Jon Nicosia, President of News Cycle Media, has another scoop about the changes coming at CNN.
Nicosia must have a source somewhere high up in CNN’s new owners because he has been a few days ahead of everyone else with the story of CNN Plus.
CNN Plus was a new streaming service CNN’s old boss, Jeff Zucker, pushed. He spent $300 million with a plan to drop close to $1 billion. He signed big names like Chris Wallace with no audience in mind. Megyn Kelly found out the hard way that the grass ain’t always greener and how CNN did not learn that lesson is a shocker.
It was botched from the start and the new owners at Discovery were not happy CNN pushed through with the streaming service right as they were taking over. Remember, the majority shareholder of CNN’s parent company is billionaire Trump donor John Malone.
Nicosia reported: “A Discovery board member on the @CNNplus mess. ‘It’s emblematic of how Zucker used CNN as his private playground and political operation masquerading as a news channel’
“They continue ‘that non-news apparatus and its members will be jettisoned like CNN+ in the coming days,’” Jon said.
SOURCE: A Discovery board member on the @CNNplus mess. “It’s emblematic of how Zucker used CNN as his private playground and political operation masquerading as a news channel” They continue “that non-news apparatus and its members will be jettisoned like CNN+ in the coming days”
— Jon Nicosia (@NewsPolitics) April 21, 2022
Greg Gutfeld took a few shots at Chris Wallace and CNN when news broke CNN Plus folded and based on Nicosia’s history, he will have more material soon.
Greg joked about rising crime in NYC: “BLM has done to black people what Chris Wallace has done to CNN+. Entice them with a promise and then ditch them on the side of the road.”
Greg joked: “A lot of these solutions that are coming from the left are unreliable, whether it’s solar panels or windmills. I mean look at CNN+, how much money they invested in wind power by hiring Chris Wallace.”
Staffers at CNN Plus were offered six months’ severance as well as first dibs on job opportunities within CNN, sources told the New York Post. The sources also said people were not happy:
“The big people will likely be saved, but what about everybody else, the people who do the real work?
“The producers, showrunners? Some will get six months’ severance, others will not. Many people left their stable jobs at CNN to go to CNN+ and then they pull it right after launch?
“Everyone is aghast and furious. The irony is that Zaslav came in a few weeks ago and told the CNN+ staff they would soon be running the world, ahead of CNN anchors on TV.
“This is f*cking crazy, it is nuts.
“CNN should have just stuck to what they do well, which is hard news, not Anderson Cooper giving parenting advice.
“This literally rivals the epic disaster of Quibi,” a source said.
