The St. Petersburg Times Eric Deggans blogs about Campbell Brown’s appearance at a University of South Florida fundraiser today and how she can’t take questions from local press…

But that contract was signed back when she was a NBC News employee. Now that she’s changed teams, Brown isn’t allowed to do in-depth interviews for another month — which must really upset one of the $150-per-plate luncheon’s marquee backers, the Tampa Tribune.

A CNN spokesperson told me it was a stipulation in her NBC contract, Brown seems to have told USF it’s CNN’s doing — trying to keep her under wraps until they roll out her new show later this year.

Business to Business’ Tim Darnell profiles former CNN anchor Daryn Kagan (no link available)…

Where Kagan is now is head of a media company that, much like the publishers of Business to Business, owns content. www.DarynKagan.com went online nine months ago, and has led the former CNN anchor into a book deal as well as a current PBS documentary inspired by her Web site. “You can’t be just a Web site,” she says. “A media company is like a big salad bowl, owning content in all manner of forms.”

But the huge leap into entrepreneurship was made even wider for Kagan, who had never owned her own company and who, in her own words, “didn’t appreciate the creation of process.

“It was always someone else’s job to figure out the ‘how,’ as in how to do something,” she says. “When you’re on your own, there’s no one to lead you by the hand. When my Web site designer asked me if my Web site was going to use QuickTime or Flash, I thought, ‘What’re you asking me for?’ ”

Now, Kagan is in a groove, staffed by a freelance group of video photographers and editors, interns, a PR and ad group, as well as intellectual property attorneys. Her video library contains more than 140 videos that have appeared on her Web site, stories about inspirational people overcoming obstacles in life, all under the motto, “Show the World What’s Possible.” The strongest hits on the site occur at noon, 3 p.m. and 6 p.m.

CNBC scratched in Primetime in both Total Viewers and The Demo. Robin & Company beat American Morning in the Demo. 8pm was an off night across the board except for maybe O’Reilly in the Demo. MSNBC’s Doc Block at 11 was strong in the Demo, winning the hour.

Cable News Daily Live Ratings for September 28, 2007

P2+ Total Day
FNC – 832,000 viewers
CNN – 462,000 viewers
MSNBC – 328,000 viewers
CNBC – 162,000 viewers
HLN – 213,000 viewers

P2+ Prime Time
FNC – 1,410,000 viewers
CNN – 682,000 viewers
MSNBC – 432,000 viewers
CNBC – a scratch with 102,000 viewers
HLN – 344,000 viewers

25-54 Total Day
FNC – 213,000 viewers
CNN – 145,000 viewers
MSNBC – 123,000 viewers
CNBC – a scratch with 47,000 viewers
HLN- 97,000 viewers

25-54 Prime Time
FNC – 309,000 viewers
CNN – 215,000 viewers
MSNBC – 177,000 viewers
CNBC – a scratch with 43,000 viewers
HLN – 125,000 viewers

Morning programs P2+ (25-54)
FOX & Friends – 892,000 viewers (356,000)
American Morning- 349,000 viewers (109,000)
Morning Joe – 313,000 viewers (96,000)
Robin & Co. – 227,000 viewers (132,000)
(more…)

The Politico’s Anne Schroeder reports that David Shuster will be filling in on Tucker today and tomorrow…

FishbowlDC has an interesting item regarding Chris Matthews and David Gregory…

FBN announced that it has named two reporters to its D.C. Bureau…

FOX Business Network (FBN) named Rich Edson and Adam Shapiro as reporters based in Washington D.C., announced Bruce Becker, Vice President and Washington Bureau Chief for the network.

In making the announcement, Becker said, “We are pleased to welcome two new reporters to FBN to contribute to our coverage of Capitol Hill and other national business topics.”

Edson joins from Reuters, where he was a freelance reporter based in Washington covering international news. Prior to joining Reuters, Edson was a government reporter for Piedmont Television’s WTGS-TV (FOX) and WJCL-TV’s ABC affiliate in Savannah, Georgia, where he founded the stations’ first political reporting unit and coordinated government coverage.
(more…)

During CNN’s Newsroom Don Lemon talked with CNN’s Senior Political Analyst Bill Schneider about life on CNN’s Election Express campaign 2008 bus…

DON LEMON, CNN ANCHOR: And here’s what everybody’s wondering about. I’ve got to move on. But the bus — can you tell us one thing about the bus that nobody knows about?

WILLIAM SCHNEIDER, CNN SR. POL. ANALYST: About the bus?

LEMON: Yes.

SCHNEIDER: It has a very nice bed. The sides of the bus move out, and the couch folds down and it becomes a bed. And I took a snooze on it. Twice I’ve taken a snooze on that bed. Very convenient.

LEMON: Election Express. Bill Schneider, not on it today. Was on it last week. He’s back in Washington. And we thank you for joining us, sir.

SCHNEIDER: OK.

TVNewser reports that Victor Neufeld announced he was leaving CNN in a meeting today. ICN had reported the latest on Neufeld’s status a couple of weeks ago…

CNN announced that it will premiere “CNN: Special Investigations Unit – The Mind of the DC Snipers” on Wednesday October 10th at 8pm ET…

The shootings began in early October 2002 and lasted for nearly a month – a series of sniper killings that exploited the fears of a nation still uneasy from the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11 only one year earlier. Five years later, anchor and special correspondent Soledad O’Brien reports the CNN: Special Investigations Unit – The Mind of the DC Snipers about how two men, John Allen Muhammad and Lee Boyd Malvo, came to know each other and began their reign of terror. O’Brien also dissects exclusive video of Muhammad taken in prison.

The Mind of the DC Snipers will premiere on Wednesday, Oct. 10, at 8 p.m. and will replay on Saturday, Oct. 13, and Sunday, Oct. 14, at 8 p.m., 11 p.m. and 2 a.m. All times Eastern.

The documentary reveals how Malvo spent most of his early years in the tiny Jamaican town of Endeavor. O’Brien learns through exclusive interviews with the boy’s aunt, Jean Lawrence, and his father, Lesley Malvo, that Lee Malvo was a gifted student, whose troubled years seemed to begin when his mother, Una James, assumed parental custody. James, who worked as an itinerant beach vendor, appears to have been neglectful and physically abusive to the son she ultimately abandoned when he was 14 years old. Soon afterwards, Malvo met John Allen Muhammad.
(more…)

Last Friday, an article in Business Week concerning the upcoming battle with FBN and FNC.

Chances are, though, that Fox’s channel could end up looking a lot like CNBC, at least during the trading day. Hoffman acknowledges that Ailes–who ran the channel for three years before he left for Fox in 1996–tried to entice superstar Jim Cramer, whose high-voltage persona has helped boost prime-time ratings at CNBC. Ailes will probably approach the network’s other brand name, Maria Bartiromo, whom he first put on air in 1993, when her contract expires in two years. (Bartiromo is also a BusinessWeek columnist.) And he may be interested in hiring Liz Claman, the former CNBC anchor, after her noncompete agreement ends in mid-October. For now, FBN’s headliner is “tear up your credit card” radio financial guru Dave Ramsey, who will have a prime-time show. Ailes declined to comment.

FTVLive reports however that nobody has approached Cramer…

An FBN executive with knowledge of the situation tells FTV Live NO ONE has approached Jim Cramer about coming to FBN — that includes Ailes and on down — Kevin Magee, Neil Cavuto and Brian Jones — as in no one on the entire executive team has had a conversation with him about joining the new network.

And as I noted on another article on Cramer’s ratings (as well as last week in this chart), Mad Money’s ratings have hardly been stellar in the Demo lately…

TVWeek’s James Hibbard writes about bigtime blowback from the CUME ratings rule that NBC took advantage of last week…

Nielsen has heard the complaints very, very clearly. Spokesperson Ann Elliot says they’re re-evaluating the policy. Nobody thinks the rule will stay the same. Shows will probably be allowed to encore within any seven day period for a cume with the original night’s numbers likely still reported as usual.

“We’re definitely going to take into consideration everything we’ve heard this week and, yes, we’ve certainly heard a lot,” Elliot says. “We didn’t tell NBC how to use this new processing approach because we thought that would be inappropriate. NBC took a creative approach and used it staying within the bounds.”

Asked if anybody besides NBC has given positive feedback about the rule, Elliot says, “I don’t think anybody has come out and said ‘this is great.’”

In spite of the division’s strength, a person close to the situation said Sweeney wanted to inject fresh blood into the fifth floor of 77 W. 66th St. - the location of ABC News’ executive suite - because she feared that the long tenure enjoyed by many under ABC News President David Westin could soon make the division stale.

To that end, a source inside CNBC said Westin met with Mark Hoffman, president of the financial-news cable network, at least once before settling on Davis.

Two ABC News executives confirmed that a meeting between Westin and Hoffman took place, but both said that it was simply a meet-and-greet session.

A spokesman for CNBC did not return a call for comment.

- Peter Lauria in the New York Post…

The Today show has an excerpt from Chris Matthews’ new book…

Yesterday on Reliable Sources Howard Kurtz was interviewing Rick Sanchez when Kurtz brought up the “Happy Negro” incident during Out in the Open…

KURTZ: All right. Let me jump in here because…

SANCHEZ: So late in the day we decided to do the story, go ahead.

KURTZ: Let me jump in here, because I want to play a bite from another interview you did on another night with a professor and blogger named Boyce Watkins who said this to say about Juan Williams, the black journalist O’Reilly was talking about.

(BEGIN VIDEO CLIP)

BOYCE WATKINS, AUTHOR & PROFESSOR: The fact of the matter is that when Bill O’Reilly gets Juan Williams, the eternal “Happy Negro” on his show to congratulate him on his racism, that’s like Hugh Hefner getting a stripper to come on the show and tell him that he is not a sexist.

(END VIDEO CLIP)

KURTZ: “Happy Negro”? That’s outrageous. Why didn’t you challenge him?
(more…)

The FBN Microsite is now up…

ICN hears that FOX Business Network is throwing a launch party hosted by Rupert Murdoch & Roger Ailes at the swanky Metropolitan Museum of Art in NYC on the evening of October 24th…

Rushing to end your show but ending it so quickly that you get caught saying something when you think you’re off the air…