World News‘ Jon Banner: We’re “Not In This Business To Be In 2nd Place”

Q&A

by Steve Krakauer | 5:18 pm, December 22nd, 2009

» 3 comments

We asked Banner for his response what Alessandra Stanley wrote today about the show in the New York Times (“With Ms. Sawyer’s arrival, the three network anchors are evenly matched in looks and take-charge personality.”)

“There’s a lot more than looks that go into an evening newscast,” says Banner. “We have a lot of people who work for this program that put their lives at risk every day in Afghanistan and Pakistan. It’s a serious business.”

There are other changes coming, in addition to “The Conversation.” There’s now a World News Twitter feed, started on Sunday. And TVNewser reports there’s a new voice to introduce the broadcast – Dirty Jobs host Mike Rowe.

And as The Conversation becomes part of the new plan, the daily World News Webcast, a shorter 3pmET version of the show, goes away. “This is somewhat of a big change for us in terms of putting the webcast on hiatus, but we think we can reach more viewers with a question of the day,” says Banner. “It’s a logical step to try to match the online mission with the on-air mission in a way that’s been absent the last couple years.”

Also – the entire broadcast can be found on ABCNews.com and iTunes, as can “The Conversation.”

Will the new web strategy produce results where it still really matters, in the Nielsen ratings? We’ll see. And the style of Sawyer can only truly be seen after a few weeks, or even months, and not just one day. But it is no doubt a different landscape now – and the competition for evening news supremacy has become a focus once again.

Here are the first two “conversations”:

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abc, ABC News, Charlie Gibson, Diane Sawyer, Jon Banner, World News

monac58

I love Diane Sawyer and I thought her first night was good. I will miss Charlie Gibson for a long while but Diane is a strong journalist and I think she will be an excellent anchor. However, ABC really needs to take a look at GMA. George Stephanopolis is not cutting it in his new role as co-anchor with Robin. I hate to see GMA go down the drain but I think it will with George at the helm. Too bad. It is the only morning show that I like to
watch.
rmbltmbl

Steve, I was wondering if you(or the Daily Show) were going to do a story on this.. http://newsbusters.org/blogs/mike-bates/2009/12/22/cnns-erica-hill-cites-networks-senate-health-care-poll-totals-110-percen — CNN’s Erica Hill Cites Network’s Senate Health Care Poll, Totals 110 Percent .. WHEN..

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/when-120-makes-sense-fox-friends-defends-poll-display/ — When 120% Makes Sense: Fox & Friends Defends Poll Display ..

Hate to be off-topic.. but we’ll have to wait and see.
adamac

The newscast seemed fine and Diane seemed comfortable, but I was a bit peeved by the Brian Ross teaser. Without any context it just seemed cheap, dirty, and unprofessional. It was like, here’s a little juicy nugget of scandal for you, but haha, you’ll have to tune in tomorrow to find out what it even is.

selenium