It has long been a well-known but under-reported fact that talking heads–particularly celebrities and high-powered businessmen–do not always appear on the cable news channels from their respective studios.
Many networks, most notably the New Jersey-based CNBC, have utilized a company called Media 3 to help cater to their high-powered guests. Located in midtown Manhattan, away from the crowded and touristy Rockefeller Center, Media 3 provided guests with cocktails, food and comfortable loungers to go with a private studio for liveshots–perfect for celebrities and the CEO on-the-go.
Today, however, Michael Wolff writes that the glory days may be over, and that CNBC guests may actually have to travel to 30 Rock… or even CNBC’s home base across the Hudson River. The result of cost-cutting by Comcast, which now owns CNBC:
It’s a cost-cutting move that could mean the end of talking heads as we know them: “Why would grown men willingly and for no money give up their time to go on cable networks where, practically speaking, nobody sees them—and do it long after the novelty has worn off?” said one regular talking head. “Honestly, because at Media 3, we were treated like kings.”