CBS Evening News

[MediaZone4K 2158]

To the previous questions about how will the dual anchor pairing handle breaking news, we did not get that answer tonight.

 

Kristine Johnson anchored coverage of the mid air collision in DC. Let's see if the new team will be on the ground tomorrow.

[C Block 1566]

12 hours ago, Jase said:

 

Since the ICE raids started days before and there were no new substantive developments. I agree with them that it didn't warrant much more than a mention. And the following day, they presented a more comprehensive piece regarding the raids. 

 

You could make that same argument against the Major Garrett piece that ran on Tuesday, or the Adam Yamaguchi piece that ran today. With that said, I do think both of those pkgs were very well done and illustrative of the larger issue, though it still just feels weird that they can completely ignore what's the lead on literally every other major outlet. I did notice that they moved the "Evening News Roundup" segment up both Tuesday and today to be right after the first story, which is probably a smart move. It seemed a little buried and lost the first day.

  

12 hours ago, Jase said:

 

I appreciate their measured approach when it comes to 'the news of the day.' Giving viewers the same tired rundown of stories, just like everyone else, hasn't worked. If there was ever a time to re-invent the wheel, it's now. I'm not sure they will ever be #1 (or even #2), but they're fully capable of being the most competitive #3 there is. The question is, will that be enough for them???

 

 

It's worth a shot for them. And if anyone is going to try this, it's going to be CBS and not the leader. I just can't stress enough how this is perhaps the most radical departure from anything they've ever tried going back to Murrow. This is not the CBS Evening News. It's not a "network nightly news program." This is a fundamentally different type of broadcast altogether.

 

Most striking to me is that based on the first three days, they haven't run sound from any sort of press conference or anything else that could have been picked up by a competitor's camera. They haven't run any sound from the president, and they've run very little sound from other politicians or authorities— not even anything from the fiery RFK confirmation hearing, which they covered today. Instead, they are prioritizing exclusive interviews and stories from real people. That is all good practice and very refreshing, no doubt – it just feels strange in the absence of *any* of the typical meat and potatoes material.

 

Is that going to be a turnon or a turnoff for viewers? I really don't know as that hasn't been tried before by anybody to this extent.

[MediaZone4K 2158]

7 hours ago, C Block said:

 

You could make that same argument against the Major Garrett piece that ran on Tuesday, or the Adam Yamaguchi piece that ran today. With that said, I do think both of those pkgs were very well done and illustrative of the larger issue, though it still just feels weird that they can completely ignore what's the lead on literally every other major outlet. I did notice that they moved the "Evening News Roundup" segment up both Tuesday and today to be right after the first story, which is probably a smart move. It seemed a little buried and lost the first day.

  

 

It's worth a shot for them. And if anyone is going to try this, it's going to be CBS and not the leader. I just can't stress enough how this is perhaps the most radical departure from anything they've ever tried going back to Murrow. This is not the CBS Evening News. It's not a "network nightly news program." This is a fundamentally different type of broadcast altogether.

 

Most striking to me is that based on the first three days, they haven't run sound from any sort of press conference or anything else that could have been picked up by a competitor's camera. They haven't run any sound from the president, and they've run very little sound from other politicians or authorities— not even anything from the fiery RFK confirmation hearing, which they covered today. Instead, they are prioritizing exclusive interviews and stories from real people. That is all good practice and very refreshing, no doubt – it just feels strange in the absence of *any* of the typical meat and potatoes material.

 

Is that going to be a turn on or a turnoff for viewers? I really don't know as that hasn't been tried before by anybody to this extent.

Good points, but i think all of American media today is a rat race to cover the same thing.  CBS's attitude might be, we haven't won trying to keep up with everyone else, they can get that elsewhere, lets be different. 

 

To your point I do wonder if viewers will feel like they're missing out when watching this and turn to NBC/ABC to see what happened with say RFK Jr .

Edited January 30 by MediaZone4K

[mountainave 597]

It's a conscious effort to air mostly features at the expense of the day's headlines.  The strategy is seemingly multifactorial: 

1. Try to tap into the same audience attracted to the style of 60M and Sunday Morning 

2. Cut costs.  Flying correspondents and their production crews all over the country every day on a whim to cover breaking stories is expensive.

 

As to the question about whether the show will be anchored tonight from the site of the plane crash, the reporting on CBS's strategy suggests they'll opt for correspondent-led field coverage over anchoring the show remotely, again, because the latter is expensive.  I could alternatively see them sending one anchor to lead coverage from the field while the other anchor stays in studio to anchor the rest of the show, which wouldn't be as costly, but otherwise predictions are that the anchors will remain at the desk.  We'll find out tonight. 

[TheNewsTV 251]

CBS has Tony Dokoupil on the ground (so much so that he anchored Mornings and Special Report today).
I believe that he will be the one to go live from there, since the focus is on field coverage led by correspondents. (Maybe with Margareth?)

Edited January 30 by TheNewsTV

[Geoffrey 856]

With Lester Holt and David Muir anchoring their broadcasts from D.C. tonight, Maurice and John remained in the studio, saying they'll devote much of tonight's broadcast to the crash.

 

On another note, it's surprising to me that CBS let an apostrophe in Charlie D'Agata's last name confuse them when typing it out. Twice.

 

[RealNews18 203]

2 minutes ago, Geoffrey said:

With Lester Holt and David Muir anchoring their broadcasts from D.C. tonight, Maurice and John remained in the studio, saying they'll devote much of tonight's broadcast to the crash.

 

On another note, it's surprising to me that CBS let an apostrophe in Charlie D'Agata's last name confuse them when typing it out. Twice.

 

I noticed that was the first thing Maurice said. They seemed to want to make it a point and emphasize that the broadcast would be dedicated to covering the crash . 

[tylerSC 61]

I think they should return the CBS Eye logo to the bottom screen graphics. The solid one next to the correspondents name and the transparent one during the rest of the broadcast. They still use the logo on the other CBS News broadcasts as well as entertainment programming.

 

And I think they should still use the Washington studio when major vents of the day originate from DC. Such as State of the Union, election and other political coverage. The DC studio is still a very nice studio and can easily be modified for various broadcasts. Although most of the time the new Evening News can still remain a New York broadcast.

Edited January 31 by tylerSC

[Jase 1042]

18 hours ago, MediaZone4K said:

To your point I do wonder if viewers will feel like they're missing out when watching this and turn to NBC/ABC to see what happened with say RFK Jr .

 

CBS Mornings/CBS Mornings + and CBS News 24/7 follow a traditional news format where viewers can get their fill of the news of the day. I don’t think viewers are necessarily missing out when CBS has alternatives readily available for viewers throughout the day.

 

15 hours ago, mountainave said:

It's a conscious effort to air mostly features at the expense of the day's headlines.  The strategy is seemingly multifactorial: 

1. Try to tap into the same audience attracted to the style of 60M and Sunday Morning 

2. Cut costs.  Flying correspondents and their production crews all over the country every day on a whim to cover breaking stories is expensive.

 

As to the question about whether the show will be anchored tonight from the site of the plane crash, the reporting on CBS's strategy suggests they'll opt for correspondent-led field coverage over anchoring the show remotely, again, because the latter is expensive.  I could alternatively see them sending one anchor to lead coverage from the field while the other anchor stays in studio to anchor the rest of the show, which wouldn't be as costly, but otherwise predictions are that the anchors will remain at the desk.  We'll find out tonight. 

I would argue that the Evening News now has a very structured format that they are not likely going to change unless a 9/11-like event happens. I would be surprised if we ever see DuBois or Dickerson live in the field.

 

That said, I don’t think cost is a factor in this situation. 

[TheNewsTV 251]

Just recently there was the first solo CBS Special Report, with Maurice DuBois.

[Yayan4155 18]

Here's new look from CBS Weekend News from Studio 57. Full video may coming soon. CBS screenbug appeared at the program, which isn't appeared at the CBS Evening News. https://youtu.be/La2tfABtmiE?feature=shared

[ATLNewsExpert 453]

On 1/28/2025 at 8:23 PM, E. R. said:

 

 

7 minutes ago, ATLNewsExpert said:

1 hour ago, Yayan4155 said:

Here's new look from CBS Weekend News from Studio 57. Full video may coming soon. CBS screenbug appeared at the program, which isn't appeared at the CBS Evening News. https://youtu.be/La2tfABtmiE?feature=shared

 

Interesting that they opted to keep the headlines, and simply recolored the old lower thirds but the theme just doesn't work for headlines, given that the 87 headline theme doesn't have an opener. They also kept them for names L3's. 

[Yayan4155 18]

Full video. 

 

[Dave Lampstein 99]

Wow those lower thirds look like ass. 

[MorningNews 1437]

In typical CBS News fashion, they make one big step forward and then two steps backwards. Why the inconsistency between the weekday and weekend?

[E. R. 66]

9 hours ago, ATLNewsExpert said:

 

Interesting that they opted to keep the headlines, and simply recolored the old lower thirds but the theme just doesn't work for headlines, given that the 87 headline theme doesn't have an opener. They also kept them for names L3's. 

Personally, I would have switched it the other way around.

6 hours ago, Dave Lampstein said:

Wow those lower thirds look like ass. 

 

30 minutes ago, MorningNews said:

In typical CBS News fashion, they make one big step forward and then two steps backwards. Why the inconsistency between the weekday and weekend?

Maybe they haven't gotten around to installing the new lower thirds yet.

[JosiahCubed 280]

Not to mention that Weekdays and Weekends have two different production teams.

[Jase 1042]

On 2/1/2025 at 9:00 PM, Yayan4155 said:

Here's new look from CBS Weekend News from Studio 57. Full video may coming soon. CBS screenbug appeared at the program, which isn't appeared at the CBS Evening News. https://youtu.be/La2tfABtmiE?feature=shared

 

Yikes!!! Zero reason this was so poorly executed. Really killed the momentum they were building with the new Evening News. Would have been better off leaving the Weekend News as is if this was going to be the end result. And why did they not move back to studio 47?

[Dave Lampstein 99]

1 hour ago, Jase said:

 

Yikes!!! Zero reason this was so poorly executed. Really killed the momentum they were building with the new Evening News. Would have been better off leaving the Weekend News as is if this was going to be the end result. And why did they not move back to studio 47?

It boggles the mind. With the number of VPs, creative directors, art directors, and designers… Disappointing, but not surprising. 

[nathannah 2402]

On 2/2/2025 at 7:00 AM, MorningNews said:

In typical CBS News fashion, they make one big step forward and then two steps backwards. Why the inconsistency between the weekday and weekend?

This is from a company that kept the 1990 GFX package on Up to the Minute until the Couric era, so I'm much less surprised their graphic continuity doesn't extend to the weekend show.

[Geoffrey 856]

I get that they're making a point of not being a daily newscast of record anymore, but I think CBS was too obvious about it this Friday night. Tonight's lead story was a surge in flu cases nationwide. The first soundbite for the top story was from an expert detailing the number of cases at her hospital this week, including the words "and it's only Wednesday."

[MorningNews 1437]

That does seems particularly egregious. However I like them starting with the flu, this season has been pretty bad despite the lack of urgent news coverage around it.

[Amra 171]

21 hours ago, MorningNews said:

That does seems particularly egregious. However I like them starting with the flu, this season has been pretty bad despite the lack of urgent news coverage around it.

I don't think it's particularly egregious. When Janet Shamlian introduced her piece with "as we made our way around the middle of the country reporting this week..." doesn't sound like a lack of news coverage or that it isn't on the daily record because the doctor said it was only wednesday. It's a look back on the week and it is part of the daily record. This is being overblown.

[HanSolo 144]

1 hour ago, Amra said:

This is being overblown.

Dramatically so.

[Yayan4155 18]

Tonight on CBS News 24/7 will be the debut of CBS Evening News Plus.