But it didn’t change broadcast news. That already had been done. Edward R Murrow’s live radio broadcasts from London during the Blitz gave the world first hand information from the war. And spawned two famous catchphrases.
There are several recordings out there of actual WWII radio news programs. I don’t know if they are on-line, but if you can find them they are fascinating. In the ones I have, the announcer reads the commercials as well as the news. It’s interesting that as the war progressed the commercials anticipated the “return to normalcy” expected, and ads were for new appliances, “which will become available as soon as the war ends” and factories could go back to making what they did before the war.
Not anymore!
I’m 43, and I remember that even up through high school and college, CNN wasn’t the primary news source for most people. It was something you tuned in to if you wanted immediate constant coverage of something breaking, or if you had 15 minutes and wanted to watch the news.
Most people still read the newspapers and watched the 6 o’clock and/or 10 o’clock news. Think about how old timers still do it- they read the paper, and they watch the evening news. That’s how everyone did it back then- there wasn’t really any other option.
The 1st Gulf War was the first one where CNN really came into its own, as they had their 24 hour schtick rolling the entire time, and showed all the news conferences live, while the other networks were showing “General Hospital” or whatever else during their normal time slots.
This had already been seen during the “Baby Jessica” event, and the Challenger disaster, but the Gulf War was a longer and more widely interesting event.
In essence, news became entertainment when the viewing public had the choice of watching a regularly scheduled program OR whatever breaking story was on at that time.
during the gulf war, I got really annoyed that NBC(or CBS) would interrupt Santa Barbara the soap opera or some of the game shows it got really annoying!