So I'm trying out a new service called "The Newsroom," which allows me to legally embed clips from CBS news and other websites onto my site for people to stream and view. Hopefully, it's pretty cool and I'm giving it a trial run on the site this week with some different stories that I think sound interesting.

We'll take the service for its maiden voyage with the recently controversial Katie Couric's Notebook on 2008 Presidential candidate Barack Obama. What I find interesting about the whole Couric-gate is that a member of the CBS News staff basically plagiarized another writer's piece for Katie Couric's notebook segment on the CBS Evening News, something that will get you expelled from college, and apparently, fired from your job. Even though I clearly have no concept of how busy Couric's life is, it was a little disappointing to me that this happened and that Couric allegedly had no knowledge of it going on. I have always wanted to trust newscasters and believe that they were involved with the writing of the news, but when you don't even create original thoughts for your own "notebook," it makes me feel as if our biggest mainstream television anchors today are merely personalities, rather than journalists who create their own stories and provide their own opinions.

As CBS struggles in the evening news rankings (ranking third behind ABC's Charles Gibson and NBC's Brian Williams) and hopes to gain and hold onto viewers with a more news focused broadcast, this scandal did nothing to help CBS and justify its signing of the top draft pick signing in the history of the evening news. CBS's drop in ratings, which are even lower than when the quintessential grandpa (but very charming) Bob Schieffer was the interim anchor, must be tough for the network to swallow, but I cannot even imagine anyone at CBS News that would be willing to admit defeat, nor admit a mistake after the fanfare that accompanied Couric when joined CBS. I was and am a huge Katie Couric fan, but until they can figure out an identity for her and the program, the network evening news industry, which I hear has a median viewer age of 60, will continue to scrutinize her signing. Right now, Couric's stint with CBS can be comparable to Randy Moss' run in Oakland. A lot of hype, but not a lot of results. Let's hope that both Couric and Moss can turn it on in this second leg of their careers.