Shift To Internet Of Advertisers Spelled Disaster For CBS News Staff

April 9, 2008 8:29 a.m. EST

Los Angeles, CA (AHN) - The layoffs of veteran CBS news staff indicates a red light for television news as more Americans shift to the Internet as their major source of news.

CBS Los Angeles news anchors Harold Greene and Ann Martin were the latest among 160 network employees spread in stations across 13 cities who were laid off. Others prominent news personalities who lost their jobs were Chicago anchor Diann Burns, Boston sportscaster Bob Lobel and Minneapolis weather man Paul Douglas.

Greene and Martin had been with CBS for 30 years. The economic slowdown and emerging technologies that saw lesser people buying printed news and watching broadcast news, resulted to advertiser bringing their dollars to the Internet.

CBS assured its viewers the quality of its news programs would not go down because of the cost cutting measures that hit 75 percent of the network's 27 stations.

Tom Kane, chief executive of CBS Television Stations group, told the Los Angeles Times, "We still have plenty of seasoned reporters and anchors... We have a lot of very strong talent."

Not all advertisers shifted their budgets to the Internet, some like General Motors, AT&T and McDonald's had cuts as well on their advertising budgets.