T. Lynne Pixley for The New York Times Try to imagine Jeff Zucker's inbox on Wednesday morning.
Along with all the e-mails from friends and former colleagues asking “Is it true?†- namely that he is the choice to run CNN Worldwide, as The New York Times reported Tuesday - there surely are some suggestions, prescriptions and outright pleas.
That is, the many helpful, unsolicited, “What to do†e-mails. Seemingly, every executive and analyst in the media business has an idea or three for CNN/U.S., the United States outlet of the cable news pioneer, which has lagged in the ratings for several years now. And this year's executive change (Mr. Zucker is in line to replace Jim Walton, who has been in charge for nearly a deca de) has been an excuse to dust them off. It's as if CNN is a blank canvas of sorts - something to project hopes, dreams and business models onto.
These suggestions necessarily are constrained by the profit motive driving the network's parent company, Time Warner, and its commitment to a journalistic tradition of nonpartisanship - despite the lure of the success of Fox and MSNBC. What follows are some of the many visions for CNN that have been bandied about in recent months and surely have made their way to Mr. Zucker:
Cover News Now
Just do the news, and consistently do it well. This is harder than it sounds, but it is a favorite answer, particularly among those who say that CNN's current news product is sloppy and uneven (terrific at some hours, unwatchable at others). When the CUNY journalism professor Jeff Jarvis asked his Google+ followers how they would reinvent CNN last summer, the most-liked comment was this one: “be a domestic version of BBC World News.†The commenter, Alan Bedenko, proposed eschewing “phony entertainment nonsense and semi-informed ‘Situation Room' type garbage†in favor of “straight news.†No gimmicks, no distracting graphics, no holiday gift-giving segments or movie star interviews.
Celebrity Names Network
Mr. Zucker “needs to bring his trademark ‘star power' to the network,†the media industry consultant Adam Armbruster told Reuters.
Might that include some superstar hosts? There are a handful of A-listers that television executives dream about having on their screen, like Bill Clinton, George Clooney and Bono - though it's hard to imagine that any of them would be willing to host a daily show. Mr. Zucker could conceivably recruit stars from other networks, like Katie Couric (he helped start her syndicated talk show earlier this year) or Joe Scarborough (he supported the creation of “Morning Joe†on MSNBC).
Computer Networked News
Despite decades of talk about integrating television and the Internet, television news still mostly exists as a standalone service, and CNN is no exception. Could Mr. Zucker be the executive to change that? Imagine a television channel that simultaneously lives online, with anchors who ask guests questions from Twittering viewers without making a big deal about it; with producers who use webcams to gather opinions from voters, rather than paid pundits; with reporters who talk “up to†viewers, rather than “down to,†because they know that if a viewer is unsure about a certain word or phrase, cnn.com, or, alternatively, Google is just a click away.
Curated Narrative Nonfiction
Many other cable channels have found success with nonfiction stories about people and places - “reality shows,†let's call them, for lack of a better label. CNN has already started to move in this direction, recruiting Anthony Bourdain and Morgan Spurlock to host taped series on weekends. It has also hired an executive to oversee acquisitions from third-party production companies and promoted a CNN Films label for documentaries. If the company concludes that it can't draw an audience with commodity news at night, it might try nonfiction programming during the workweek. “It's going to take someone like Zucker to make that happen,†Andrew Wallenstein of Variety wrote on Wednesday.
Comedy News Network
With the caveat that this won't happen: why not hire Jon Stewart as a consultant? The host of “The Daily Show†takes CNN to task on a regular basis for perceived faults in its programming. Mr. Stewart and his writers would surely have some suggestions for stopping some of the channel's unintentional humor. (His show appears on the sister network CNN International.) Conversely, encourage viewers to laugh at the TV set! CNN could take a shot at a news satire show like Mr. Stewart's, or at least encourage anchors to p oke fun at the stories they cover.
Conversations on the News Network
The radio industry learned years ago that it's not the news that compels listeners to keep listening - it's conversations about the news. While Fox News and MSNBC have reputations for partisan talk, CNN could think of itself as a never-ending nonpartisan live talk show, one that mentions the headlines but mostly chews on the news with its reporters and analysts. This would be a bet, in essence, that taped news packages are a thing of the past.
Checking News Network
The New York University journalism professor Jay Rosen has been sharply critical of CNN for a “he said, she said†style of journalism. His prescription for the channel: “declare jihad on the talking points and make that your identity, along with on-air fact checking.†The marketing slogan could be “the only side we're on is yours.†Mr. Rosen admitted that such a strategy is “politically risky, because there is no guarantee that the results will be balanced, all neat and symmetrical like the panel of pundits.â€
Critical Newsgathering Network
Asked what qualities he'd like to see in a new head of CNN, Tom Johnson answered, “A leader who will position CNN as The New York Times of television news - not The New York Post or The National Enquirer.†Mr. Johnson was the head of CNN in the 1990s. He recommended that it “develop the niche as THE investigative/enterprise network - the watchdog for the public!†To accomplish that, he recommended hiring “more Sanjay Guptas in specialty areas, and more Anderson Coopers,†and bringing back Christiane Amanpour full time (she currently splits her time between ABC News and CNN International).
Commercial-Limited News Network:
This one is pretty pie in the sky, given the big profits that CNN makes. But CNN could drastically curtail the number of commercials it shows, thus encouraging viewers to watch for longer stretches of time (right now it suffers in the ratings because viewers tend to watch for just a few minutes). It could, in theory, charge more for the remaining chunks of commercial time. More importantly, it could add more minutes of news each hour. At the same time it could bill itself as a public service or a public utility for the American people - a bid for hearts and minds that might create a loyal following well into the future.
Surely these aren't the only ideas out there for CNN. Please add your thoughts in the comments section.
Brian Stelter writes about television and digital media. Follow @brianstelter on Twitter and facebook.com/brianstelter on Facebook.
