 |
         
|
Amid these changes, NBC's newscast, which entered the year as the ratings leader and so had less incentive to revamp itself, seems remarkably stable. NBC's specialty, not surprisingly, since the Weather Channel is a subsidiary of NBC News, is Natural Disasters (661 min year to date v CBS 513, ABC 449). NBC has devoted more time than its rivals to Japan's earthquake-tsunami, to killer tornados, and to Hurricane Irene. Do not be misled by the Hard News statistic mentioned earlier into thinking that Williams' newscast is feature-free. Rather, it concentrates almost all of its hard news reporting into the top of the newscast, before the first commercial. The remainder of the newscast is considerably softer than Pelley's on CBS. The penultimate segment is usually reporter-free, showcasing anchor Williams' wry observations on celebrity or watercooler tidbits. Then NBC routinely concludes with an inspirational human interest feature, often using its Making a Difference strip format.
By contrast, CBS' Pelley has little time for those soft closings. Astonishingly, in his first four months behind the anchor desk, while ABC has given us a stray penguin chick and a migrating whimbrel and a baby lemur, and NBC has featured baboons and blue whales and a talking dog, CBS (0 min v ABC 46, NBC 23) has not filed a single animal feature.
You must be logged in to this website to leave a comment. Please click here to log in so you can participate in the discussion.
