Whither MSNBC?



(image via myboxinabox)

Gawker's Ryan Tate has an interesting post on the future of MSNBC in the wake of the Facebook-Fox News deal. NewsCorp, which owns MySpace, is running circles around its competitors -- MSNBC, CNN and the network paleosaurs -- in the social networking space.

Tate concludes, thoughtfully:

"As MSNBC adds coveted young viewers, who are overwhelmingly Democratic, it becomes less likely to ever seek, say, a conservative counterweight to Olbermann, or a barking pseudo-populist curmudgeon like Lou Dobbs. It would no more do such things than MTV would. And the temptation to become the winning cable network of the Obama years will be too great for MSNBC to ever truly balance its present leftward political tilt."

Liberals have a problem with admitting their political biases, and, rather, aim towards "Objectivity," that unattainable goal. "Ethics and Journalism" -- a structure created by the Journo Establishment -- is, in the present struggle of MSM-versus-ant-MSM forces -- being rendered a vanity worthy of discussion only at 3 AM on C-Span. It is noble, yeah, striving towards this unreachable Objectivity, but the Conservative side of the fence -- the Fox News-Limbaughs of the world -- as well as their unlikely allies, the anti-MSM wing of the blogosphere -- have developed an asymmetrical strategy of taking eyeballs from the Journalism Establishment's waning hegemony. The Foxxies and the anti-MSM brigade have decided to reveal their biases at the outset -- conservatives, for example, see the world through a pro-business, pro-"character" prisom of virtue -- and thus attack institutions like The New York Times as being hypocritical and pompous and unable to consciously accept their political biases (and, worse, unable to eke out a profit). Clever.

Tate's Gawker post on MSNBC's struggle at navigating narrows reminds The Corsair of two things: 1) Jon Fine's March McGraw-Hill Media Summit in New York on ''The Changing Face of News: The Power, The Influence and the Challenge of the Technologies.'' The panel included Julia Wallace of The Atlanta Journal Constitution and Howell Raines, ex-Editor of the New York Times, Jon Klein of CNN, Kinsey Wilson of USA Today, David Westin of ABC. From FishbowlNY:

"What should the New York Times do? Lightning round. Klein: 'Stop writing about themselves.' Wallace: 'Become that voice for the intellectuals of America on any platform.' Wilson: Long pause. Then he agrees with Howell --. Westin: 'It sounds right ... that they're in a middle ground that is not sustainable right now, neither fish nor fowl.' He says he doesn't know whether the (thing) is about local or a set of subjects of readers. Raines: 'I think Julia's idea of going for that elite, intellectual audience is a sound one.'''

And the second thing that Tate's post reminds us of is Ed Kosner's idea not so long ago of making US News & World Report into a sort of American version of The Economist, deeply analytical, targeting an elite audience. Such a journal, sorely lacking, would be an invaluable resource, able to command premium ad pages and revenue because of the median income and cultural influence of the readers. Of course, Kosner's grand scheme never quite worked out and he subsequently left the employ of the mercurial Mort Zuckerman in frustration.