Eating up all the Pie

Rupert Murdoch has once again flexed his muscles in the media by starting the Fox Business Network, the sunnier side of business news. Some critics debate over whether this network will flourish, while others think that this “Main street” style will not last past nine months.
Rupert Murdoch and the Fox business network (FBN), bring an everyday people kind of environment to the business market. FBN wants to be different from CNBC by sugar coating the financial news. It puts a positive light on what’s going on, and gives it that good ole “go capitalism!” feel. It underestimates the potential of people. What FBN does is close the gap to variety, shrinks the possibility for “the other.” The variety of outlets is smaller with big corporations taking more of the pie.

Alessandra Stanley writes an article on the “Perky debut for the Fox Business Network” (October, 16th, 2007). This network is perceived as a joke because the tone is “giddy” and upbeat. Stanley argues that although the show gives an upbeat, uncomplicated, positive side the financial market, it still shows a bias that Fox is known for, “with the underlying drumbeat of Fox News (global warming is natural and so are tax cuts).” It makes you wonder, if the style is pro business, what are they going to report about when corporations do the wrong thing? Is this truly a network for Main Street, or is it yet another network that businesses can benefit from propaganda?

Joe Nocera, writer from the New York Times, deems the Fox Business Network as unrealistic to what is going on in our economy. “In a week when Countrywide’s chief executive was discovered to be under S.E.C. investigation, when the market lost about 4 percent of its value, when evidence emerged that the housing slump was deepening, the tone at Fox Business was upbeat” (Nocera). How can Fox Business Network compete with other networks like CNN when they are not showing the pitfalls of our economy, they are glazing over everything that is not entertaining; news entertainment at its best. Nocera suggests that it is difficult to take this network seriously when the interviewer Liz Claman “turns positively giddy” during an interview with Warren Buffet (Nocera). If the authoritative or serious tone is removed, will the public still look at this network as “news”? Or is that how the FBN wants to differentiate themselves from other networks?

What is interesting to me is the point of view that each article takes on Rupert Murdoch starting Fox Business Network. The article from the Associated Press took more quotes from Fox associates than Nocera or Stanley’s article, and this changed the overall perception of the FBN; it put an optimistic outlook on the new Network. When we look at the articles by Nocera and Stanley, the debut of the Fox Business network is perceived as “giddy and simplistic.” The theme behind the AP article is that in time, the Fox Business Network will become more like CNBC because they will want to go after a more “profitable demographic” for advertisers. Kevin Magee, executive vice president of Fox News, said “our goal is essentially to broaden the pie that watches business news.” How ironic that he used the same pie metaphor that I used in the beginning of this paper. Magee is not broadening the pie but actually shrinking the pie that people, or the viewers, can eat.


Reference Websites

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/20/business/media/20nocera.html?pagewanted=2&_r=1
http://www.nytimes.com/2007/10/16/business/media/16watch.html?_r=2&oref=slogin&oref=login
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2007/10/15/business/main3366877_page2.shtml