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April 06, 2011

Hello, Goodbye: You Say Goodbye, I Say Go To Hell, Glenn Beck

by Gary Farber

Glenn Beck is leaving Fox News, but not, I'm afraid, leaving us alone.

FOX NEWS AND MERCURY RADIO ARTS ANNOUNCE NEW AGREEMENT
(New York, NY)  Fox News and Mercury Radio Arts, Glenn Beck’s production company, are proud to announce that they will work together to develop and produce a variety of television projects for air on the Fox News Channel as well as content for other platforms including Fox News’ digital properties. Glenn intends to transition off of his daily program, the third highest rated in all of cable news, later this year.

Speculation is, of course, rampant.  

[...] Two of the options Mr. Beck has contemplated, according to people who have spoken about it with him, are a partial or wholesale takeover of a cable channel, or an expansion of his subscription video service on the Web.

Reports this week that Joel Cheatwood, a senior Fox News executive, would soon join Mr. Beck’s growing media company, Mercury Radio Arts, were the latest indication that Mr. Beck intended to leave Fox, a unit of the News Corporation, when his contract expired at the end of this year.

Notably, Mr. Beck’s company has been staffing up — making Web shows, some of which have little or nothing to do with Mr. Beck, and charging a monthly subscription for access to the shows. 

He's not going away. Frankly, this is part of the not-that-slow collapse of the whole "tv network" paradigm that the internet is forcing. "TV' isn't going away as fast as traditional publishing, which is going away much faster than the traditional music distribution business, but it's circling the drain rapidly with streaming and direct deals for iPads and tablets and phones and all sorts of streaming.

Below, the worst of Glenn Beck, but why he's not stupid about media.  Laugh and weep.

By the end of this year, an estimated 2 million households in the U.S. will have abandoned TV for the Web, cutting the cord with their cable companies. This estimate comes from Convergence Consulting Group, a Toronto-based research firm with a new report on The Battle for the American Couch Potato. That 2 million is up from the 1.6 million it was estimating a year ago, but it is still rather small and the number of cord cutters may very well have peaked last year as cable companies begin to fight back with TV Everywhere offerings.

Nevertheless, the big beneficiaries of cord cutting are Netflix, Hulu, and Apple TV.  They benefit even if people keep their cable but add Internet TV streaming or downloads to their viewing repertoire, as is much more common. According to Convergence , 18 percent of viewers in the U.S. watched free, full episodes of TV on the Web last year, and that is growing by a percentage point every year:

Estimated Percentage of Average Weekly US Viewers That Watch Free Broadcast and Cable Network Online Full Episodes, 2009-2012

2009—16%
2010—18%
2011—19%
2012—20%

Streaming has helped Netflix in particular in terms of driving new subscriber growth, and it is also arguably a gateway drug to cord cutting.  Convergence estimates that Netflix revenues from online-only subscribers in the U.S. will grow from $172 million this year to $578 million in 2013.  And if you add in Hulu Plus, the combined streaming revenues from both companies will reach an estimated $800 million in two years.

Beck is just part of this, and he's ahead of the curve.  

Were Mr. Beck to set off on his own, it would be a landmark moment for the media industry, reflecting a shift in the balance of power between media institutions and the personal brands of people they employ.

[...]

Mr. Beck has been contemplating a cable channel of his own for more than a year, according to the people who have spoken with him about it, who spoke on condition of anonymity. Mr. Beck may not be able to actively pursue such an arrangement until his Fox contract is up.

Presuming he leaves, Mr. Beck could follow a road paved by Oprah Winfrey when she started OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network in January. He could schedule his own talk show and the shows of others on one of the many cable channels seeking a ratings jolt. Or, following Martha Stewart’s road to the Hallmark Channel, he could start smaller, taking over a few hours of a channel’s schedule.

But a cable channel takeover, even in part, carries enormous risk, as Ms. Winfrey and Ms. Stewart can attest — they have more real estate now, but the ratings comparisons are not favorable. For Mr. Beck, the risk may be heightened by the fact that many advertisers have shunned him on Fox, in part because of a boycott that started after he called President Obama racist in 2009.

Furthermore, having cable channel turf may carry less importance in the future as more people access TV shows online.

Mr. Beck’s other option is to expand Insider Extreme, the subscription portion of his Web site, glennbeck.com, by hosting an exclusive show there and by adding other content.

Insider Extreme already simulcasts Mr. Beck’s three-hour radio show; shows a fourth hour hosted by his sidekicks; shows a daily show hosted by S. E. Cupp, a conservative commentator; and occasionally features documentaries.

Mr. Beck is also in business with Dr. Keith Ablow, a well-known psychiatrist; they sometimes co-host free webcasts.

Mercury Radio Arts, which is privately held, has not released any figures for the $9.95 subscription service. Last April, one month after Insider Extreme started, Forbes magazine estimated that the Web operations earned Mr. Beck $4 million a year, twice as much as the $2 million he earned from Fox.

On the Web, unlike on television, Mr. Beck owns the data about his subscribers.

Italics mine.  Glenn Beck is crazy, but he isn't stupid.  Not about media and making money.

But let's say fare-not-well for now, and good riddance.  In honor of Glenn Beck leaving Fox, the top 10 dumbass things he said about the environment:

What one man can accomplish in a few short years. Just let the crazy wash over you:

  1. Bill McKibben's climate change activism group 350.org is a communist plot March 2011
  2. Winter disproves global warming March 2010
  3. Beck peddles 'food insurance' kits: "More than peak oil or financial crash, I fear angry men armed to the teeth." November 2010
  4. Beck sneers at the food safety bill December 2010
  5. Race-baiting Beck insists Van Jones is a communist ex-con on a mission to dispense reparations for slavery September 2009
  6. Beck insists Van Jones is a black nationalist taking over the U.S. from the inside July 2009
  7. Not content with Van Jones resignation, Beck targets 'other radicals' September 2009
  8. Obama's clean energy agenda will destroy the economy, energy advisor Carol Browner is a socialist October 2009
  9. Cap and trade will cost American families $1,761 a year September 2009
  10. The smart grid is a socialist plot to steal our thermostats March 2009

Bonus! Here are a couple of clips charting the earliest evolution of Beck's denialism. 

Cow farts produce more greenhouse gases than cars July 2007

Climate change is a complete and utter hoax, here are a bunch of denialists to prove it May 2007

Beck indicts himself: 

[...]

The hits just keep on coming:  of 122.  This is Glenn Beck, in his own words, unedited, not out of context.  Did Media Matters collect them?  Yes.

But watch the clips for yourself, as much as you want, and decide for yourself how accurate or not he is. 

He can be good comedy if he weren't so dangerous. 

 

David Sirota: Glenn Beck's dangerous movement: It CAN happen here.

Cross-posted at Amygdala.

ADDENDUM, 3:24 p.m.: Beck has always been a clown, by the way, as you can see from this clip of him literally monkeying around in his younger DJ days.  Hat tip to Alex Lawson.

 

Posted by at 02:58 PM in Culture and Stuff, Current Affairs, Television |

Comments

Of course he si also resposible for icitig a series of murders and attempted murders,too. Let's not forget that. Or forgive.

Posted by: wonkie | April 06, 2011 at 06:04 PM

Lots of links, but this time, I won't be clicking on them. My doctor's sphygmomanometer will thank me.

I would pass on this Salon article about Glenn Beck's early days and wonder if looking at that career arc, we can see some way of figuring out who people like Glenn Beck before they become Glenn Beck. Even if there is no way to making that prediction, part 2 and part 3 are still fascinating reading.

Posted by: liberal japonicus | April 06, 2011 at 06:20 PM

Hey, this will only really resonate with Boston folks, but Jay Severin's gone too.

Frabjous day indeed.

Posted by: russell | April 06, 2011 at 07:27 PM

From Russell's link, setting aside the other stuff:

[...] On March 29, while discussing the case of American Apparel CEO Dov Charney, who is being sued for sexual harassment by two former female employees, Severin called the women "whores and liars" and said they belong in jail. He went on to say that he had slept with interns.

"Those girls that got to sleep with me got to know their boss better, they got to go on trips, they got to travel in some cases to various parts of the world, to see things and meet people that they never would have seen or done," he said.

Classy!

Obviously more women should sleep with their bosses! It would be a better world for everyone!

In Jay Severin's world. Where there's sexual pressure on attractive young women, but where:

[...] Severin was pulled off the radio in 2009 after he called Mexican immigrants "primitives," "leeches," and exporters of "women with mustaches and VD."
So this means that if you're a Latina, you're safe from Jay?

No, probably only if you have a mustache.

And I'm sure he no longer follows the practices of his younger days.

He's such a classy, sensitive, guy now, after all.

Posted by: Gary Farber | April 06, 2011 at 08:15 PM

yeah, he's a piece of work.

basically, he's a egomaniacal jerk, but his numbers have been good, so up to now he's just gotten slapped on the wrist.

now, his numbers aren't so good, and he costs a lot of money, so it's goodbye jay.

it ain't show friends, y'all.

couldn't happen to a nicer guy.

Posted by: russell | April 06, 2011 at 08:56 PM

This is a funny clip from the Glenn Beck show earlier this week, responding to the claim by the White House that opponents of health care are spreading “mis-leading” information over the internet: I can’t wait for new polling data to come out, because I’m pretty sure this White House propaganda attempt, along with the outrageous accusations on the authenticity of the town hall protests, is going to backfire on.

Posted by: Atlanta Roofing | April 06, 2011 at 09:32 PM

Obviously being an insufferable boor pays very well.

Posted by: Spiny adagio | April 06, 2011 at 10:38 PM

Well, the damage has already been done by the Becks, Severins, Limbaughs, Hannitys, and the rest of the Redstate murderous filth.

F*ck civility. It's too late for retrieval.

Severin, in Russell's link, said, in his world, "the poor and the stupid would starve".

He was merely stating the Republican program, excepting, of course, the stupid who now rule the day.

The only question left for this murderous civilization is how much Republican blood, and corrupt Democratic blood who stood by and let it happen, will have to be drained into the sewers to avenge the murder of the poor as we move forward into the corporate Death Palin future.

Posted by: Countme--In | April 06, 2011 at 11:35 PM

Hmmm.... "Mercury Radio Arts", "Mercury Theater on the Air".

Coincidence? I think not.

Posted by: ral | April 07, 2011 at 12:27 AM

I'm confused by your "good riddance" comment, Gary. Do you actually watch Fox News? That would frankly surprise me.

I don't care much about what Beck is doing or not doing. Before clicking on some of Gary's links, I've probably watched Maddow more than Beck, which is to say all of maybe 30 minutes total in my lifetime while going through an airport. Note: on one of those links (the cow fart link), the Rain Forest Action Network guy says the best way to produce energy is to save it?

Thanks for the link, lj. Interesting reading. That explains why the show just doesn't interest me and turns me off. Must be the "morning zoo" vibe. I never listened to morning radio either. Couldn't stand it. Also explains ratings to me to some degree. It's an equal mystery how Beck and morning zoo radio have the ratings they do (did).

Posted by: bc | April 07, 2011 at 01:11 AM

Now I understand why the right fights mercury filters tooth and nail. Did anybody check, whether Beck's behaviour could be better attributed to mad hatter syndrome than past alcoholism? Well, as fishy as his claims notoriously are, Hg overdosing is very likely.

Posted by: Hartmut | April 07, 2011 at 03:37 AM

So, the wheel finally turns, and Fox betrays the true-believer Tea Party Beck fans.

The TPers may be paranoid, but they're not very observant, otherwise they might catch on that there are traitors in their midst, just using TPers for their own purposes.

Will they ever wake up? I bet "no", and Murdoch laughs and laughs.

Posted by: Disturbing Truths, Comforting Lies | April 07, 2011 at 08:10 AM

I'm not rejoicing that much-- the right wing is just giving themselves a "respectable" makeover for the 2012 election. The crazy vibe was fine for 2009-2010. Beck would interfere with the sort of brand-building the Republicans are trying to do for the general election. So he can be the public face of the Republican party when he's useful but simply shuffle him aside when he's a liability. Doesn't make the right wing any less crazy or dangerous-- it just means they shaved and got a haircut.

Posted by: Tyro | April 07, 2011 at 09:15 AM

I'm sorry, I know this is a shallow observation, but I got a laugh out of this:

Joel Cheatwood, a senior Fox News executive
Sometimes you can't help but pluck the low-hanging fruit.

Oh, and speaking for myself, I don't need to be part of the Fox News audience to wish Beck good riddance and be glad that his lies and dangerous insanity will no longer have as much visibility and audience.

Posted by: Amezuki | April 07, 2011 at 12:35 PM

How do we know the new Beck channel won't be tremendously popular among the sadistic, murderous Republican base?

Are we thinking the oily, telegenic, devout Roman Catholic and Ayn Rand devotee (a deadly incoherence for the rest of us -- especially permitting Dagny Taggert all of that ideological f*cking without access to birth control) Paul Ryan, who ran to Beck first to discuss his "cause", is now going to boycott Beck?

Who do you think will win the "rights" to telecast the privately-run, for profit death panels ... Beck's channel or FOX?

Besides, FOX is hedging its bets by bringing in Trump to tide the sadistic clown show over until Ailes can find a more credible malign clown to retail a little more believably murderous product line.

Beck is just Goebbels getting his own brand to keep the Jews (liberals, Democrats, Jewish liberals, immigrants, blacks, American Muslims, teachers, professors, union members, women on birth control, government employees, gays) busy changing channels to compare delousing regimens, train schedules, and work-will-set-you-free initiatives.

Do we find it comforting that there will be yet another channel for velociraptors to tear the remaining flesh from civic discourse?

Is it a good thing that the aliens at FOX have learned how to subdivide -- throwing their noxious filthy spawn off to wreak havoc from another direction?

Do we believe that enabling yet another outlet on the broadcast spectrum to spew their f8cking hate for this country and its government and roughly half its people is a favorable development?

Last time I checked, learning that vermin have spread from the basement to the attic was a bad development.

That's not divide and conquer. That's being surrounded.

Now you have to burn down the whole house.

Posted by: Countme--In | April 07, 2011 at 01:46 PM

Amezuki:

Ben Limbaugh Foster

That's the name of the drunken Pawlenty staffer who was arrested after vomiting in someone's front yard and then trying to break into their house in the middle of the night.

I don't expect that to be a drawback, however.

I envision that the Republican demon kid will one day be elected to public office running on a platform of no taxes, excessive alcohol consumption, prohibition, subsidized projectile vomiting, no-knock raids on liberal homes, radical, large-clip Second Amendment rights, and Christ-is-your-uncle-with-a-boner morality.

He'll raise millions from the usual suspects.

Posted by: Countme--In | April 07, 2011 at 02:20 PM

Some further commentary from Business Insider, via Russ Wellen, privately.

No real news, but for whatever it's worth:

[...] One person who has worked with Ailes before told us that when Ailes says " I look forward to continuing to work with him" what he really means is "don't let the door hit you on the way out."

They also relayed to us the rumor (entirely unconfirmed) that it was Wendi Murdoch who was most uncomfortable with Beck and pressured husband Rupert to make a move.

But what is really going on? You don't leave a platform like Fox, nor lose a ratings powerhouse like Beck willy nilly.

There are no shortage of people leaping in to take credit and point the finger squarely at Beck.

Media Matters, who devotes the majority of their extensive anti-Fox coverage to all things Beck, immediately released a statement from founder saying that "The Only Surprise Is That It Took Fox News Months To Reach This Decision."

The Jewish Funds for Justice, the group that ran the ad in the Wall St. Journal signed by all rabbis that was then denounced by the Anti-Defamation League, thinks Beck got fired because "he has been rejected by Jews." In a word, no.

Beck and Fox are parting ways because Beck had too much power and Fox couldn't control him.

It's not exactly a secret that Beck was unhappy with many aspects of Fox's tightly controlled (and not always friendly) media machine and was eager to be free of it.

Many assert that Fox led the way here to clear the decks to seem saner before the 2012 elections, but that seems more than extremely dubious to me as any kind of explanation.

Fox has enough other crazies, I don't expect to see them reined in, and I also don't see why Beck would struggle to stay on Fox. I expect it's true that it was a mutually desired parting of the ways, insofar as "Fox News" can be said to have a singular notion, or we could put it down to Murdoch and Beck, though what Rupert Murdoch's personal feelings about Beck are, other than the fact that Murdoch has always been much more interested in making money, ultimately, than politics, I have no idea.

I prefer my own explanations in my post. :-)

Posted by: Gary Farber | April 09, 2011 at 11:18 PM

Note: on one of those links (the cow fart link), the Rain Forest Action Network guy says the best way to produce energy is to save it?
US energy use chart shows we waste more than half of our energy.

Posted by: Gary Farber | April 10, 2011 at 04:17 AM

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