Brian Stelter of The New York Times takes a look Friday at “Nightly Business Report” on PBS as attention about business news on TV in the wake of the turmoil in the stock markets this week.
Stelter wrote, “With all the attention paid recently to CNBC and its new competitor, the Fox Business Network, it’s easy to forget that ‘Nightly Business Report’ attracts a bigger audience than the cable outlets, albeit for only half an hour a day. Three-quarters of a million people tune in on an average evening, according to Nielsen Media Research. There is, it seems, an audience interested in market news without the flashy graphics.
“‘Our challenge,’ said Rodney Ward, the program’s executive editor, ‘is to help viewers make better decisions about their financial lives, and that’s what we try to do.’
“In recent interviews, Mr. Ward and Ms. Ghraib acted enthusiastic about the new Fox entry into the business news market — ‘it’s great to have more people watching financial news,’ Ms. Ghraib said — but emphasized that their lower-key version of the news still has a rightful place on television.
“‘What viewers tell us in e-mails and focus groups is that they prize our ability to digest the vast amounts of data out there and put it in a meaningful context,’ Mr. Ward said.”
Read more here.
