I really like Olbermann, but his ability to grind through employers is pretty impressive. So yes, snarky, but I’m guessing he won’t care.
What a pompous, self-righteous, arrogant, ignorant blowhard. He entertained the hell out of me.
Thank God for O’Donnell & Schultz, or political opinion on TV would be dead to me.
The New York Times article said that he signed a $30 million four-year contract in 2008. Assuming it’s linear, that means $7.5 million per year. So perhaps they felt that was too much. No idea what the buyout provisions were.
It’s just unfortunate because I fully expect O’Reilly, Hannity, Beck and Limbaugh to gloat about this on their shows. Except that some of them work for Fox News, which claims to have toned things down, so we’ll see. (Well, I won’t, as I don’t watch or listen to their shows.)
From the transcript of the show: “I think the same fantasy popped into the head of everybody in my business who has ever been told what I have been told. This will be the last edition of your show.”
That makes it quite clear that he did not decide to quit – he was told the show was canceled.
I’m sure there are some network execs slavering at the chance to hire him. He’s got an audience. Too bad they already hired that idiot Brit prick to fill in for Larry King.
It would be totally cool if Cenk Ugyar gets his own show. His guest commentaries are always great. I’d also be pleased if Dylan Ratigan gets a boost … I love the way he drills relentlessly into the corporate thievery … no one else seems nearly as focused or knowledgeable on TV news anywhere. That said, Rachel Maddow is the obvious way for MSNBC to go … Rachel Maddow is young, attractive, smart and witty. She makes those female Fox bimbos look like the bimbos they are. I think she could be a breakaway hit as a news commentator.
I’m just wondering, what’s the difference between “prior notice” and “notice”?
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The same difference as between “offer” and “tender offer”. That is to say: none.
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I don’t know if you noticed but your link uses numbers from 2006. I did a quick search and found this article showing ratings from the third quarter of 2010. They show Olbermann’s share of viewers has grown to be 39% the size of O’Reilly. That may still be only a fraction of viewers but it is undeniably a larger fraction.
The trend has been away from Fox for some time now and it looks like MSNBC has been picking some of them up, particularly in the younger demographic loved by advertisers.
Who says there is a buyout? I don’t know anything about the typical structuring of contracts for media figures at his level, but as far as I can tell, he will continue to collect his full salary for the remaining term of the contract, if he abides by a provision to not broadcast elsewhere for some period of time (a matter of some months, apparently, but well short of the contract period).
Of course neither side is putting this out directly, so this is a matter of inference and conjecture from various sources.
But I haven’t seen any reason to think NBC (or Comcast) is expecting to save any money here. He’s gone because somebody decided they’d rather pay him to not be there.
Notice: “You’re fired, get your shit and leave”
Prior Notice: “We are going to fire you in two weeks”
FWIW,
So maybe they felt Olbermann would become a bigger headache and looser cannon if he wasn’t happy, and they wanted to save the additional money it would take to keep him happy.
When you have 2 years left on your contract, at about $7 million per year, and they tell you they will pay out the contract but you are not to come to work anymore,
you have been fired.
I checked out Olbermann’s tweets and the last one was a notice that he was going to read a different Thurber story than originally announced. It was posted during the middle of his show.
I think that would indicate when he was notified. The choice of story was clearly a statement.
Here’s some figures from today’s Drudge Report
And those numbers back up exactly what I said. They show Olbermann with an audience 38% the size of O’Reilly’s audience. Not less than a quarter of O’Reilly’s audience as the numbers from 2006 showed.
Thanks!
I honestly find it shocking so many people still watch any of these shows. Cable news shows like his are honestly, at least from my perspective, as “trash TV” as soap operas or professional wrestling.
With such a rich source of actual news in the internet, I just don’t get why people waste their time listening to someone who has no real expertise on anything relating to public policy spout off their opinion for an hour at a time.
Also, for those wondering about Comcast’s motivations (if it really had anything to do with Comcast at all), keep in mind MSNBC is but a tiny tiny sliver in the Comcast empire. It’s not a big deal for them to get rid of someone notoriously difficult to work with even if it does cost one of their cable channels a little bit of money and ratings.
It’s not necessarily a matter of specific expertise. General intelligence, wit and passion can make for valuable and entertaining opinions.
I mean, I enjoy talking to my friends about all kinds of subjects. Sometimes I even read opinions posted to the SDMB.
For that matter, too-specific expertise can sometimes be a hindrance, to the extent that it may foster a forest-for-the-trees blindness in which people can only talk about things within the established parameters of their own field.
Well, both confirm my initial regarding how the network doesn’t exactly establish a high water mark when it comes to viewership.
As for the % figures, increases in comparative percentages could be the result of declining numbers at the top instead of increasing numbers at the bottom.
Take this how you will, but Comcast has said they have not yet taken over operational control of NBC, which seems probable, since they were only given approval on Tuesday. I would think it unlikely that, with all the legal papers and other issues they need to deal with, that they put that aside to say, “Fire Keith Olbermann!” – and even if they did, MSNBC would have had to do the actual firing, something they were not yet obligated to do.