Media Man

Media Man

Ted Turner, born 1938 in Cincinnati, was a big admirer of Alexander the Great and at times he emulated him. His father, Ed, ran a successful outdoor-advertising company. Ted's childhood was comprised of troublemaking and his father's forceful dictatorship over him. Ted attended boarding school and by his teenage years realized he did not want to work for his father which made Ed very angry. Ted was accepted to Brown U. despite his rejection from Harvard. Ted declared Classics as a major which peeved his father and merited Ted a threatening letter from him. Later, Ted was expelled from Brown for sneaking in a coed and then entered the family billboard business. In 1960, Ted married Julia Gale Nye, had 2 children, and then was divorced by Julia due to Ted's actions. Ted married shortly after in 1964 to Jane Smith with who had 3 children and again divorced. In 1989, Ted had his first date with Jane Fonda, a woman he deeply admired. Business-wise, in 1961, Ed Turner acquired the Atlanta, Richmond, and Roanoke divisions of General Outdoor Advertising for $4 million but shortly after in 1963, due to depression, committed suicide.

The death of Ted's father inspired focus to expand an empire. In 1968, Ted bought a Chattanooga radio station, WAPO. In 1970, he purchased his first television UHF station Channel 17. In 1975, RCA launched satellite communications which broadened horizons. Turner transformed his local station into a national cable network via the satellite. "He renamed the new network TBS--Turner Broadcasting System" (p. 34). Turner founded a building block for cable along with HBO. In 1976, he purchased the Atlanta Braves to ensure continuous baseball coverage on his Superstation. Ted saw himself as a small and fast rabbit whose big competitors were like wolves chasing him. The emblem of a rabbit soon adorned Turner's Cable News Network (CNN) a 24-hour news network promoted by Reese Schonefeld who Turner made president. CNN debuted on June 1st, 1980. After a conversation with Fidel Castro who "urged Turner to take his news service worldwide" (p. 43), CNN became the only global news network. In August of 1985, Turner bought the MGM film studio, its Culver City lot, and over 3,500 movies for $1.5 billion without the consent of his board. Within 3 months, he was forced to sell MGM back but kept the film library which became an asset to his new network Turner Network Television (TNT) in 1988 and in 1994 to Turner Classic Movies (TCM). Turner was in massive debt and consulted with TCI and Time Inc. Turner gave them 1/3 ownership and 7 seats on the board for $500 million. In 1991, Turner purchased Hanna-Barbera to create the Cartoon Network. During the Gulf War, CNN's ratings rocketed due to the decision to keep CNN at ground zero. That year, Ted was on the cover and chosen Time magazine's 1991 Man of the Year.

In 1990, Time Inc. merged with Warner Comm. to create Time Warner. Gerald Levin owned 19% of that company. Turner had tried to work with them but his efforts failed. Yet, Time Warner wanted Turner for they were "determined that if anyone was going to take over CNN and Turner's assets, it was going to be Time Warner" (p. 66). In August of 1995 at Turner's ranch, he accepted Levin's proposal for a merger. "Turner owned almost eleven percent of the merged company" (p. 77). During this time, Turner was politically involved and contributed $100 million per year for 10 years to support UN programs. In January of 2000, Turner and Fonda officially separated due to his 3 bears: "an insecurity that can be traced back to his abusive father; a manic, restless nature; and lust" (p. 95). In that same month, AOL acquired Time Warner, since AOL held the majority of stock.

Levin believed that AOL "would transform Time Warner from an old to a new media company" (p. 98). The truth was that AOL considered Time Warner people too soft and fuzzy and Time Warner felt AOL considered them old media dinosaurs. Turner's future role was not discussed at any negotiations, he would own 4%, remain on the board, named vice chairman, but "would not become an integral part of the new management team" (p. 105). In March of 2001, the parent company replaced Terence McGuirk and Steve Heyer, top executives at Turner Broadcasting, with Jamie Kellner of Warner Bros. broadcast network. CNN was losing market share to Fox News and MSNBC. Profit-growth targets were not met so cost cutting was sped up. The concern among journalists at the company was that "the support system did not always cooperate to advance that goal" (p. 117) and also CNN employees did not extend the same trust they did for Turner as they do for the new management for they seemed to care more about the brand than the journalism. "CNN's news was becoming a commodity" (p. 124).

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