Bloomberg

As a part of the Intelligence Squared US debate series, BloombergTV will be broadcasting a special debate titled "Good Riddance to the Mainstream Media" this evening, tomorrow, and Wednesday at 9pmET.

The debate centered on "the viability of the mainstream media," and the debaters included Vanity Fair/Newser.com's Michael Wolff, Politico co-founder Jim Vandehei, and Phil Bronstein, editor-at-large of the San Francisco Chronicle.

NYTimes' David Carr countered arguments that the major media organizations won't survive and argued a point that some in the TV news biz have also argued: "...The New York Times has a news budget of two hundred and twenty million dollars, dozens of bureaus all over the world, many other news organizations have the same footprint. And we're going to toss that out -- which is the proposition -- toss that out and kick back and see what Facebook turns up. I don't think so."

Bloomberg TV debuts the new series "Innovators" tomorrow night at 9pmET and 11pmET. According to the network, the new show "takes a look into the revolutions in computing, space travel, genomics, finance, manufacturing and entertainment are upon us."

The mouth from the south was in Manhattan today. CNN founder Ted Turner was talking media with Betty Liu on BloombergTV.

On Time Warner:
"What would I like to see? I'd like to see me running Time Warner. That's what I'd like to see. But I'm so busy working on nuclear disarmament and global climate change and stabilizing."

On CNN and Cartoon Network:
"I'd like CNN to report to me and the Cartoon Network. If I had the Cartoon Network and I had control of it, I'd put Captain Planet on at a top time period so that kids would see the environmental superhero instead of just Superman."

On Comcast and NBC:
"Go for it... They've got a real good cable system. And they don't have that much programming. It was - in programming, you can - distribution and software go together."

On Rupert Murdoch and the Wall St. Journal:
"I talked to - we had lunch. But I haven't - I dropped him a note the other day." (Liu: Saying?) "I thought that he was doing a good job at the Wall Street Journal."

The interview airs tomorrow morning on BloombergTV at 8amET.

Breaking: Bloomberg L.P. has announced it is acquiring BusinessWeek. "The BusinessWeek acquisition will yield huge benefits for users of the Bloomberg terminal, and for our television, online and mobile properties," said Daniel Doctoroff, president of Bloomberg in a press release. "We couldn't be more excited."

BloombergTV, which has undergone belt tightening since the arrival of former NBC News president Andy Lack last year, will incorporate the BusinessWeek brand and its journalists on air.

Heading up the operation as Chairman is former Time and Wall Street Journal editor Norman Pearlstine who joined Bloomberg in May 2008 as Chief Content Officer.

Terms of the deal were not disclosed.

AgencySpy has a post about a new advertising campaign that's been launched for the Intelligence Squared debate series.

According to the NY Times, Bloomberg TV will be adding one-hour, edited versions of the debates to their evening line-up, airing them Wed-Fri at 9pmET the week they take place. David Rhodes, head of Bloomberg TV US, told the Times, "We thought it was the kind of smart and insightful programming that we want to have on here."

The debates will be moderated by John Donvan of ABC News.

William Cohan has joined Bloomberg TV as a contributing editor. Cohan, the author of bestselling books, 'House of Cards: A Tale of Hubris and Wretched Excess on Wall Street' and 'The Last Tycoons: The Secret History of Lazard Freres & Co.', will provide analysis on financial issues of the day including mergers and acquisitions, bankruptcy and private equity.

Cohan spent six years at Lazard Freres in New York and later became a Managing Director at JPMorgan Chase. Cohan will continue as a contributing editor at Fortune.

Bloomberg Anchor Margaret Brennan sat down with TVNewser recently to discuss her new job and the transition from CNBC where she'd been working for seven years. Her first day on air was July 13th and now that she's settled in a bit (and can spend less of her day commuting to New Jersey), we caught up with her.

With such a long tenure at CNBC, we asked Brennan about the decision-making process that led to her move to Bloomberg TV. "It was a long process, it was something I thought a lot about," she said. "But it was the right decision for me at the right time. I really wanted to continue to grow. And my interest area and really my passion is more international news and having the platform and the opportunity to tell more of the global business stories with a global news organization is really what hooked me in. And I'm loving it."

"It's not just corporate America in the snapshot of earnings," she added of the editorial vision at her new home. "It's also really connecting more of the narratives there."

Part of Brennan's transition from CNBC to Bloomberg involved changing roles from correspondent to anchor, something we were curious to know how she's handled. "I don't view being an anchor as just holding the set down. It's also bringing news into the mix," she told us. "It's great for me in that I can get a lot of my ideas in during a program, what we're seeing and what's moving the markets. And not just focusing so narrowly."

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First on TVNewser: Bloomberg TV has hired CNN producer Mark White to be its executive producer, focusing on morning production.

White is currently a senior producer on American Morning. He's been with the network for 10 years.

He begins at Bloomberg on May 26.

White was hired by David Rhodes, now head of U.S. TV for Bloomberg, who left Fox News late last year.

As first reported by two U.K. newspapers, TVNewser confirms Bloomberg is cutting 100 jobs in the radio and television groups. Forty-five from the New York newsroom.

"We have eliminated around 100 positions in the U.S. and are considering some additional redundancies in Europe, UK and Japan, specifically in radio and television," Bloomberg's head of PR, Judith Czelusniak, tells TVNewser. "We're reorganizing the radio and TV operation into an English-language global 24/7 business network."

Despite the cuts in TV/Radio, Bloomberg is "hiring around 1,000 employees this year in print news, product development, sales and customer service."

The major shake-up comes less than four months after Bloomberg's new CEO, Andy Lack, took over the network. "The business television viewer needs a universal perspective that is not now available on any financial network — and only Bloomberg has all the pieces," says Czelusniak. "Andy is here to put those pieces together into a global network."

Yesterday TVNewser reported Mike Schneider had been let go from the network and his 10pmET show "Night Talk" canceled. That followed the departure of Bloomberg TV (U.S.) managing editor John Meehan last month.

Breaking: TVNewser confirms Bloomberg TV anchor Mike Schneider has been let go from the network, and his 10pmET program, Night Talk, has been canceled. The news was first reported by TheMediaIsDying on Twitter.

We hear the slot will be occupied tonight by global reporting on the opening of the Asia and European markets.

A TV insider notes this is the second time Schneider has been let go from an Andy Lack operation. Lack, who joined Bloomberg as CEO in October, was Schneider's boss at NBC News in the mid 1990's.

Schneider has reported and anchored for ABC, NBC and Fox News before joining Bloomberg in 2003.