And they’re off…

CNN started off half an hour early going Live to Rome at 3:30 am with Christiane Amanpour. CNN has a helicopter flying over the Vatican beaming back live shots with a CNN logo in the corner. I haven’t seen that angle before on any network. How did they get clearance from the Italian government? I would have figured the airspace would have been closed off for security reasons. Interesting. CNN is graphics heavy at the start with the crawl still going and a big lower third. CNN is calling it “The Inaugural Mass”. Amanpour had two analysts and would also toss down to a reporter who was interviewing the crowd down on St. Peter’s Square. CNN dropped the crawl at 4 am, but the lower third is still a lot bigger than it needs to be. CNN has an English translator and not only can you hear other translators in the background but also on at least one occasion CNN’s own analysts were talking over him for a while before someone got them to knock it off! Oops. Earlier CNN had another translator translating an English reading of a Lesson being read by an American into another language for a few seconds before they cut it off. Oops. CNN is not translating everything though; only the spoken parts. Amanpour and the analysts are disrupting the event with their constant talking during every lull.

MSNBC was running a Time&Again episode on John Paul the 1st and left to start live coverage at 3:50 with Chris Jansing. MSNBC began it’s pre-coverage with no crawl and only a minimal lower 3rd saying “Inauguration Mass”. MSNBC has a camera in the air too? Ahhhhhh….now I get it. CNN is cheating. They plastered the CNN logo on top of the Vatican TV pool feed. CNN doesn’t have a chopper in the air though their logo makes it look like they do (which was a split screen…with CNN’s footage on the right and the Vatican TV ariel shot with CNN Logo on it on the left). Shame CNN. NBC is simulcasting the MSNBC feed? I don’t believe it! This is may be the first time in NBC’s history that they’ve ceded coverage of a major news event to MSNBC talent. We have achieved NBC/MSNBC synergy folks. MSNBC has three analysts and Keith Miller down on the street. The tiny lower 3rd changed to “Inauguration Mass” when 4 am came around. MSNBC later started using a bigger lower 3rd at times that explained what was going on during the different parts of the ceremony. MSNBC is having someone do play by play and translation for the ceremony. Don’t recognize the voice (it’s not an NBC/MSNBC talent) but he knows his stuff and knows exactly how the ceremony is unfolding. Aha…Chris Jansing identified the voice as Archbishop John Foley of Philadelphia; an MSNBC analyst. Smart move, using an archbishop to give the play by play. Is he doing it for MSNBC exclusively or is he doing it for Vatican TV? Can’t tell. MSNBC hasn’t gone completely quiet with it’s anchor/analyst banter though. But it’s much less frequent than CNN.

Where is FOX? No pre-inauguration coverage? 4 am comes and goes and FOX is re-broadcasting Heartland with John Kasich? Shocking. Oh wait…now they interrupted Heartland to give a feed of the broadcast. Why start Heartland at all if you’re going to interrupt it three minutes in? Inexplicable. That lapse in judgement caused FOX to miss the beginning of the ceremony which actually started a few minutes before it was scheduled to. Where was FOX Master Control? Couldn’t they see what was going on? FOX is running its regular lower 3rds and is keeping the crawl up. FOX is calling it “Pope Bennedict XVI”. FOX is cutting costs by broadcasting the Vatican TV feed only. No anchors broadcasting live from Rome. No commentary. No interviews. At least Roger Ailes got Murdoch to cough up enough cash to afford a translator. No wait…. Make that two translators as the male voice handed off to a female after an hour and fifteen minutes. Hang on….the male voice took over again a couple of minutes later. What is this? Tag team translating? After a half hour or so they switched to custom lower 3rds that copies what MSNBC has been doing since the start; telling the viewer what’s going on during a given period. I suppose it will be good to have no anchors talking for purists who want an “unblemished” ceremony but this is going to be a long broadcast with lots of lulls and FOX will essentially have dead air with nothing going on. In any case it doesn’t do the viewers any service by not having anyone to tell them what’s going on. FOX has essentially ceded coverage of this event to CNN and MSNBC who are presenting a more dynamic and interesting broadcast. FOX decided to phone it in. Not the kind of behavior I would expect from the “Leader In Cable News”…

As of 6:00 am (way past my bedtime), MSNBC/NBC is the early winner in striking the best balance between reverence and analysis. CNN’s talent is talk happy, leaving no silence unblemished, and there have been several gaffes in their broadcast so far. And they lose points for plastering that CNN logo on the Vatican TV chopper feed. FOX isn’t a player; having gone on auto-pilot.

But I’ll wager FOX and CNN will still win in the ratings given the current trends in cable news viewing habits even though MSNBC had the most professional coverage. At least those who tune in to NBC will see the broadcast since it’s a simulcast.