While the deal isn’t done yet, it appears that Paramount Skydance, not Netflix, will acquire the assets of Warner Bros. Discovery, including CNN. This prospect inspires horror among pretty much all CNN employees, since Paramount Skydance is not controlled by leftists. CNN employees seem to believe that only liberals should be allowed to buy companies:
CNN staffers are freaking out after learning that their left-leaning network’s owner Warner Bros. Discovery will be acquired by Paramount Skydance — even as insiders confirmed that the new owners plan to take a more politically centrist approach to news….
***
Now, CNN staffers are so panicked that the network’s president Mark Thompson was forced to send out a memo late Thursday to tamp down anxiety.
Much as some of us might want the new owners to turn CNN into a right-wing bastion, that apparently isn’t going to happen:
But that doesn’t mean that CNN will be automatically transformed into a MAGA sounding board; in fact people close to the Ellisons’ burgeoning media empire say they expect a centrist CNN to emerge from their $80.5 billion purchase.
As one person inside Paramount Skydance told me: “Yes, I know people are scared but we’re looking to produce a news product that appeals to 70% of the country that is either center left or center right. Why be scared of that?”
That’s the point, isn’t it? The left-wingers at CNN have no desire to appeal to the 70% of Americans with normal views. They are now exactly what they want to be: a niche opinion outlet that caters to the 10% of the population on the extreme left wing. So the fact that a different strategy will broaden CNN’s audience and cause it to make more money (unlike, for example, the Washington Post, CNN is mildly profitable) is irrelevant to CNN’s current employees.
All of which suggests that the network needs new employees.
