Chris Wallace, and his arrogant attitude, Sunday “news” show were the lowest rated of all Fox News “news” programs, not matter what day of the week it was. So what does Chris Wallace’s hiring by failing CNN say about the network?
The big media news over the weekend was the announcement that Chris Wallace was leaving Fox News and the subsequent revelation that he is heading to CNN’s new digital platform, CNN+. While there are a lot of conservatives who have been critical of Wallace over the last couple of years, the move says less about his possible shifting political leanings or what at the network may have driven him out and more about the upcoming shift we’ll be seeing from CNN.
With a corporate merger and new corporate overlords, it’s very likely that CNN is going to be seeing a re-alignment toward its original mission of journalism. Wallace is a big hire in that regard. He is a longtime newsman who has shown over the last two years that he can be tough toward the left and the right. He is also fairly well-respected across multiple networks. It’s a solid public relations move for CNN.
A bit below the surface, though, is the acknowledgment that CNN’s corporate owners realize something Fox News realized a few years ago: Digital content isn’t the future. It’s right now.
Fox Nation app downloads have been on the rise for a while, and regular events like CPAC and special programming usually create massive bumps in the download rate for its app. With the rise of so many successful streaming apps and the fact that we, apparently, haven’t hit critical mass where people are just giving up on those services and going back to cable. CNN is extremely late to the game, but a hire like Wallace shows that they are taking it seriously.