Bari Weiss Takes Over CBS News

Let me first say that I really, really like The Free Press (and Bari Weiss). She is taking over CBS News. That, plus The Dispatch, are daily reads for me. But I think she is going to have a much harder time there than expected.

Why? A traditional newsroom and an opinion-oriented digital media outlet function very differently and have different values. It’s apples and oranges (despite what politicians want to pretend is true to further their political goals).

I finished Marvin Olasky’s Pivot Points last year. After building a great newsroom at World Magazine (still a favorite), the board panicked because Epoch Daily was cutting into their subscriptions. They decided to become more opinion-driven to survive, and Olasky was driven out. It’s a fun read if you want to understand how journalism works, and some of these new tensions.

In the early days of my radio career, I was scolded for talking to sales. Sales and programming were never supposed to speak. In 20 years of different media work, that has loosened up, but the tension is still there. When sales dominate content creation, it ends up like the golden goose fable. That’s why many influencers flame out. They become addicted to the money, and it alters their content.

Now, opinion and newsrooms have that same tension. So I am very interested to see how this works out.