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PEJ confirms Fox News trails far behind rivals in News Corp. scandal coverage

avatar by Published July 20, 2011 2:59 pm Updated July 21, 2011 6:37 am

Project for Excellence in Journalism
An analysis by Pew’s Project for Excellence in Journalism found that Rupert Murdoch’s Fox News Channel devoted about one-fifth as much time to the News Corp. phone hacking story as MSNBC, and about one-sixth as much time as CNN. During the period examined by Pew, CNN and MSNBC devoted roughly 16 minutes per night in prime time on the story, while Fox News devoted an average of about three minutes per night. PEJ’s report adds:

Daytime cable tends to be more hard-news oriented than the opinion-driven evening programming, but the same basic pattern emerged.

CNN spent the most time on the subject, just over four minutes per hour (35 minutes and 19 seconds over the eight days). That was substantially more than MSNBC (18 minutes, 19 seconds.) The Fox News Channel spent a total of 3 minutes and 52 seconds on the story over those eight hours.

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  • Anonymous

    No doubt Fox is treading lightly, just as the Times has not exactly been a birddog on Carlos Slim. But the question is where is the middle point of coverage? Seems to me the media’s interest in this story is about five times greater than the public’s. It bores me to tears. With all that is going on, I can’t believe that networks lead with it.

  • http://lincolnparishnewsonline.wordpress.com/ Walter Abbott

    “I was taught when I was a young reporter that it’s news when we say it is. I think that’s still true — it’s news when ‘we’ say it is. It’s just who ‘we’ is has changed”
    David Carr (b. 1956), US Journalist.
    CNN “Reliable Sources”, Sunday, August 10, 2008.

  • Larry Seltzer

    Maybe MSNBC is spending 5 times too much time on the matter. Personally I think it’s insanely overblown in the US and even the UK. There’s way more important stuff going on.

  • Anonymous

    Probably because FOX News has done a detailed job covering the debt-ceiling issue, and the possible first-time default on America’s debt. And you know, that just burns my britches.

    Those IDIOTS at FOX! They should be examing their belly button the way excelsior journos like Jay Rosen and Keith Olbermann do!

    Get Roger Ailes on the phone. I demand to be outraged. I will sate my anger on FOX Noiz and Ailes off by reading Rog pithy criticisms from Michael Wolff!