The New Face of TV News

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An hourlong newscast was seriously considered by all three networks in 1976; it faded when NBC abandoned the idea because of the unwillingness among its affiliate stations to yield half an hour of local time. Yet the stepped-up competition among the networks suggests that a reconsideration cannot be too far off.

The commercial networks will get a prod in the direction of providing more news come June, when Atlanta Braves Owner Ted Turner launches his Cable News Network. CNN will feature round-the-clock news highlighted by a prime-time broadcast from 8 to 10 p.m. The new network will also provide extensive coverage of sports and business, topics that get little attention on the major networks' evening news. Although a midget by commercial standards, CNN promises to be a feisty competitor, with seven domestic and three foreign bureaus reporting to its Atlanta headquarters. Turner has budgeted more than $20 million for the first year of operation and pledges to spend whatever is required to make CNN succeed.

ABC's rejuvenation has already substantially improved the quality of the network news on a night-to-night basis. The speed with which television reports events is a technological marvel. Says Bill Leonard of CBS: "TV has become like radio in its instant global capability. In the past two years, thanks to the satellite and the electronic camera [giving reporters the ability to transmit from the field], we have a capability that is immeasurably larger."

Television crews get better footage than ever because new lightweight videotape cameras, called minicams, give them greater mobility. Another important advance is the Chiron, a device that projects symbols, graphs and subtitles on the screen. The key words of a major speech can now easily be shown, and complicated economic stories can be untangled with Chiron-generated charts and tables. But doubts linger about how TV journalists will use their new technical skills. Bill Moyers places the challenge on Arledge's lap: "The test is whether Roone's talent for technology will be spent making the important interesting or the trivial acceptable."

The technological advances can have undesired side effects. In their zeal to get news fast and get it first, correspondents are sometimes forced to skip over stories that require much digging. "Strangely enough," says Rather, "the new competitiveness has not resulted in more stories being broken on the air."

Perhaps too much is expected of television. Because it can shrink the world with a satellite signal, people tend to think of it as a total journalistic service. "We are not," says Chancellor. "We could be on three hours a night and could not produce a Russell Baker column or an Art Buchwald piece or a Jeff MacNelly cartoon. Television is good at the transmission of experience. Print is better at the transmission of facts."