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to share some news operations
Daily webcast to cover this year's elections
ABC News and The New York Times have decided to test the waters of cooperation by co-producing a daily political show on the web.
This is the latest in a series of high-profile news alliances which includes collaboration between NBC, MSNBC, the Washington Post, and Newsweek, as well as between Time Warner-owned CNN and Time magazine.
The Times was already pooling business news resources with TheStreet.com, while ABC and The Washington Post have been jointly conducting polls.
"There is a need for alliances," ABC News president David Westin told reporters, acknowledging the difficulty of competing alone in a multimedia environment. While neither party is ready for a full-scale union at this point, "It makes sense to say, ‘Let’s try this and see how it goes,’" said Westin.
The two organizations will embark on a program of limited cooperation throughout the election season. If all goes well, at the end of that time they will expand the arrangement to include more news sharing opportunities.
For the time being, the emphasis of the deal will be on "Political Points," a daily 15-minute webcast that will run on ABC.com and NYTimes.com at 1:30 p.m. Content will include interviews with candidates and campaign personnel, conducted by reporters from both news agencies.
Mark Halperin, ABC News political director, and Michael Oreskes, chief of the Times’ Washington bureau, will serve as moderators for the show, which debuts Monday, just in time for the Iowa caucuses. It will be produced out of ABC News’ Washington bureau.
The two agencies will also link up to create segments for "20/20" and "Good Morning America," sharing costs of production equally. In addition, they’ll join forces to sell advertising.
Unlike competitors NBC, which has MSNBC and CNBC, and Fox, which has Fox News Channel, ABC has no cable presence to speak of. It does have webcast experience, however, having produced short segments featuring Sam Donaldson on the web since last fall.
CBS has no sister cable news channel and no newspaper alliances, but is expected to closely consider partnership opportunities in the wake of the ABC-Times announcement.