Rescue CNN!

The Cable News Network (CNN) is now in third place among the three cable news networks and its viewership continues to fall.  It is the grand-daddy of cable news networks ... and that's what the public views it as.  An old fossil.  What CNN needs is a new direction and there's no better way to get a new direction than getting a new boss.  A new boss can come in and just by their very existence bring about this change.  But the new boss has to be truly new and not part of the old establishment.  Not just the guy on the next step down but someone fresh and new to the entire organization.  Not someone safe.  Not someone that will appease the old guard but someone that will give the old guard a heart attack.  Not someone beholding to people out of fondness or loyalty, but someone that will chop out of the deadwood and throw it overboard.  Someone that will call a spade a spade and treat it as a spade.

But it cannot just be anyone.  It cannot even be someone from just another "hot" media property.  It needs to be someone with a new vision for CNN.  A vision that makes sense and has a logic behind it.  A vision that is bold, fresh, and daring.  Playing things safe is how you lose ... and is the reason why CNN is now third.

Given all of this, I would like to put my name forward to be the new CEO of CNN.  My name is Scott Jensen, I'm a 45-year-old marketer, author of the 2003 white paper "The P2P Revolution" (http://www.nonesuch.org/p2prevolution.pdf) that focused on peer-to-peer networks' potential impact on the entertainment industry, and the following is my vision for a new CNN.  And if you think my plan for CNN is a good one, tell Jeffery Bewkes, Chair and CEO of Time Warner (CNN's parent company), so by using the email address at the bottom of this page.

MY CNN MAKEOVER

1) A libertarian CNN.  As this last presidential election has proven beyond doubt, there is no impartial news media.  But the truth of the matter is that there never was an impartial news media.  Read history.  Shortly after the United States of America was born, newspapers were either republican (what Thomas Jefferson represented) or federalist (what Alexander Hamilton represented).  And today the press is just as biased.  Today, Fox caters to conservatives and CNN and MSNBC cater to liberals.  As CNN's new CEO, I would stop CNN fighting MSNBC for liberal news viewers.  First, it would be very hard to be more left-leaning than MSNBC or to find more blatant and outrageous leftists than Chris Matthews, Keith Olbermann, and Rachel Maddow.  Now I know that Susan Roesgen (as exhibited by her coverage of the Chicago Tea Party) is trying to make CNN competitive with MSNBC but she still pales next to Chris, Keith, and Rachel.  Second, it is a smaller pie than to which Fox is catering.  In fact, you could combine the current ratings of CNN, MSNBC, CNBC, and CNN's Headline News and it would still be less than Fox's.  Third, there is more than just conservatives and liberals in America.  For example, there are libertarians.

Libertarianism is where young adults live and breathe and thus I, as CNN's new CEO, would better position CNN to go after advertisers' most sought-after demographic group.  Libertarianism's "Do as you like as long as you physically harm no one" is something young adults can readily understand and fully agree with.  Fiscally conservative and socially liberal is another way of putting libertarianism.  Personal freedom and personal accountability is still another way of putting it.  Libertarianism though isn't anarchy.  Libertarianism doesn't want to completely eliminate government as anarchy does.  Libertarianism views government as a necessary evil.  An evil that one must always be vigilant to prevent it getting any bigger and more powerful than is absolutely necessary for the smooth operation of society.  And as for society, libertarians believe that what makes the United States of America great isn't mob rule (a.k.a. democracy) but its Bill of Rights, which chains down mob rule.

Another nice thing about libertarianism is that until the Libertarian Party gets its act together or, an even longer long-shot, U.S. House Representative Ron Paul becomes the leader of the Republican Party, a libertarian CNN will always be in opposition to all of the current political leaders in Washington DC.  This is good.  Good for critical journalism and good for ratings.  CNN and MSNBC are now suffering because the Democrats completely control Washington DC.  There's no powerful Republican for them to complain about.  Their side won.  The only thing they can do is what Jon Stewart is doing at Comedy Channel's "The Daily Show" and that is to attack anyone that attacks Democrats, but this runs weak, transparent, and will be harder and harder to do as time goes by.  It can also cause a backlash as it can come off as kicking someone that is already down on the ground.

As CNN's new CEO, I will give the directive that all news will stop being covered from the liberal perspective and, from then forward, covered from the libertarian perspective.  I would raid Reason Magazine, Liberty Magazine, and the CATO Institute for news editors to guide and steer this new libertarian course for CNN's reporters.

2) A libertarian line-up for prime time.  I would move The Living Fossil (a.k.a. Larry King) to daytime and fire all the other prime time hosts.  In their place, I would pay whatever it takes to get John Stossel to leave Fox Business Network (after just recently leaving ABC and its show "20/20") and lead off CNN's prime time with his own hour-long Monday-Friday show.  Following after John, I would also steal away Judge Andrew Napolitano from the Fox Business Network and give him the next hour of prime time and then have Drew Carey to take take the last hour of prime time.  Each one of these libertarian celebrities are strong opinionated personalities that can more than carry a show by themselves.  I would give each complete creative control over their shows.

3)  Eliminate the commercial break.  In its place, I would stop the ticker-tape news feed at the bottom of the TV screen and replace it with advertising.  I'd have the advertiser's logo on the left and then whatever advertising message they'd like to present to the right of that.  I wouldn't allow flashing words or sounds.  I would allow multiple lines for the advertiser's message and roll them like how the news feed is presently rolled there.  I would then change CNN's slogan from  "The Most Trusted Name in News" to "All news.  All the time."

One of the benefits of this change is that it eliminates advertisers' concerns about DVR (a.k.a. TiVo) systems blocking TV advertising.  Using my advertising business model, there are no ads that DVR systems can block.  It is just solid news programming all the time.

Another benefit of this change is reducing the loss of viewers due to commercial breaks.  When a commercial break happens, many TV viewers go channel surfing to see what else is on.  And due to the fragmented nature of newscasts, there is little pulling back the viewer if they find something interesting on another channel.  No commercial breaks, no channel surfing.  This means when CNN gets a viewer, it will have a better chance of holding onto that viewer.

Now I realize that this change will make some CNN ad sales people faint and give nervous diarrhea to a few on Time Warner's board of directors, but I sincerely believe this change is needed.  And because of it, the following will explain more why it should be done, what is then possible, and how this can make CNN the news leader again.

4) Change CNN into a news boutique.  Under my administration, I would enable and encourage CNN viewers to sign up for email lists that would send them links to CNN news reports that should interest them.  All news reports will be put up on YouTube.com and properly tagged as for their content.  It will be these tags that CNN's news editors put on their news clips that will enable viewers to get email notifications when something interesting is put out by CNN.  For example, let us say that a CNN viewer is a fan of the American football team Green Bay Packers.  Whenever CNN does a report on the "Gold and Green", that viewer will get an email telling them of this fact and giving a link to it at YouTube.com.  Because of #3 above, this viewership at YouTube.com will actually increase viewership numbers AND viewers seeing advertising done during it and thus increase CNN's value to advertisers.  I will also campaign heavily to have Neilson add these download numbers into its rating system for all TV shows so they're counted for CNN's shows.

And all CNN programs would be done this way.  Viewers would be able to sign up to receive a link to an entire CNN program (such as "Larry King Live"), broad news category (such as sports), narrow news category (such as just news about the Green Bay Packers), by reporter (such as all reports done by Wolf Blitzer), by celebrity (such as Clint Eastwood), by politician (such as Wisconsin's US Senator Herb Kohl), by city/state/region (such as all news reports about Las Vegas), and so forth.  The idea is to give control over the news to the viewer.  To give the viewer the news they want to learn about rather than what some news editor thinks they should learn about.  In other words, I would turn the news room on its head.  Not top-down directed news (editors deciding what viewers see next) but bottom-up directed news (viewers deciding what news they want to see).  I would then tell the news room to focus on improving our download numbers at YouTube.com and to use those download numbers to help decide what viewers want to see more of and then this changing what CNN covers in its programs.

I would also have CNN pay for something it can currently get free.  I would share ad revenue with YouTube.com.  I would dictate that 10% of all ad revenue be given to Google.  The truth is that YouTube.com is bleeding Google dry.  As outlined above, YouTube.com would become one of CNN's helpers.  I do not believe in taking advantage one's helpers.  I believe the healthier one's helpers are, the more they can help you succeed.  So even though CNN could upload its stuff for free on YouTube.com, I would give a cut to Google.  I think 10% of ad revenue is very generous but worth it to make sure YouTube.com remains a free video-sharing website.

Additionally, I would upload news programs and individual news reports onto peer-to-peer networks.  Contrary to what is proclaimed by the music and motion picture industries, p2p networks are not evil.  P2P is simply a new distribution system and the future of entertainment.  A future that is also going to be the future of TV news.  The reason is the cost of bandwidth.  P2P networks eliminate this cost for content producers as their viewers carry that cost.  In fact, if it is possible to somehow provide links to CNN programs/reports on p2p networks, I would just post video clips to p2p networks.  Then again, if YouTube.com switches to being a p2p network (thus saving a ton of money now spent on bandwidth and this alone would probably move YouTube.com out of the red into the black), I would not make the switch.   If the technology to link to p2p downloads isn't presently possible, I would give research grants to universities to develop such p2p technology and then release it free to the public.  I would also direct the news room to go hard on any bandwidth provider that tries to limit p2p traffic.  Real hard.  As for tracking downloads on p2p networks (thus increasing what can be charged to advertisers for content distributed over p2p networks), that's already possible and done by companies like Big Champagne.

5) Relocate CNN's corporate headquarters and main studios.  As CNN's new CEO, I would be coming to shake things up and get CNN back into fit shape.  Moving CNN out of Atlanta to another city will help with this.  As for which city to which it would move, it would only have to be one that isn't in Georgia.  I would publicly put up the new location for bid.  Interested cities could bid against each other for CNN.  However, due to CNN then leaning libertarian, I would prohibit consideration of any bid that offered tax money to try lure CNN to a city.  Instead, I would encourage city leaders to get their state and local governments to give CNN and its employees tax breaks and, even more importantly, get their local businesses to put up the money, land, buildings, services, etc. for their bid.  Part of this can be those local businesses promising to sign legally-binding agreements to regularly buy X amount of advertising on CNN if it relocates to their city.

Now will some CNN employees refuse to relocate?  Yes.  In fact, I'm hoping that's the case and would give incentives to those close to retirement to take an early retirement.  This way new fresh blood can be injected into all areas of the corporation.  A new start at a new location for a new era at CNN.
6) I would tie my salary to the ratings.  I'd take whatever the CEO of CNN currently makes and lock my salary to the current ratings of CNN.  If I succeed and CNN's ratings increase, my salary would increase in direct proportion to the increase in ratings.  If I fail and ratings continue to fall, my salary shrinks accordingly.  Needless to say, if I fail for too long, I'm booted out the door.  What I will ask for is that once I have a libertarian line-up for prime time, that I be given a year to prove CNN can at least outdo MSNBC in the ratings.  My goal would be to beat Fox but that will likely take years to accomplish.

Take action!

Now if you agree with what I propose and want CNN to give me a shot at doing it, send Jeffery L. Bewkes, Chairman and CEO of Time Warner (CNN's parent company), a letter using the following email address:


When writing him an email, put at the top of the email: "Please forward to Jeffery L. Bewkes, Chairman and CEO".  The email address above is Time Warner's investor relations email address.  It is the best I can find at the moment.  If you know of Mr. Bewkes' direct email address, please send me an email using the email address below and I'll change the above one to it.

And when emailing Mr. Bewkes, be sure to give a link to this webpage so he can see the above for himself.

If you would like to send me an email, you can send it to sj@rpwsj.com.

Help rescue CNN!  Help CNN re-invent itself!  Help me become the new CEO of CNN!

P.S. Reason Magazine has done a blog post about this website.  Here's a link to it: Why Not a Libertarian CNN?