The conversation ranged from Piers Morgan and CNN’s prime time ratings troubles to Rupert Murdoch, Howard Stern, David Westin and Glenn Beck. Check it out:

To embed a smaller version click here.

[Doma is located on 17 Perry St. It is a new and exciting restaurant set within the confines of the coffee shop/cafe that villagers have loved for the past eight years. The cuisine is driven by the seasons and relationships with local purveyors.]

[This video was produced and edited by Ashwin Chaudhary and Ben Kahn of Juice Groove Films]

TRANSCRIPT:
SK: Is the future moving away from the NBC, ABC, CBS sit-at-a-desk-read-from-a-teleprompter?

GR: I think that, with Westin’s departure from ABC News, that may be the end of an era there. I’m not suggesting necessarily it is, but a lot of people believe that there’s one too many national network news programs at 6:00 or 6:30.

PK [TO GR]: I think you were a pioneer in something that may not even realize you were pioneering at the time, this idea of a personal brand for a journalist. Because you’ve taken that brand with you from one place to another. And it hasn’t been an ABC brand or an NBC brand or a Fox brand so much as it’s your brand. And that’s something that I think is becoming way more important.

GR: The last big star that was created, I think, was Glenn Beck. He was big at HLN — or then, Headline News — but not nearly as big [as now] because he has a bigger platform. But I think what Glenn Beck did in D.C. and what he does on his radio show is an example of that. It’s the Glenn Beck brand more than the Fox brand.

SK: Do you think that Glenn Beck is this generation’s Geraldo Rivera?

GR: You could make that argument. You certainly could, in terms of his impact. But he would have a bigger argument with the person Steven Colbert calls “Big Papa” — or “Big Daddy” — Bill O’Reilly. He’s still the number-one rated and number one in the demo.

SK: How about a time when NY1.com or FoxNews.com has a bigger appeal than NY1 and Fox News? Can you see that happening?

GR: It’s already happening at CNN. CNN has a much bigger audience on CNN.com than on CNN. And when you look at CNN now, with all due respect, to what was the pioneering network. It seems kind of dull to me. A lot of it.

PK: Yes, I see that happening, where the web audiences are bigger than the traditional broadcast audiences. It scares the hell out of me, because you look at CNN.com and there’s no substantial anchor presence on there.

GR: Maybe the new schedule will liven things up.

SK: Piers Morgan?

GR: I mean, I don’t know, not a choice I would’ve made. If they keep getting the marquee interviews, and he does a reasonable job — as Larry [King] did — just allowing the marquee players to say whatever’s on their mind. Seems pretty gray to me…

PK: This is the death of the mainstream media. Howard Stern’s problem is that he went from a show that millions of people could access everyday to a show that was in subscription obscurity. And suddenly, people stopped talking about Howard Stern. The buzz wasn’t there anymore.

GR: I see what Rupert Murdoch is doing for the Wall Street Journal and I think that that might be the Howard Stern of the Internet. If they can — if the Wall Street Journal is successfully charging for content. If you read any of the coalition of products from people doing any original reporting, there’s one reporter and a thousand repeaters.

PK: Whenever I see a story about the decline on the newspaper business, I’m thinking, “Don’t take my newspapers away!”

GR: They can read the blogs. Or Mediaite!

—–
» Follow Steve Krakauer on Twitter

There’s no single factor. I miss Paula Abdul more than I thought I would, but her departure didn’t leave too big of a hole. And it’s not that this season’s contestants are lacking in the talent department. It’s just that it all seems so … boring. Ratings for the show reflect the boredom. Last week’s numbers were the lowest since 2002. It bounced back a little last night with “movie night” performances from the final four, but an audience of 18.7 million viewers is still cause for concern at the Fox franchise.

For me, the key to the final month of “American Idol” is the transformation. It’s compelling to see the contestants turn awkward into amazing. That’s how I remember Jordin Sparks in Season Six. Clearly, she brought talent from the beginning. But it wasn’t until the middle of April that it started to become clear that her star quality was outshining her inexperience. It was fun to watch in the final stretch as she hit one home run after another.

I thought the contestant who showed the most growth this season was young Katie Stevens. She didn’t have what she needed to win, but I was eager to see her perform each week because she kept getting better. In contrast, this season’s early favorite, Crystal Bowersox, has been a contender all along. She was so strong coming in that instead of bringing excitement, she seems to bring exactly the same thing from one week to the next.

Last year, producers had Adam Lambert to keep things interesting every week. Scott MacIntyre and Danny Gokey gave the producers sad back stories to work with. Somehow, this time round it’s been hard for me to even remember all of the contestants’ names. It would be easy to say that the format is old. But I think the bigger problem is that the contestants this year haven’t given us much to get excited about. “Capable” is the unenthusiastic word that comes to mind.

I did see a few sparks last night. Most notably, the standout duet that paired Lee DeWyze with Bowersox. I smiled through the whole thing because it was clear in the first 20 seconds that they’d nailed it with their rendition of “Falling Slowly,” that song from “Once.” But those ‘that’s what this is all about’ moments have been rare this year.

It’s not as though all of “Idol” has jumped off the track. Ryan Seacrest has been solid, as usual. The show’s production has met its own high standards. And there’s been little to complain about with the selection of guests – Harry Connick Jr. was exceptional in his roles as mentor and performer. But these are just the trimmings on “Idol.” The main course is the music delivered by the contestants. As viewers, we’d like to feel that the meal was at least as satisfying as last year’s.

There are some other factors worth mentioning. ABC’s “Dancing with the Stars” has had a strong season. And it seems apparent that “Idol” is hurt directly when the shows are scheduled on the same night. There’s also an indirect impact when time-challenged viewers pick one competition over the other. The DWTS casting is great this season and ABC benefited from the show’s early media buzz: Kate Gosselin was at the top of the gossip cycle when the season started, Erin Andrews had just been in the news after the hidden camera bust and Evan Lysacek went straight to the dance studio from his Olympic gold in Vancouver.

I haven’t decided whether the new faces at the “Idol” judges’ table have hurt ratings. I’ll admit the show does miss the unpredictability of Paula’s comments. Ellen DeGeneres has moments of brilliance, like last night in response to the duet from Big Mike Lynche and Casey James. (They sang “Have You Ever Really Loved a Woman” and she dryly replied, “Yes, I have.”) She’s exceeded my expectations but I’m still not sure that she needs to be there. Kara DioGuardi has stepped it up in Paula’s absence. Her insights have been good and the chemistry with Simon seems legitimate, but she’s too reliant on her ‘feel the words’ theme. It’s hard to insist that a contestant be ‘believable’ when the themes and song catalogs are dictated by the producers.

That brings us to Simon. I’ve made the case before that Simon Cowell’s ability to get the critique right every time is the driving force behind the show’s success. He’s been too nice this season. Not always, but I think there’s been a definite pullback from his nastiest work. The warm Simon played well last year when Susan Boyle put him in his place on “Britain’s Got Talent” (video below). I suspect he’s softening his “Idol” critiques to help Americans adjust to the mentor role he’ll play when the US version of X-Factor makes its debut.

I don’t want to say the answer for “Idol” is to encourage Simon’s inner grouch to reappear, but that’s what it might take to keep viewers from remembering Season Nine as “American Idle.”

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

Something’s happening this morning. I noticed it first last night when Roger Ebert posted the link to his review, and then Pat Kiernan, Mediaite contributor and the guy who, in my head, will always be the host of the World Series of Pop Culture, noted that New York Daily News was also fairy complimentary:

I’m sorry, but how can you not want to see a movie called “Hot Tub Time Machine”? I’ve been intrigued since I read about it months ago. The premise is that a group of male friends is transported back to the 1980s via, of course, a hot tub. The New York Daily News says “this guys-gone-wild comedy is actually pretty damn funny,” due in large part to Rob Corddry, whose role is the most “memorable showcase for a goofball co-star since Michael Keaton in 1981’s ‘Night Shift.’”

Now I just may have to go check it out, and that scares me. Could this year’s Hangover really involve meta-80′s jokes and a jacuzzi that breaks the time-space contiuum? Let’s see how it does come the release of box office numbers on Sunday…

It is worth noting that Mediaite’s Smart Hollywood started this trend, with a super smart and insightful review from Wednesday. Check that review for the real deal.

I’m lucky enough to bypass it through the use of technology that I probably shouldn’t discuss publicly. All week, I’ve had the luxury of watching just about anything I want live on the CTV feed from Canada. I guess the NBC thing just irks me on principle.

I reached a new level of frustration last night as I sat at home watching coverage of the women’s bobsled runs. There’s only one good reason for people to be standing in the dark at Whistler watching sliding events. It’s because a 5 pm start in Vancouver matches perfectly with NBC’s live 8 pm ET telecast. I watched with excitement on CTV as Canada 1, Canada 2 and USA 2 lined up for gold, silver and bronze finishes. Then, I reached for the remote to see if the “live” NBC had an interview with the US team. When I got there I realized that NBC was even delaying an event that it could have delivered live. I think it was a good half hour later before the race was “over” on NBC.

I was at the Whistler Sliding Center last week, hiking through the snow on a barely lit path for an event that was scheduled at night for the benefit of TV networks. If they aren’t going to put it up during the nighttime events couldn’t they just let the organizers run them in the afternoon? It’s a lot more spectator friendly to gather people on a mountain when the sun is shining.

These are all points I made in my Mediaite column on this topic two weeks ago, so I won’t drag out the argument again. The reason I’m back on the rant today is that there was great news in the New York Times this morning. The paper says ESPN intends to make a pledge for live coverage part of a bid for the Olympic rights in 2014.

The Times quotes John Skipper, ESPN’s vice president in charge of content, saying he doesn’t think “nonlive is sports fan-friendly.” NBC’s got one more Olympics on their contract before the rights are sold for the 2014 and 2016 games. In the article, NBC defends its adherence to the tape delay and says it’s unlikely it will change its strategy for the 2012 Summer Games in London. The network points to the 25.5 million viewers who tuned in to watch prime time coverage of the Vancouver Games, a number that knocked “American Idol” out of its long-held number one spot. But ESPN executives believe that NBC’s revenue model, one which emphasizes prime time ads, will be outdated by the time 2014 rolls around. Said the network’s president of sales: “It will be an online, on-demand world, and those of us in front of it believe the ad models will be there to monetize it.”

NBC is way behind it. They may have a monopoly on anything Olympic right now, but they no longer have a monopoly on the news — my CTV feed tells me that, not to mention Twitter. Time to catch up, NBC – like it or not, there are other options. And you know what they say in the Olympics — let the best competitor win.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

When they want to be outside with the crowd, they’ve got a ski hill and skating rink. Inside, they’ve built a full interview set. And I love the name the NBC technical crew has given the temporary studio in my native country. They’ve replaced New York’s “Studio 1A” with “Studio 1-eh.” (Al Roker relayed that clever name on air this morning, giving credit to veteran NBC cameraman Bob Jaeger.)

The Today Show is one of my favorite parts of the NBC Olympics lineup. It’s the perfect showcase for some of the local color and Olympic history that would seem intrusive in the middle of event coverage. The morning-after interviews with winning athletes are a perfect complement to the network’s primetime showcase.

It’s just too bad NBC insists on still clinging to its tape delay philosophy for the Winter Olympics because there’s so much to like about the way the network covers the games.

NBC has 835 hours of Olympic programming scheduled on its television networks. That’s twice as much as viewers were offered for Turin’s games four years ago. And if there ever was a year for NBC to give up on its tape delay, this was it. The growth of online news and the rise of Facebook and Twitter make the network’s tradition of holding back video from key events for hours seem more ridiculous than ever. And this year would’ve provided an easy transition, thanks to Vancouver’s proximity – every event occurs at a reasonable hour for coast-to-coast live coverage.

I understand how the policy started. When NBC began its current run of Olympic telecasts in Seoul in 1988 it didn’t have to compete with a thousand other news sources. Advertisers liked the idea that a huge audience could gather each night for a tightly-packaged telecast. But as each year passes, more viewers get early access to results and the delay policy grows more insincere.

I’m headed to Vancouver Saturday morning and fully intend to tweet (@patkiernan) and blog from the events I attend. Should I consult the NBC schedule to see if I’ll be ruining someone’s primetime viewing enjoyment by sending an update about the biathlon on Tuesday? Even if I decided to delay a tweet for NBC’s benefit, do I delay until 8 pm ET for the Eastern US audience, or am I compelled to hold back until the news is out on the West Coast?

In fairness to the network, there are plenty of second-tier events available live. But it has used its clout to push many events into the 8-to-11 pm ET window. Monday’s luge event, for example, starts at the spectator-unfriendly time of 5 pm PT. I’ll be attending the event at Whistler and shivering in the dark just so NBC can put a “live” bug in the corner of the screen. I’d feel better about that if the network at least delivered the luge-in-the-dark telecast to the entire country live. But it’s only the Eastern and Central time zones that get that privilege. Western viewers see the “live” marquee events on a further tape delay – something that seems to have entirely escaped the network’s promo producers:

By now you’ve heard that NBC overpaid for the Vancouver 2010 TV rights, so the network has little interest in departing from its proven program strategy. In a Wall Street Journal story this week, NBC noted that three-fourths of its US TV audience is in the Eastern time zone. But there are plenty of viewers interested in finding a way around the delay. The Seattle Times published a lengthy Q and A for viewers looking to circumvent the blackout. (Short summary of the story is that you’re stuck with whatever NBC gives you.)

A solution does exist, if the executives at NBC are interested. Canada’s broadcasters do great ratings with a hybrid schedule that delivers every big event live as it happens, and then repackages the big moments into a primetime show. CTV will keep its primetime show fresh by bringing winners into the studio for live interviews to follow the replay of the daytime events. The athletes have often been whisked from venue to studio and it’s a joy to watch their reaction as they see the coverage of their win for the first time.

From the early indications on Today, it’s clear that NBC is spending the money to deliver a great product with its Vancouver 2010 coverage. I don’t have access to the viewer research that leads the network to believe the time delay is its only option, but in the long run I think the network needs to acknowledge that the tape delay is as outdated as the term “tape delay.” (We use video servers to record most programming now.)

The 2012 Summer Games will be in London, with live events coming from a time zone perfectly suited to daytime programming in the US. Millions more will be plugged into mobile devices and social media by then. It will be the perfect time for NBC to make the switch to live feeds for all.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

When we do a story looking back at 2009, I typically say “Two Thousand Nine.” And when 2010 comes up in a script my first instinct is to continue the pattern and say “Two Thousand Ten.” But it’s time for a format change.

There is, of course, no governing body to make this decision for the world. And it’s not like “Two Thousand Ten” is horrible. But we’ve got to think ahead on this so we can get back into the pattern that leaves us with easy historical references like the “Summer of ’69.” The example set by the media in the next few days will be a critical one. Whether it’s Ryan Seacrest and Dick Clark on “Rockin’ New Year’s Eve” or Anderson Cooper on CNN, anybody who’s on the air this week will have to figure out how to react to the number 2010.

I’ve been watching my colleagues to try to get some affirmation of my choice. There is little consistency. Carson Daly was on the Today Show this morning saying “Two Thousand Ten.” We’ll see if he sticks with that when he hosts NBC’s countdown tonight. I listened to some of NBC Nightly News to see what direction Brian Wiliams was taking and didn’t find a reference to 2010, but I did hear him say “Twenty Twenty-Five.”

I checked with friends at CNN and there’s been no clear directive to the network’s anchors and reporters. But the promo announcer on the tease for the midnight coverage didn’t fall in line with me. He says “countdown to two thousand ten.”

I looked to the Brits for some affirmation. ITN’s reporter said “Twenty Ten” in a lookahead to London’s fireworks celebration. That definitely seems to be the pronunciation favored by my counterparts in Canada — likely driven by the fact that they’ve been talking about “Vancouver Twenty Ten” for years in their pre-Olympic coverage.

I crowd-sourced the question on Twitter and got dozens of responses and a clear consensus in favor of Twenty-Ten. Two followers led me to the TwentyNot2000.com website, which weighs in with this: “If we don’t fix this now, we’ll be stuck saying years the long way for the next 99 years. Don’t let that happen!”

Cleveland Plain-Dealer reporter Tony Brown wrote about the topic last week. An expert at the Oxford English Dictionary told him it’s obvious why we started the decade with “Two Thousand” instead of “Twenty Hundred.” From there, we were led to “Two Thousand and One” by the iconic science fiction movie. But with 2010 we are in a position to make a clean break.

So join me in the transition to “Twenty Ten.” As my interim reminder, I changed 2010 to “20-10″ in broadcast copy. I’m betting I’ll only need to do that for a few weeks, because a month from now “Twenty Ten” will be comfortably routine.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

Related:
The Aughts: A Decade of “Huh?” [Mediaite]

It’s an interesting move, but I don’t think we’re getting a glimpse into the true future of journalism. Rather, I’m betting it’s just another of the steps along the way toward convincing the public that quality content isn’t free.

The Herald launched its PBS-style donation campaign this week, according to their crosstown rivals at nbcmiami.com. (The story appeared under the headline, “Brother, can you spare a dime.”)

When you click on the invitation to donate you’re taken to a credit card form that asks you to “consider a voluntary payment for the web news that matters to you.”

I’m overselling the Herald’s donation request by comparing it to PBS. When a PBS station is in the pledge drive, there’s no escape. When the Andrea Bocelli concert or Ken Burns documentary grinds to a halt, you have little choice but to listen to the reminder that quality content isn’t free. This is why I don’t think the Herald is actually thinking this will become a significant revenue source. The donation appeal is about as subtle as it could possibly be and there’s no recommended amount.

When asked about the potential revenue, Herald vice president Elissa Vanaver admitted to NBC that this is new territory. “We’re putting it out there to see if it works,” she said.

It’s tough for any for-profit business to make an argument for a donation. Can the donor be guaranteed that the pledge is actually going to “support ongoing news coverage” or is that dollar just as likely to end up underwriting McClatchy CEO Gary Pruitt’s $2.9 million compensation package? If the Herald is serious about adding donations to the revenue mix, there should be a clearly established destination for the funding. A reader might feel better about making a donation if he knew it was going to fund a part-time reporter position dedicated to his county.

And the Herald’s appeal for handouts would have more impact if it wasn’t stamped on the bottom of every single page. It might be possible to convince someone a donation is in order for a groundbreaking investigative report or maybe a Dave Barry column. Somehow “Celebrity Birthdays on December 15” doesn’t seem quite as worthy of the charity treatment.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture.

Washington Post columnist and Power Grid #3 Dana Milbank delivers an impassioned Sunday column today, using a literary allusion and extended metaphor to describe the dealmaking that occurred yesterday in the Senate. It’s all very Southern — straight out of a Tennessee Williams play, he contends in “Sweeteners for the South.” And it may sound like your typical gimmicky op-ed fare, but it works this time. I mean, her name is Blanche.

Her, of course, being Sen. Blanche Lincoln of Arkansas, the final hold out among the Democrats in the Senate, all of whom were needed to keep the bill alive. The other Senator in need of wooing was Sen. Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, who earlier in the day agreed to support the proliferation of the legislation in return for a financial “fix” for her state. “And it’s not a $100 million fix. It’s a $300 million fix,” she said.

Milbank writes:

The plot was gripping — the bill survived Saturday’s procedural test without a single vote to spare — and it brought out the rank partisanship, the self-absorption and all the other pathologies of modern politics. If that wasn’t enough of a Tennessee Williams story line, the debate even had, playing the lead role, a Southerner named Blanche with a flair for the dramatic.

On Lincoln, he continues: “Like other Democratic moderates who knew a single vote could kill the bill, she took a streetcar named Opportunism, transferred to one called Wavering and made off with concessions of her own.”

The entire story is an illustrative tale of politics in their most nakedly loathsome, “we always knew it was this way” way, spun by Milbank into a compelling narrative. It’s a perfectly frustrating and instructive Sunday read. And here it is.

(h/t Pat’s Papers)

I had the privilege of providing Americans with the chance to dust off their stockpile of pop culture ephemera as host of VH1’s “World Series of Pop Culture.” They even paid me to recite the lyrics to “My Humps” using my best monotone.

But the competition has been off the air since the summer of 2007, when VH1 decided its future was anchored in reality shows.

After two years, you can imagine the stockpile that has accumulated in my head. Rather than randomly quizzing fellow subway riders about 90s TV show-themed trivia, I decided to turn to the broader audience online — so today I launched “Pat’s Trivia Quiz,” a daily pop culture trivia quiz at PatsPapers.com.

I have had grand plans for about a year to create a serious online competition that would match the intensity of the televised WSoPC. But every concept I came up with was too easily ruined by Google. Unless you are face-to-face with contestants in a controlled environment like a TV studio, there’s just no way to guarantee that they’re not searching for every answer.

So for now you’ll find more emphasis on nostalgia rather than on competition when visiting the trivia page of PatsPapers.com. Small prizes will keep it interesting. But my main goal is to re-assemble the loyal “World Series of Pop Culture” audience and eventually find a new TV home for an annual championship.

And because I know you have been wondering, Jack Black’s Dewey Finn assumed the name “Ned Schneebly” to scoop his friend’s teaching gig.

A new question goes up daily at 11:30 am Eastern Time. You can also follow the questions on Twitter: @patkiernan.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture.

Content from Reuters, Bloomberg and CNN will fill the spaces normally occupied by the Associated Press. And, if editors are creative, readers won’t have a clue that anything has changed. But the simple test of “can we get by?” overlooks the broader role of the AP because much of what the AP provides is unseen by readers, listeners and viewers. The organization keeps event calendars, staffs bureaus in state capitals, distributes pool reports and acts as a non-partisan clearing house. In short, the AP is the 24-hour foundation for almost every newsroom in the country.

Participation in the AP is a given. It’s part of the infrastructure that allows journalists to do their work. For a legitimate newsroom, it’s as necessary as insurance, taxes, and the electric bill. It’s also expensive. And many publishers, the Tribune Co.’s included, are balking at the AP’s high fees.

The AP knows it’s expensive and has been cutting fees. The wire service estimates the typical fee a news organization pays will be 20 percent lower in 2010 than it was two years earlier. Give customers a 20 percent price cut in any other industry and you’d win them over. But it the hysterical environment of newspaper publishing, it’s not enough. Saying their revenue declines are even steeper, Tribune wants to see what its papers look like without the AP’s contribution.

There’s no denying that the raw materials are out there. But so are a million recipes for a Thanksgiving turkey.

I’m particularly sensitive to this because I come from the broadcast side of things. I remember my early days in radio news, when, on Saturdays and Sundays, I was the entire newsroom. I did a decent job of picking up the local news by working the phones. But for everything else, I turned to the wire service. I depended on the editors at the AP to monitor national and international stories. And so did my listeners.

TV news operations are bigger, but that doesn’t diminish their reliance on the wire. Without the AP assembling and editing a package of national coverage every day, local newsrooms would be responsible for that gargantuan effort on their own. I’m not sure if that’s even possible. But even if it were, it’s definitely not necessary.

The days when a newsroom, even in the most ambitious newsroom, provided all of its content are over. There are some stories where diversity of reporting is useful, but there are many others where you just need a simple accounting of the facts. Those are perfect opportunities to use the wire service — so your own reporter can cover another story.

It’s not that I don’t understand the logic behind the Tribune experiment, I do. Because of the Internet, free news is available in so many places that neither readers nor publishers want to pay for it. But as much of a problem as that poses for the business model of a newspaper, it’s an equally daunting one for the AP. The sheer volume of content they provide means that more of it gets e-mailed, linked to by bloggers and ultimately, is not paid for.

And every newspaper that decides it can do without the Associated Pres means less money available to provide a foundation of coverage. At some point, this becomes a big problem for smaller news organizations that can’t do what Tribune is doing and find other places to source the news.

It’s true that anyone who is interested in the goings-on at the White House doesn’t have to wait for the AP. They can just subscribe to the Obama Administration’s press alerts on e-mail. Or stream video from press briefings. Or subscribe to the Twitter feed of two dozen White House reporters.

This is undoubtedly what is going through minds over at the Tribune Co. There’s no denying that the raw materials are out there. But so are a million recipes for a Thanksgiving turkey. Or dozens of blogged opinions about the health care debate. And I still see the value in having an experienced editor do the sorting for me.

Yes the AP’s high fees pay for content, but they also pay for an essential editorial process, one that is continues to get second-billing as the industry struggles to find a profitable business model. Replicating a system that works well when newsrooms and reporters are being slashed left and right doesn’t make sense. What does is paying a well-established organization a healthy fee so reporters can concentrate on producing better stories. If the Tribune Co. doesn’t realize this yet, I hope they will by the end of the week.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

Somewhere in the rush to fill dozens of hours a week with reality-competition shows we’ve left behind the traditional studio game show.

I became a game show fan long before I hosted Studio 7 and World Series of Pop Culture. My mom and her parents watched just about every game show on TV when I was growing up. So I watched them too.

We had opinions about all of them. It took us years to get over Chuck Woolery’s removal from Wheel of Fortune. We loved watching Tom Kennedy get genuinely excited to give away the big prizes on Name that Tune. Our fellow Canadian Alex Trebek at the helm of Jeopardy when it returned in 1984 made it all the more sweet.

Ratings prove there’s a big audience when networks program a good game show. Millionaire’s 1990s primetime run proved how big the numbers could get. After decades on the air, Wheel of Fortune is still appointment viewing. It did a 5.6 national rating in July. Jeopardy wasn’t far behind with a 4.9 rating. (Those numbers are bigger than the ratings for Judge Judy and Oprah. Oprah.)

But of course, not all game shows are created equal. Some of the genre’s newest assume that audiences want more show than game. I’m not convinced. Deal or No Deal can be great TV. But the play-at-home value of the show starts to wear thin because there really is no game to play.  What I prize is a real test of skill and logic.

Jeopardy and Wheel of Fortune are classics for a reason. They attract generations of fans because they are smart entertainment. Excitement, big prizes, lively hosts, clever graphics and scantily clad models are part of the package. But the core attraction of a game show is the game.

The stakes are high for Let’s Make a Deal. It isn’t my favorite format, but I’m all for it if Wayne Brady’s sharp wit can help to prove to that there’s room for classic studio game shows to make a comeback. To make sure it’s faithful to the original, 87-year-old creator Monty Hall (another Canadian!) will act as a consultant and may appear on the new version to give his blessing to Brady. CBS has the right instinct with Deal — it’s fun, affordable programming. The network also has revivals of Pyramid and the Dating Game in the pipeline. (Disclosure: I’m a big fan of Dick Clark’s work on Pyramid and auditioned for the revival, but wasn’t selected for the June pilot.)

In the 60s, 70s and 80s the big three networks all had a daytime game show block. Only The Price is Right survived. I’m hoping good ratings for primetime Millionaire and Let’s Make a Deal will remind network programmers, as well as the rest of us, that a straightforward game show has timeless appeal. The oldies are still the goodies.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

Related In Classic TV Game Show Moments: Cliff Clavin on Jeopardy on Cheers …

American Idol is one of the only shows I seem to be able to make time for regularly.  I’ve long said it’s a near-perfect reality television creation, and the masses seem to agree.  The ratings have turned Idol into a billion-dollar franchise for Fox Television.  So the negotiations with the stars for contract extensions are less about what their services are worth and more about protecting the franchise at almost any cost.

With auditions getting underway, there’s pressure to wrap up contract details for all of the principals.  From the perspective of a devoted viewer, these are the pieces of the puzzle that Fox must re-assemble to keep the audience coming back:

Simon Cowell: Indispensible and he knows it. There’s a reason he’s talking about a contract extension worth several times as much as what Seacrest settled for.  The show changes dramatically without him.  It’s not just the cutting remarks.  It’s the fact that the cutting remarks are always right.

Ryan Seacrest: Like any host, Seacrest is worth a lot to Fox simply because he’s established.  But he brings two other key assets that increase his value.  One:  the full package of his radio, cable and online buzz.  And two:  he’s just a damn good host.  It’s an old-fashioned live show and he’s remarkably adept at saying the right thing at the right time.

Randy Jackson: I don’t see Idol taking a big ratings hit if Randy was ousted in a battle for a bigger contract.  But I do think he consistently adds an informed viewpoint.  And we’d all miss the “dog” routine.

Paula Abdul: She gets wackier every year, but I still think the show would suffer if she left.  This year she seemed particularly uncomfortable delivering what appeared to be rehearsed comments to contestants.  But I’d still like to see her back next year.

Kara DioGuardi: Did the show need a fourth judge?  Of course not.  The introduction of Kara was an insurance policy to keep the contract renewals for the other three in check.  For obvious reasons, Kara is easiest to swap in for Paula.  But I think she could also keep her head above the water stepping in for Randy.  The “Bikini Girl” gag in the May finale scored her some personality points.

With these principles in place, the real key to ongoing success for Idol is to keep delivering the big stars the audience has come to expect.  Unlike many of its talent show competitors, Idol really does find stars who go on to make hit records. One recent misstep has been in casting contestants like Carly Smithson and Joanna Pacitti, who weren’t truly new to the record business. Viewers don’t like this and neither do I.  Discovering the “diamond in the rough” is the strategy that made Idol a gem in its own right.

So, congratulations to Ryan Seacrest for his big deal to keep the Idol profit machine humming.  I suspect the other contract talks will wrap up soon.  And then we can move on from signing to singing.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture. Twitter: @patkiernan

And I’m not even talking about the economy being a mess.  I’m talking about the fact that VH1’s Best Week Ever may have paid tribute to pop culture news for the final time.

Officially, VH1 has put the Friday night program on an extended hiatus.  There’s supposedly a plan to bring Best Week Ever back next year, but a new incarnation may not have much in common with the program I’ve come to know over the past five years. The employees have moved on with the assumption that they won’t be back.

As an occasional contributor to Best Week Ever, I’m sad.

Of all the segments I did for Best Week Ever, that missing shirt gag was my favorite:

Aware of VH1’s reliance on celebrities, the show tried not to directly “bite the hand” with open ridicule.  The producers often told me of their mandate to “celebrate” the quirky moments in pop culture.

The challenge of mocking without being cruel forced writers to get creative.  And they usually succeeded.  Like any topical comedy show, they had their ups and downs.  It was tough to chart a consistent path when the format ‘tweaked’ so often. But at its heart was a smart, funny review of the week’s events that was a fine fix for a pop culture junkie.

Paul F. Tompkins was the name most associated with “Best Week Ever” in its final season.  But the show built a talented roster of regular contributors:  Doug Benson, Chuck Nice, Judah Friedlander, Jessica St.Clair, Christian Finnegan, Jessi Klein, and Paul Scheer come to mind immediately.  In the same way that every Broadway actor seems to have done a Law & Order episode, a Best Week Ever credit became a standard part of the comedian’s résumé.

I suspect Best Week Ever was hurt by the same trend that left my beloved World Series of Pop Culture homeless.  The show attracted decent ratings and great demographics.  But then VH1 found great success with a new breed of celebrity reality shows.  The big audiences for Flavor of Love and I Love New York weren’t the people who loved Best Week Ever or World Series.

I’m sure we’ll all find somewhere else to get our sarcastic pop culture news without Best Week Ever.  But for my first column for Mediaite.com, I offer an appeal to programming executives to protect the news ecosystem: Funny and fake news shows are an important part of what gets people talking about the news.  We need shows like Best Week Ever.

I know — it’s not like there aren’t other great fake news options out there.  The online video from The Onion is often brilliant.  Saturday Night Live had a welcome surge in election season. Jon Stewart is remarkably consistent with his smart review of the day’s headlines. And hey, the BWE blog is still around! But just like mainstream news, democracy demands diversity of fake news viewpoints.  So I’m sorry that the Best Week Ever is over.

TV newsman Pat Kiernan picks his favorite stories from the morning papers each weekday on NY1 News and PatsPapers.com. He’s known to VH1 fans as the host of World Series of Pop Culture.  Twitter: @patkiernan