TVNewser links to the videos I posted this morning and characterizes this one and says the following…

The video is full of grandiose and ultimately unrealistic quotes about the channel, like this one: “You’ll see all the NBC stars, bringing credibility and experience to MSNBC.” But my favorite comes from Bill Gates: “We’re going to really be able to change newsmaking, to do something very unique.”

I think this smacks of too much second guessing. Sure it’s easy now to say that MSNBC didn’t bring the stars and credibility and experience to MSNBC and it’s easy to ridicule Bill Gates now for saying that MSNBC is going to change newsmaking and do something unique.

To analyze MSNBC’s launch you have to put it in proper perspective and view it through what was going on at the time. The internet was the California Gold rush. Everybody wanted in. Everybody had grandiose plans. And everybody thought it would work. Why do you think Time Warner and AOL merged? In 1996 AOL was today’s Google and Microsoft was playing catch up. Today you can’t even find the AOL in AOL-Time Warner…
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When a crisis breaks out like what’s going on in the Middle East, do you stick with one channel or do you channel hop? And if you channel hop how long do you stick with a particular channel before you switch?

I don’t know if this has anything to do with what happened with the North Korea Missle Launch but MSNBC has stayed on the air way past its 4 pm ET traditional period of tape. Milissa Rehberger has been covering both the North Korean U.N. Security council resolution agreement story and the Middle East crisis. They even have live analyst Rick Francona still around.

FNC will have weekday primetime programming tonight and tomorrow in response to the escalating violence and tension in the Middle East. Greta will be live tonight with On The Record.

Sunday, The O’Reilly Factor, Hannity and Colmes, and On The Record will all be live with the regular hosts. The programs will predominantly focus on the Mideast.

UPDATE: I don’t know where else to stick this so I’ll put it here. FNC was live at 5 am covering the Bush press conference with Bob Sellers and followed a few minutes later with Donna Fiducia talking with Mike Tobin about the Middle East crisis. The only reason I know this is I had set my Tivo to record the Your World 5 am repeat and it caught the tail end of the press conference.

UPDATE 2: Shepard Smith will be leading FNC’s coverage from Israel. Bill Hemmer will be reporting from Israel tomorrow as well.

ChronWatch’s Ira Simmons speculates about trouble at the #1 cable news channel. Some of Simmons’ points I think are non starters, particularly points 1 and 2 that there are too few Democratic politicians on the network and the same old Republican politicians on the network. Those “same old Republican politicians” (who aren’t exclusive contractual contributors of FNC) are also the same old Republican politicians that show up on CNN and MSNBC.

5. The Weekend Decline

Geraldo Rivera is disliked by many Fox viewers especially Bill O’Reilly Premium Members. But since he left his 10 PM ET weekend slot to start the syndicated Geraldo at Large, the ratings have slumped. Although she was reportedly a pill behind the scenes, the departure of Rita Cosby to MSNBC also contributed to the weekend decline. Thus far Kimberly Guilfoyle has not set the world on fire with The Lineup and the jury is still out on other recent weekend personnel changes including Jamie Colby and Julie Banderas anchoring 1-2 hours both days and Trace Gallagher doing Shepard Smith’s newscasts.

John Eggerton is depressed about the news that CNN is devoting a weekly show to the War on Terror…

CNN has given a full series order This Week at War, a series of news analysis shows that have aired over the past month.

Sadly, they are right, of course. With Iraq and Afghanistan and now what seems the entire Middle East, there is enough fodder for a continuing series on our inability to avoid blowing each other up. The international stars, who I am sure would much prefer just being plain folks back home, are our sons and daughters and fathers and brothers and cousins and friends and uncles and aunts and…..

The LA Times’ Lynn Smith writes about the CNN Presents special In The Footsteps of Bin Laden…

If Christiane Amanpour could have interviewed Osama bin Laden for her upcoming CNN special, “In the Footsteps of Bin Laden,” she knows exactly what she’d ask.

She’d press him, in her trademark fashion, about “the whole Islam bit,” she told reporters Friday. “In my opinion, it’s really twisted,” she said. “He says he has one enemy, the United States. Yet the majority of those killed have been fellow Muslims.”

Someone posted the countdown to the launch of MSNBC. The footage consists of a bunch of promo spots that were used to describe the lofty goals for the channel. Admittedly, this is coming out of order since I already posted clips of the launch of MSNBC, but I needed to work on this before I could post it. Here is the video…

MSNBC.com has put up a page looking back at the last 10 years for both the network and the website. Included on the page:

- A history of some of the major stories covered by MSNBC.com

- A video retrospective of some the stories covered by the network

- A photo review of some of the enduring images of the last 10 years

Can you name all the hosts/anchors that started on MSNBC when it launched? The answer is after the jump (and I will have egg on my face if I got it wrong)…

UPDATE: Anybody got some toast to go with my eggs?

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Leo Laporte, who played Dev Nul on “The Site”, noticed TVNewser’s interview with Soledad O’Brien and comments…(photo via Laporte’s site)

I’ll never forget pitching it to NBC at 30 Rock just before Christmas 1995. Then NBC News Director Andrew Lack came in in a three-piece suit and cowboy boots. He propped his booted feet up on the table and said, “ok, let’s hear it.” It was like something out of Seinfeld.

I wish I were a better packrat. I have the 90-page treatment on a disc somewhere. If I can find it I’ll post a couple of pages.

I had hoped to be the lead reporter on the show, but the NBC executives told me I had no chance of getting on camera so they stuck me in a VR suit and the character Dev Null was born. I won an Emmy for it but the only other competition was a sock puppet character on the local Spanish language station, so it wasn’t exactly a competitve category.

Today is the official 10 year anniversary of MSNBC. I was watching that day on June 15, 1996 and taped it. Somehow I managed to keep that footage all these years in my old and decaying tape library which I’ve been working on and off to convert to DVD the past few years. So here is an MSNBC blast from the past.

UPDATE: Someone narked to the content police and so most of these videos are now gone.

Jodi Applegate was the first MSNBC news anchor on the air that day. Here are the first minutes of MSNBC on the air…

Applegate served as the viewer’s guide to what programming was being planned for MSNBC. Here, Applegate tosses to Tom Brokaw in front of the White House to announce Internight and its first guest; President Bill Clinton.

The Olympics in Atlanta were only a couple of weeks away and MSNBC would be covering it with most of their talent reporting down in Georgia (and wound up getting scooped by CNN with that bombing footage). In this clip, Applegate tosses to Katie Couric and Matt Lauer to talk about the Olympics.

Back in 1996 the Dot Com bubble was still in full expansion and one of the ways MSNBC wanted to tap it was with a show called “The Site”. In this clip, Applegate tosses to The Site’s host; Soledad O’Brien, who talks about the new show which was based out of San Francisco.

MSNBC had access to all the resources of NBC News and that meant all the file footage stored over the years in its archives. In trying to utilize that footage, MSNBC came up with “Time and Again”. In this clip, Applegate tosses to the show’s host; Jane Pauley, who talks about the program.

MSNBC wanted to have a flagship broadcast to cover the day’s news. NBC News White House correspondent Brian Williams was tapped to anchor the fledgling broadcast. At the time many thought Williams was taking a big risk with his future with this move. Who knew? In this clip, Applegate tosses to Williams who talks about the program; “The News with Brian Williams”.

Of course the whole point of the MSNBC partnership between NBC and Microsoft was to synergize the Internet and TV News and a cornerstone of that was MSNBC.com. Here Applegate goes live to Washington; the location of MSNBC.com.

As I watched this footage again for the first time in years, I was struck by how much has changed in the last 10 years and yet how much has stayed the same. The talent has changed and the programming has changed but little else has. Cable News as a whole is still trying to tap into the Internet in new and different ways. The latest incarnation on MSNBC has been “The Most”. MSNBC.com turned into a rousing success. MSNBC is still working with a live/tape formula only the format of the taped programming has changed. The Olympics continue to boost MSNBC’s ratings (though they don’t hold). Newsmaker programs are still going on on MSNBC only the format has changed to the host dominated style of Tucker, Countdown, Hardball, and Scarborough Country. The one glaring hole in my opinion is the lack of a flagship news program. I still regret the decision to move The News to CNBC where it eventualy died.

UPDATE: An emailer wrote in to note that this morning MSNBC played a clip of the opening moments for the channel…