The Future of News is NOT TikTok, It’s Netflix

Posted December 18, 2024

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The Wall Street Journal reports today that legacy TV news networks are increasingly looking to TikTok to solve their problem.

Their problem is that their viewership is rapidly diminishing, (or rather dying, apparently) with a median age of 69. TikTok, of course, is, rather frighteningly, the number one go-to source for new for 39% of Americans, and with a far younger demographic.

Well, TikTok is certainly entertaining, and it does attract a younger demographic, but then again, Marvel Comics are entertaining and they certainly attract a younger demographic, but I am not sure society is well served by having The New York Times migrate its content to Marvel Comics.

In terms of delivering in-depth reporting that engages an audience, there is already an alternative that, in my opinion, presents a far better model for audience engagement (and a far younger demographic) and that is Netflix.

While NBC Nightly News, the #1 rated TV news program in America gets 5 million viewers a night (and in that 69+ demo), Netflix garners 280 million paid subscribers. And, as anyone who has binge-watched a Netflix series, from Game of Thrones to Stranger Things (with 1.65 million cumulative watched hours), there is something to be said for the format.

And what is the essence of the format? It is all about storytelling — a character that an audience can relate to, an arc of story and a resolution. This is what creates that all important bond between viewer and content. (Admittedly, dance routines are also effective, but you don’t find them on Netflix).

When television news was invented in the 1950’s, God did not descend upon Rockefeller Center and command David Sarnoff to create News with a reporter stand up and lots of b-roll and some man on the street soundbites and an interview. The current news format is not cast in stone. What we can do then is to borrow from Netflix (and Hulu and HBO) and take their excellence in storytelling and marry it to news and journalism.

Character-driven journalism is not new to newspapers, though it once was. It was once called The New Journalism in the 1960s — see Truman Capote or Tom Wolfe. Today it is industry standard. Why not take the Sopranos or Breaking Bad formula and marry it to TV journalism? (How many interviews have you seen in The Sopranos? How many Man on the Street soundbites have you seen in Breaking Bad?)

That is just what we have been doing with Spectrum News 1 and CBS News. Marry great storytelling to great journalism. The results are pretty astonishing. They grab your interest and hold it — while still delivering important journalism.

Want an example?

Here is the same story (more or less) done once on TikTok and again by Spectrum News 1 reporter Taylor Schaub (on an iPhone BTW — and for which he got an Emmy nomination. You tell me which is more compelling television.