Journalism

Richard Leibner, a pioneering talent agent who represented such notable broadcast news journalists as Dan Rather, Diane Sawyer, Mike Wallace, Andy Rooney, Norah O’Donnell, Ed Bradley, Morley Safer and Fareed Zakaria, died Tuesday.

In an unusual move, the five major broadcast and cable news networks have prepared a joint open letter that urges President Biden and former President Donald J. Trump to participate in televised debates ahead of Election Day, according to two people with direct knowledge of their plans. The letter — endorsed by ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC and Fox News — thrusts into public view a question that has swirled within media and political circles: whether the presidential debates, one of the nation’s last remaining mass civic rituals in a polarized age, will occur this year at all.

CBS News and Stations is making moves to better unify CBS News, its owned stations and CBS Media Ventures, and better cover breaking news, as Wendy McMahon, president and CEO of CBS News and Stations and CBS Media Ventures, shared at a town hall meeting today. One initiative involves building a larger coverage footprint across the country, which the company refers to as a national movement of community journalism. CBS said the following cities will get new multimedia journalists, and perhaps become what the company calls a “news hub”: Cleveland; Columbus, Ohio; Des Moines; Kansas City; Nashville; New Orleans; Raleigh, N.C.; San Antonio; St. Louis; Phoenix; Las Vegas; Houston; and Tampa.

CBS News and Stations is launching a weather unit that it hopes will enhance coverage of critical weather stories at both its owned stations and CBS News. Wendy Fisher will head CBS Weather Network as VP of weather strategy. She starts April 22 and comes from ABC News. The KPIX San Francisco team will help shape coverage. Pictured: KPIX San Francisco chief meterologist Paul Heggen delivers a forecast on the station’s virtual reality set.

A bipartisan coalition with support from Hollywood power players and Prince Harry and Meghan Markle’s Archewell Foundation is working to prepare U.S. voters for a possible deepfake onslaught as the campaign year goes into high gear. With federal agencies and social media companies barely talking to each other about AI-driven misinformation threats, “this is a disaster waiting to happen — no one’s doing the public inoculation,” warned Miles Taylor, chief policy officer of The Future US, which is coordinating the campaign.

New jobs posted to TVNewsCheck’s Media Job Center include 13 openings in news, sales, digital and engineering.

Local TV can still attract a truly talented younger generation of workers. But it will need to excite them with the prospect of inventing a whole new future of local news and information.

As you may have heard, there’s a solar eclipse going on Monday, April 8, and the news networks are all over the uncommon event. The so-called path of totality will run from northern Mexico, through Texas and across the Midwest, including Indianapolis and Cleveland, then on to Maine. The last total solar eclipse in the U.S. happened in 2017, and the next one, after April 8, is scheduled for 2044.

Many of the reporters, news photogs and newsroom personnel covering the Great American Eclipse in August 2017 are still alive and likely working the April 8 redux. Not only will these broadcasters have the benefit of experience from the 2017 solar eclipse, but also those assigned to cover what Scientific American has dubbed “The Great American Total Solar Eclipse of 2024” will have a few tech, organizational and distribution improvements to enhance their coverage and reach viewers.

If local TV journalism is to have a future, its leaders need to assess the true value of everything it holds sacred and empower the change agents who may have been pushed to the margins.

Vice Television is going through a shuffle at the top, with head exec Morgan Hertzan set to exit next week and Pete Gaffney replacing him on an interim basis. The move was just announced internally by Vice Media Group CEO Bruce Dixon in a memo to employees.

The trimming at NFL Network continues as on-air personalities Melissa Stark, Andrew Siciliano, James Palmer and Will Selva are all out, according to an executive with direct knowledge of the moves.