So, Charlie Gibson retires from anchoring the ABC World News after a relatively short stint in the driver's seat. Howard Kurtz, the Washington Post's media watcher, provides interesting background, specifically that Gibson realized he doesn't have the star power needed to keep viewers coming back to the show.
That seems honest on Gibson's part. He seems a relatively colorless figurehead, and unfortunately for him, when he tries to look serious he looks just grumpy. Also, I'd like to know where he buys his ties - let's find that unimaginative haberdashery and burn it down! I also got the impression from Kurtz's piece that Gibson is just tired - tired of the schedule, and tired of fighting to keep network news from becoming just another form of entertainment. Certainly, in that fight, he had few allies and his own network, owned by cartoon king Disney, was not among them.
On the other hand, it's difficult to imagine that Gibson or anyone else thinks his former Good Morning America partner, Diane Sawyer, has any more "buzz" than he does. Of course, there may be an initial spurt of interest, as there was with Couric, but it's unlikely to last; and Sawyer's hard news credentials in my view leave a lot to be desired - I've heard her ask some incredibly inane questions on those occasions when she was sent off to do "news," as in a trip to Korea a year or so ago.
Network news has a problem. I can imagine a model for a personality-driven news show (which seems to be what under-40s want these days) in which the personality also has enough authority to deliver less one-sided reportage than the non-traditional media are currently offering. Sawyer isn't the one to pull it off, though.
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