Ted Turner changed the nature of news — and of those who consume it

When the Space Shuttle Challenger exploded in 1986, Beth Knobel, then a graduate student and future TV news correspondent, found herself among others watching the tragedy unfold on CNN. Television sets had been placed in her school’s lobby, all tuned to the 24/7 news channel that Ted Turner had launched just five years earlier.

“Shuttle launches were just kind of routine and the broadcast networks weren’t even covering them anymore,” recalls Knobel, who later worked for CBS News in the 1990s and now teaches journalism at Fordham University. “CNN did. So when things went so tragically wrong, there they were on top of the story like no one else.”

This incident exemplifies why Knobel considers Turner, who died Wednesday, the most significant innovator in television news history. His foresight in understanding how news needed to be delivered revolutionized the industry.

Turner’s death comes during a challenging period for cable news. The industry has struggled with declining viewership amid proliferating media choices and streaming options. CNN itself has undergone multiple editorial shifts and financial challenges over the decades, resulting in an organization markedly different from Turner’s original vision.

“We use the word giant sometimes to describe people that really aren’t giant,” Knobel says. “Ted Turner truly is a giant. He invented around-the-clock news.”

Media analysts have struggled to find words significant enough to capture Turner’s impact on news consumption. Robert Thompson, director of Syracuse University’s Bleier Center for Television and Popular Culture, emphasizes that Turner’s innovation transcends hyperbole.

“I can think of very few other things in the 20th century that so dramatically changed American politics, journalism and civic engagement than the invention of 24-hour cable news,” Thompson says.

For years, especially throughout the 1990s, CNN became synonymous with breaking news coverage. “CNN became almost generic for breaking news,” notes Thompson, “like Kleenex for facial tissues and Xerox for photocopying.”

Beyond the 24-hour news cycle, Turner’s vision of news as a global commodity represents another crucial element of his legacy. Knobel remembers seeing CNN playing on televisions inside the Kremlin during her tenure as CBS Moscow bureau chief in the early 1990s.

“That was the way in which they came to understand what the world was thinking about Russia,” she explains. This global influence was unprecedented. “Global programming didn’t exist before Ted Turner came along and said, ‘Not only am I going to build a new channel for America, but there are a lot of people around the world that will probably want to watch this news channel.'”

The concept of continuous news has become so embedded in modern life that it’s difficult to convey to younger generations that it once didn’t exist. Before Turner’s innovation, television in many markets would simply display static, test patterns, or an American flag during overnight hours until regular programming resumed at dawn.

Frank Sesno, former CNN White House bureau chief and now a media professor at George Washington University, regularly explains to his students about the “Walter Cronkite era” – when news was delivered at specific times by authoritative voices in concise 30-minute broadcasts.

“I teach these young people and they have no idea who Ted Turner is,” Sesno said. “I remind them this was, in fact, the world of Walter Cronkite. Ted Turner came in and CNN was seen as an upstart, as something that wasn’t going to succeed.” The network was initially derided as “Chicken Noodle News” when Sesno joined in 1984.

CNN achieved early success during the October 1987 rescue of 18-month-old Jessica McClure from a well in Texas. The network’s coverage of incremental developments throughout the two-day ordeal – now standard practice but revolutionary at the time – demonstrated the potential of continuous news coverage.

However, it was during the first Gulf War that CNN truly transformed journalism. While other news organizations evacuated Baghdad, CNN correspondents Bernard Shaw, John Holliman, and Peter Arnett remained, broadcasting from the al-Rashid Hotel under siege. This coverage forever altered war journalism.

Technology played a crucial role in CNN’s advantage. Turner provided the necessary resources for the network to implement satellite phone technology that enabled continued broadcasting when other communications were disrupted.

“I’m someone who competed against CNN for many years working for CBS, and I can say CNN always had a technological advantage over everybody else,” Knobel acknowledged, crediting Turner for this edge.

The 24/7 news cycle dramatically changed working conditions in television journalism. Professionals increasingly found themselves expected to “be available 24/7 to satiate the public’s appetite for news,” according to Brooke Erin Duffy, an associate professor of communication at Cornell University.

As CNN demonstrated success, competitors followed suit, intensifying competition for continuous content and making timeliness even more crucial in breaking news.

“I think one of the consequences is the race for eyeballs within the saturated media landscape,” Duffy observed. “Time is the currency in news media.”