programs rather than the networks. The way things are going, with Fox news making ,ore profits than all the 3 network news combined, the cable news programs are gradually going to have the network news programs for lunch.

[RicocheT]

You don’t need all that staff when you just read White House press releases and Democrat caucus talking points.

[OldDeckHand]

"Add up the 3 million from Beck through to the 4 million for O'Reilley, 2.8 million for Hannity, plus Greta, plus the daytime Fox news programs, and assume that different people are watching Fox news at different times, and Fox news will parable trump any of the 6:30 network news programs in total viewership on a regular basis."

If you're going to add the prime-time numbers and compare them to the network's news number, then you also have to add in the network morning news numbers. From TVNewser on the network evening broadcast ratings from the week of Feb. 8...

ABC.....9,240,000
NBC....11,050,000
CBS.....7,090,000

And, from that same period for cable news, again from TVNewser and measuring average daily and unique viewers...

P2+ Total Day
FNC – 1,460,000 viewers,
CNN – 479,000 viewers
MSNBC –389,000 viewers
CNBC – 176,000 viewers
HLN –337,000 viewers

While FNC is a very successful cable network, the numbers don't lie. They still only represent but a fraction of the combined network news coverage, and they account for even a smaller percentage of total lost network viewers over the last 20 years. People didn't stop watching broadcast news (and reading papers, for that matter) because of "media bias". They stopped watching because they were dead.

[OldDeckHand]

"If you're going to add the prime-time numbers and compare them to the network's news number, then you also have to add in the network morning news numbers."

I forgot to include those numbers for the morning network news shows. They can be found here.

Total Viewers Adults 25-54

ABC.....4,680,000
NBC.....5,750,000
CBS.....2,830,000

[Jack Hydrazine]

Why do I call Faux News instead of using its standard spelling? Do I think the content is anywhere as conservative as I and many other people would like it to be? No. And this is reflected in their numbers, too, with the net result being lost viewership for everyone.

What this country needs is a news organizations created, run, and broadcast by conservatives for conservatives.

We are in the computer age and news will continue to be viewed more and more with computers. How it will be archived without the possibility of alterations to it (with the intention of re-writing history is going to be interesting.

All of the major news organizations have their own internet websites but now they have to compete with everyone else. The only things that will ultimately save them is their content and their ability to innovate.

[sionnsar]

What they need to ask themselves is: Why should people tune into ABC News? What distinguishes it?

Teeheevee news is worthless, even as entertainment. I tuned in in 1980, tuned out in 1981. Don't miss it one bit. Not only is it a waste of time, it's dishonest.

[Jackknife]

[Walkingfeather]

er..... uh....hmmm ooookay...

[SmokingJoe]

If you're going to add the prime-time numbers and compare them to the network's news number, then you also have to add in the network morning news numbers. From TVNewser on the network evening broadcast ratings from the week of Feb. 8...

Now why don't we compare total prime time on Fox News to prime time network news on NBC or CBS or ABC?
Or alternatively, add the whole day of all cable news to the whole day of news programs on the networks?

I'll just pick the last day we have the figures for, Thursday, Feb 25th, just for prime time, and assume that the folks who watch Beck at 5PM, are not the same people who watch O’Reilley at 8PM (people have a life, and going by comments on FR, most people who watch Hannity can't even stand O’Reilley), and that those who watch O’Reilley at 8 pm , are not the same people who watch O’Reilley at 11 pm(why would anyone watch the same program twice in the same day?).
5PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
Glenn Beck – 2,462,000 viewers (603,000) (1,146,000)
The Fox Report w/ Shep – 2,248,000 viewers (609,000) (1,050,000)
8PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
The O’Reilly Factor – 3,493,000 viewers (923,000) (1,615,000)
PM – P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
Hannity – 2,842,000 viewers (749,000) (1,417,000)
10 PM P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
On the Record w/ Greta—2,235,000 viewers (584,000) (1,106,000)
11 PM P2+ (25-54) (35-64)
The O’Reilly Factor— 1,376,000 viewers (469,000) (805,000)
http://tvbythenumbers.com/2010/02/26/cable-news-ratings-for-thursday-february-25-2010/43195

That gives us a total of a massive 14,656,000 who watched Fox news at prime time alone. That totally trumps those who got their news and commentary from ABC, CBS or NBC, at only.:
ABC.....9,240,000
NBC....11,050,000
CBS.....7,090,000

And this was not even a particularly high ratings day for Fox News, in view of the Olympics siphoning away some viewers.

[SmokingJoe]

I forgot to include those numbers for the morning network news shows.

You will find that if you added in Fox and Friends(6:00AM-9:00AM), together with a solid 8 hours of Fox daytime news programs from 9 am to 5 pm(when Beck starts), Fox News will probably trump any of the networks in total viewership as well.

[namvolunteer]

Here’s a little starter kit for you:

http://www.westlinntidings.com/news/story.php?story_id=119688465157959900

http://crimene.ws/craigscrimelist/

http://www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/editorials/articles/2009/04/23/crime_and_craigslist/

I’m not giving you fish, I’m teaching how to catch them. Give Google a try.

[george76]

ABC is just removing the middle man.

Now, direct from the DNC...WH