THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1996, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, August 1, 1996 TAG: 9608010037
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Column
SOURCE: Larry Bonko
LENGTH: 94 lines
HAVE YOU NOTICED? CNN of late has been reminding viewers that they are watching live coverage of fast-breaking news.
Be it a bomb exploding in crowded downtown Atlanta or the crash of TWA Flight 800, CNN lets you know the story is coming to you live, live, live!
From the lower right-hand corner of the TV screen, the words ``CNN Live'' leap out at you, with the date and time of the day included just for good measure.
Live!
CNN didn't put that little ``bug'' in there until last month when a competitor, MSNBC, signed on. It's CNN's not so subtle way of telling viewers that the new guys may have computer-generated flash and dash, along with Jane Pauley and Tom Brokaw, but CNN is live virtually all the time.
Live!
MSNBC, a $500-million NBC News-Microsoft partnership with an alphabet-soup name, comes to Hampton Roads today. Cox Communications adds it to standard cable along with Home & Garden Television, the Cartoon Network, ESPN2 and The History Channel.
MSNBC takes over Channel 23 from The Nashville Network, which moves to Channel 56.
At the start, MSNBC's daily schedule will be 14 hours live, 10 hours of repeat programming. CNN reprises some of its programs such as ``Larry King Live,'' but by and large, it has live programming around the clock. Live!
MSNBC doesn't.
And CNN is rubbing it in.
Judging by what I have seen of MSNBC over the last two weeks - the channel was beamed to a gathering of TV critics in Los Angeles - the new channel begins life more than a step or two behind CNN. Shortly after the TWA jetliner went down in waters off Long Island, CNN had live coverage of the story well past midnight while MSNBC was repeating its ``Time and Again'' feature with Pauley.
Hold your criticism, suggested NBC News president Andrew Lack when he addressed the TV press on the day MSNBC was launched - just 24 hours before the TWA disaster. Judge us not today, but six months from now, said Lack.
For news junkies, MSNBC in its infancy may not be the same comfortable fit as the 16-year-old CNN. But MSNBC has some things going for it. Brian Williams anchors ``The News'' nightly at 9, and he's darn good at it - solid, cordial, coolly using satellite technology and computer link-ups to chat with newsmakers and NBC correspondents.
The MSNBC studios in Fort Lee, N.J., are red brick merged with shiny high-tech, which is no surprise. NBC is in league with Bill Gates, the chairman of Microsoft. He practically invented home computers.
``Not being able to do news 24 hours at NBC was frustrating for the correspondents. It was like keeping a Farrari in the garage,'' said Williams.
Well, the Ferrari is out of the garage now. With Microsoft aboard, it delivers news on cable from NBC's considerable resources. And it's NBC News on the Internet at http://www.msnbc.com.
CNN, rising to meet the challenge of MSNBC, will soon see another bear in the same cable woods, with an eye on the same picnic lunch. Fox last week said it will launch The Fox News Channel on cable starting Oct. 7.
It will be on 24 hours a day - 17 hours of fresh programming, seven hours of repeats with live updates.
With MSNBC up and running, and The Fox News Channel scheduled to begin three months from now, is that all there is to worry the CNN brass? Hardly.
Even more competition may be on the way soon.
When Disney in June announced that it had no desire to pony up $400 million for a 24-hour ABC news channel, the TV world figured that was it - Disney and ABC will not challenge CNN. Don't be so sure about that.
When he met with TV reporters, David Westin, the president of the ABC network, said Disney had postponed plans to start a cable new channel - not canceled them.
And CBS was also heard from.
That network, recently bought by Westinghouse, will not launch an all-news cable channel, said Peter Lund, president and chief executive officer of CBS Inc. However, CBS will get into cable full time, and when it does, the cable channel will make use of CBS News' archives, said Lund.
Cox Communications, the only local cable system planning to carry MSNBC at this time, has done away with its Cox Select package which cost subscribers $2.95 a month.
Instead, ESPN2, The History Channel, The Cartoon Network and Home and Garden Television join MSNBC as part of Cox's standard lineup. Turner Classic Movies, which had been included in Cox Select, will cost subscribers $1.95 extra per month starting today.
Cox marketing executive Larry Michel, in announcing that MSNBC will join the three channels from Cox Select in the standard lineup, said cable bills will rise $1.25 soon. So, let's figure the math on this.
You save $2.95 when Cox Select goes away. But if you want to keep TCM - and it's a quality channel - that'll take $1.95 of the $2.95 you saved.
That leaves you $1 ahead. That dollar plus 25 cents more will come out of your pocket for MSNBC, ESPN2, The Cartoon Network, The History Channel and Home and Garden Television. Is it worth it?
Yes, if you appreciate the joy of gardening or want to watch another news channel. ILLUSTRATION: Color logo of MSNBC by CNB