Most of the axed were based in the Los Angeles office, affecting in-house production and striking a yet another blow to the city's already suffering entertainment industry. The original programs Current Tonight, Current Takeover and Current Exposed have been canceled and David Neumann, the head of programming was fired. About 300 employees total remain in San Francisco, New York, the now much smaller LA office and the international offices in London and Milan.
The pioneering, Emmy-Award winning channel was originally conceived by Gore and businessman Joe Hyatt as a peer-to-peer news and information network with one-third of the on-air broadcast featuring viewer created content (VC2) and geared to 18-34-years-olds. During the 2004 campaign, Gore envisioned a news network with no political leanings
that would help change the tide of "consolidation and conglomeratization" of the media by leading the change to "democratization."
Now that videophones and Flip cameras are in almost everyone's pocket, most local news channels-as well as the cable news networks-allow viewers to email or upload raw footage and short reports. The tide of consolidation hasn't turned, but with YouTube and Vimeo, democratization has happened. If it exists, if it happened, or if you think it's a conspiracy, it's been videotaped.
Current TV's new CEO Mark Rosenthal, who replaced Hyatt, is now revamping Current to a more traditional model of 30-minute and hour-long programs, much of it to be acquired, reports Variety.
Current said it will now move money into creating departments focused on program development, licensing and acquisitions, talent management, research, marketing, affiliate relations and advertising sales. In other words, start operating like a more traditional network.
Short-form videos will continue to be a part of the network's lineup, but now as part of regularly scheduled programs.
Rosenthal, the man behind the upheaval, is the former COO and president of MTV, which made the same sort of changes in the mid-1990s, shifting from music videos to longer-form programming. The logic is that original, longer form programming attracts more advertising dollars. Current TV is available in over 59 million homes in the US, UK, Ireland and Italy thanks to cable and satellite.
No word yet on the changes from Current Media chairman Al Gore, but Current.com, the channel's internt portal reports that Current Media's COO, Joanna Drake Earl said that this year is set to be Current's most profitable year since its launch.
No wonder: A year ago to the day, Current fired 60 employees as a cost cutting measure
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- groups:
- News, Current Tonight, U.S. News, News and Information, 5 more
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- Ihatethemall
- added this
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Traditional sucks. Why do you think anyone likes Current to begin with?
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- JonRaymond
- 11 days ago
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They may need a bailout. Current is to big to fail.
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- Ihatethemall
- 11 days ago
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This is really heartbreaking to read. It's official, free speech in America is no longer free. Thanks alot Current for atleast "trying" to be different. I have lost all faith in the Media.
Your going to lose so many long time supporters. You've just lost one. I will no longer support this station or it's new policies.
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Wow, this really sucks!!! People watch Current because it is so different from other channels! They are going to try to make a lot of money, and then lose all their viewers.
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NASDAQ talks and money walks.........nobody is safe under this economy...NOBODY!!!
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Disappointing to see where the programming is going. I suppose those of us who were here first before Mr. Rosenthal who believe in Current's stated goals at inception will just have to stay and be more vocal and participatory regarding his actions ;-). What I want to know from Mr. Gore is, how do you feel about your stated goals and dreams for Current (which were the reason for my coming here to support them) going up in smoke all for the same corporate profits over a well informed citizenry you railed against in The Assault On Reason?
I refer you to your own words in the Introduction, 3rd paragraph, page 5:
"Our Founders knew all about the Roman forum, and the agora in ancient Athens. They also understood quite well that in America, our public forum would be an ongoing conversation about democracy in which individual citizens would participate most commonly by communicating with their fellow citizens over great distances by means of the printed word. The Founders placed particular emphasis on ensuring that the public could be well informed, and took great care to protect the openness of the marketplace of ideas so that knowledge could flow freely."
Somehow, I don't see The Rotten Tomatoes Show or some other Entertainment Tonight rip off accomplishing this, and I think you truly underestimate the youth audience by thinking this is all they want.
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I remember not to long ago, the staff would contact us about "changes" being made. They would ask for our input and sometimes even invite us to meetings and ask for our opinion about what should or shouldn't be changed. We were actually part of a "community" and had a voice in what happened here.
But not this time, no warning, no input, no communication at all. I could almost smell the diesel fumes from the corporate bulldozer moving in. It's not like we haven't witnessed this before. Take the government as a prime example, or what's happening to our biosphere as we speak, and unfortunately we will probably see the same in Copenhagen next month. What a bad example to set for your target audience, the ones that could make a difference. You have silenced the change to "democratization" in favor of tradition, "the advertising dollar."
What a shame.
I would also like to know how Mr. Gore feels about this, this Assault On Reason.
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thank Obama...
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The world is unfair. Current is laying people off, Fox News is one of the top channels on TV. It should be the other way around.
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- Future_America
- 6 days ago
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