“Hope For Haiti Now” – a global telethon.

“Hope For Haiti Now” is something of a first.  A global telethon that  will truly be seen worldwide.

CNN International will be airing the 2 hour telethon at 8pm ET / 5pm PT / 0100 GMT / 0200 CET.  It is also being aired internationally on National Geographic Channels around the world and MTV channels around the world, including China.

In Canada, the CBC and CTV are both airing the telethon.  So far, I have heard nothing about any UK or Irish terrestrial broadcasters taking the telethon.  US Local broadcasters, including affiliates of ABC, CBS, NBC, FOX, The CW and PBS, are airing the telethon at 8pm local time, except in the Central time zone where it airs at 7pm. 

Any further news on broadcasters airing the telethon, I’ll let you know.

NBR without Paul Kangas, but with a new look

On December 31st 2009, an era ended at Nightly Business Report when co-anchor and one of the founding team there, Paul Kangas, retired after just over 30 years at NBR.

He started as the Stocks anchor back in 1979, when WPBT first produced The Nightly Business Report.  Linda O’Byron and Merwin Sigale were the original anchors.  Susie Gharib joined NBR in 1998, and for nearly 12 years, they were the team bringing the world of business news every day to an appreciative American and later global audience through the internet.

Tom Hudson, also of Chicago based syndicated programmer “First Business” is now co-anchor in Miami, taking over from Paul Kangas, but it would be impossible to “replace” him.

However, that’s not the only change.  A new anchor, a new format, though some elements have remained exactly the same, a new studio set, which is entirely virtual, and a new graphic look, NBR has undergone a massive overhaul that wouldn’t have been necessary otherwise.  But because it was the end of an era, NBR needed to do something that would catch people’s attention.  And whilst the blogosphere hasn’t been hot with the new look, Newscast Studio has some info, though little is really known.

Open Thread: Sunday 18th November 2007

The Bill Moyers Journal on PBS reported this week on the FCC's proposed deregulation of media consolidation. You can read the transcript to the entire piece as well as watching the video of the programme.

My question to you is this; Is it right that the market decides who gives you your news, or should there be some form of pluralism, to ensure that different political voices, be they conservative, liberal or centrist, get heard in each and every local market?

Biased News on NPR? I don't think so!

There is a blog which purports to monitor "...rightwing, pro-government and corporate bias..." on the programming of National Public Radio News, called NPR Check. The reality is that this is a blogger that is looking for a news service to be explicitly liberal, in the same way that Fox News Channel is explicitly conservative.

Thankfully, for people like me who are fed up with biased news, from any source, liberal or conservative, NPR News is not biased, but sticks very closely to just reporting the facts. I have listened regularly to NPR's top shows, Morning Edition and All Things Considered, and I find it to be very fair, airing reporting that is based exclusively on fact rather than even the slightest agenda.

Most blogs which attack the public service broadcasters (NPR, PBS, BBC, CBC, RTE, ABC Australia etc) are run by bloggers with a conservative political bent. This one is decidedly liberal, proving that the anti-public service broadcasting community comes from all sides and colours of the political spectrum.

For crying out loud, people STOP TRYING TO FORCE EVERY NEWS ORGANISATION TO MATCH YOUR POLITICAL BENT! If you want BIASED news, there are plenty of newspapers and websites out there with enough bias to fill the Pacific Ocean!!!

Let those of us who would actually PREFER some unbiased news, some sources like the BBC, NPR, RTE etc.