ABC World News Now on:  
[Wikipedia]  
[Google]  
[Amazon]
''World News Now'' (or WNN) is an American overnight
news broadcast seen on
ABC
ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script known as the alphabet.
ABC or abc may also refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Broadcasting
* American Broadcasting Company, a commercial U.S. TV broadcaster
** Disney–ABC Television ...
. Airing during the early morning hours each Monday through Friday, the program features a mix of general news and off-beat stories, along with weather forecasts, sports highlights, feature segments, and repurposed segments and story packages from other
ABC News
ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...
programs; its tone is often lighthearted, irreverent and humorous.
Created by David Bohrman, who also served as the original
executive producer, a number of well-known news personalities have
anchored ''WNN'' early in their careers, including original anchors
Aaron Brown and
Lisa McRee
Lisa McRee (born November 9, 1961) is an American television journalist and news anchor, of the Emmy Award Winning LA TIMES TODAY. Born in Fort Worth, Texas. She is a former co-anchor of ''Good Morning America''.
Career
She was a news anchor an ...
,
Thalia Assuras
__NOTOC__
Thalia Assuras is a Canadian television journalist and media consultant.
Early years
Assuras was born in London, Ontario to parents who immigrated from Tripoli, Greece, after World War II. She attended London Central Secondary School, ...
,
Kevin Newman,
Alison Stewart
Alison Stewart (born July 4, 1966) is an American journalist and author. Stewart first gained widespread visibility as a political correspondent for MTV News in the 1990s.
Early life and education
Stewart was born in Glen Ridge, New Jersey.
...
,
Liz Cho
Liz Cho is a news anchor at WABC-TV in New York City. She has co-anchored the weekday 4 and 6 p.m. editions of ''Eyewitness News''.
Early life and education
Cho grew up in Concord, Massachusetts, and has a younger brother, Andrew. She was born ...
,
Anderson Cooper and current ''
ABC World News Tonight
''ABC World News Tonight'' (titled ''ABC World News Tonight with David Muir'' for its weeknight broadcasts since September 2014) is the flagship daily evening television news program of ABC News, the news division of the American Broadcasting ...
'' anchor
David Muir
David Jason Muir (born November 8, 1973) is an American journalist and the anchor of ''ABC World News Tonight'' and co-anchor of the ABC News magazine '' 20/20'', part of the news department of the ABC broadcast-television network, based in N ...
. The program is primarily co-anchored by ABC News correspondents
Andrew Dymburt
Andrew is the English form of a given name common in many countries. In the 1990s, it was among the top ten most popular names given to boys in English-speaking countries. "Andrew" is frequently shortened to "Andy" or "Drew". The word is derived ...
and
Mona Kosar Abdi
Mona Kosar Abdi ( so, Muna Koosaar Cabdi) is an American multimedia journalist. She graduated from the University of California, San Diego where she earned a BA in International Studies, Political Science, and Communications.
In January 2019 sh ...
, who also anchor the network's early-morning news program ''
America This Morning
''America This Morning'' is an American early morning news program, broadcast on ABC on weekday mornings. The newscast is anchored by Andrew Dymburt and Rhiannon Ally, who also serve as anchors of ABC's overnight news program ''World News Now''. ...
''.
''WNN'' is divided into four segment blocks ("A", "B" "C" and "D") that start with national and international news headlines incorporating some pre-taped reports (with some live wraparounds) from ABC NewsOne correspondents or repeated reports from the network's evening news program ''
ABC World News Tonight
''ABC World News Tonight'' (titled ''ABC World News Tonight with David Muir'' for its weeknight broadcasts since September 2014) is the flagship daily evening television news program of ABC News, the news division of the American Broadcasting ...
''. The "A"-block also features a national weather forecast (significant weather stories are also reported during the broadcast through analysis from meteorologists employed with
AccuWeather
AccuWeather Inc. is an American media company that provides commercial weather forecasting services worldwide.
AccuWeather was founded in 1962 by Joel N. Myers, then a Pennsylvania State University graduate student working on a master's degree ...
, which provides forecasts for ABC's
owned-and-operated stations) and an often humorous "kicker" story that ends the block. The "B," "C" and "D" blocks usually feature a mix of stories from ''
Nightline'' or the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
, or other live-to-tape or pre-taped segments produced in-studio, depending on the day of the week.
History
1991–1993
In late 1991 and early 1992, ABC,
CBS
CBS Broadcasting Inc., commonly shortened to CBS, the abbreviation of its former legal name Columbia Broadcasting System, is an American commercial broadcast television and radio network serving as the flagship property of the CBS Entertainm ...
and
NBC
The National Broadcasting Company (NBC) is an American English-language commercial broadcast television and radio network. The flagship property of the NBC Entertainment division of NBCUniversal, a division of Comcast, its headquarters are l ...
each created their own overnight general news programs (with the ABC program competing with the latter two networks' ''
Up to the Minute
''CBS Overnight News'' is an American overnight news broadcasting that is broadcast on CBS during the early morning hours each Monday through Friday. The program maintains a infotainment format, incorporating national, international and busines ...
'' and ''
NBC Nightside'', respectively, those two in particular replaced more news/interview formatted programs; ''NBC Nightside'' left the air in 1998, and ''Up To The Minute'' is now called the ''CBS Overnight News'') to compete for viewer demand that was driven originally by
CNN
CNN (Cable News Network) is a multinational cable news channel headquartered in Atlanta, Georgia, U.S. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable news channel, and presently owned by ...
's 24-hour coverage of the
Gulf War
The Gulf War was a 1990–1991 armed campaign waged by a Coalition of the Gulf War, 35-country military coalition in response to the Iraqi invasion of Kuwait. Spearheaded by the United States, the coalition's efforts against Ba'athist Iraq, ...
, and to supply local affiliates with overnight programming. Until the creation of these news programs, owned-and-operated and
affiliate stations of the three networks commonly filled overnight timeslots with movies and/or syndicated programs, while some others simply
sign-on and sign-off
A sign-on (or start-up in Commonwealth countries except Canada) is the beginning of operations for a radio or television station, generally at the start of each day. It is the opposite of a sign-off (or closedown in Commonwealth countries exce ...
the air for the night. The original
working title
A working title, which may be abbreviated and styled in trade publications after a putative title as (wt), also called a production title or a tentative title, is the temporary title of a product or project used during its development, usually ...
for the program was ''World News Overnight''; ABC News executives chose to rename the program ''World News Now'' prior to the first broadcast.
The program debuted on January 6, 1992, with
Aaron Brown and
Lisa McRee
Lisa McRee (born November 9, 1961) is an American television journalist and news anchor, of the Emmy Award Winning LA TIMES TODAY. Born in Fort Worth, Texas. She is a former co-anchor of ''Good Morning America''.
Career
She was a news anchor an ...
as its original anchors. Later that year, the production staff of ''World News Now'' took over production responsibilities for the network's early-morning news program ''
World News This Morning
''America This Morning'' is an American early morning news program, broadcast on ABC on weekday mornings. The newscast is anchored by Andrew Dymburt and Rhiannon Ally, who also serve as anchors of ABC's overnight news program ''World News Now''. ...
'', with both programs sharing anchor staffs as a result. After McRee's departure from ''World News Now'' in January 1993 (at which time Brown anchored solo until he was joined in May of that year by
Thalia Assuras
__NOTOC__
Thalia Assuras is a Canadian television journalist and media consultant.
Early years
Assuras was born in London, Ontario to parents who immigrated from Tripoli, Greece, after World War II. She attended London Central Secondary School, ...
, who eventually became the program's longest-serving anchor until her departure from ABC for
CBS News in 1998), the program would begin experiencing significant turnover with its anchor staff that continues to this day.
In the tradition of ''
NBC News Overnight'' (the predecessor to original rival ''NBC Nightside''), ''World News Now'' has featured serious as well as offbeat news stories interspersed with odd features such as the "World News Polka" (played by comedian
Barry Mitchell on the
accordion), video footage of dancing
camels on Wednesdays (for "Hump Day"), and laughter coming from off-camera.
Weather
Weather is the state of the atmosphere, describing for example the degree to which it is hot or cold, wet or dry, calm or stormy, clear or cloud cover, cloudy. On Earth, most weather phenomena occur in the lowest layer of the planet's atmos ...
predictions were made for obscure and exotic places around the world; some of the locales have had various ties to the show, while some have had
popular culture
Popular culture (also called mass culture or pop culture) is generally recognized by members of a society as a set of practices, beliefs, artistic output (also known as, popular art or mass art) and objects that are dominant or prevalent in a ...
significance, including
Cicely, Alaska and
Twin Peaks, Washington.
The program also often replays story packages from other
ABC News
ABC News is the news division of the American broadcast network ABC. Its flagship program is the daily evening newscast ''ABC World News Tonight, ABC World News Tonight with David Muir''; other programs include Breakfast television, morning ...
programs such as ''
Nightline'' and ''
ABC World News Tonight
''ABC World News Tonight'' (titled ''ABC World News Tonight with David Muir'' for its weeknight broadcasts since September 2014) is the flagship daily evening television news program of ABC News, the news division of the American Broadcasting ...
''. It has been an apparent training ground for new
news presenter
A news presenter – also known as a newsreader, newscaster (short for "news broadcaster"), anchorman or anchorwoman, news anchor or simply an anchor – is a person who presents news during a news program on TV, radio or the Internet. ...
s (see list below) who eventually go on to higher-profile positions with the network or local affiliates. The show is also unique for its interactive segments, some of which pioneered the
email
Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a method of exchanging messages ("mail") between people using electronic devices. Email was thus conceived as the electronic ( digital) version of, or counterpart to, mail, at a time when "mail" mean ...
communication that is commonly used on television newscasts today. The ABC News ''WNN''
internet forum
An Internet forum, or message board, is an online discussion site where people can hold conversations in the form of posted messages. They differ from chat rooms in that messages are often longer than one line of text, and are at least temporar ...
has offered viewers questions and comments from the anchors themselves, during the course of the show.
1994–1998
On
November 23
Events Pre-1600
* 534 BC – Thespis of Icaria becomes the first recorded actor to portray a character on stage.
* 1248 – Conquest of Seville by Christian troops under King Ferdinand III of Castile.
* 1499 – Pretender to the t ...
, 1995, ''World News Now'' became the first television program to be broadcast live on the
Internet
The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a '' network of networks'' that consists of private, pub ...
, using the
CU-SeeMe
CU-SeeMe is an Internet videoconferencing client. CU-SeeMe can make point to point video calls without a server or make multi-point calls through server software first called a "reflector" and later called a "conference server" or Multipoint Co ...
interface. Victor Dorff, a producer of ''WNN'' at the time, arranged to have the show simulcast on the Internet daily for a six-month trial period.
''World News Now'' was used as the prototype for ''Fred'', ABC's plan to operate a cable news channel. The plan was floated by network management in 1995 and was later dropped within a couple of years due to issues with cable carriage, including competition with the recently launched
MSNBC
MSNBC (originally the Microsoft National Broadcasting Company) is an American news-based pay television cable channel. It is owned by NBCUniversala subsidiary of Comcast. Headquartered in New York City, it provides news coverage and politi ...
and
Fox News
The Fox News Channel, abbreviated FNC, commonly known as Fox News, and stylized in all caps, is an American multinational conservative cable news television channel based in New York City. It is owned by Fox News Media, which itself is owne ...
.
In the fall of 1998, ABC News entered into a
labor dispute
A labor dispute is a disagreement between an employer and employees regarding the terms of employment. This could include disputes regarding conditions of employment, fringe benefits, hours of work, tenure, and wages to be negotiated during co ...
, resulting in support employees being locked out from the news division's headquarters for several months. While ''World News This Morning'' continued to be produced in
New York City
New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the most densely populated major city in the Un ...
with substitute production staff, production of ''World News Now'' was moved to the news division's
London
London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...
news bureau
A news bureau is an office for gathering or distributing news. Similar terms are used for specialized bureaus, often to indicate a geographic location or scope of coverage: a ‘Tokyo bureau’ refers to a given news operation's office in Tokyo; ' ...
.
Mark Mullen returned to anchor ''WNN'' during the last month of the lockout.
1999–2008
Following its CU-SeeMe trial, ''World News Now'' later attempted another webcast; between 1999 and 2001, the program was streamed live for free on the ABC News website. In 2005, the free behind-the-scenes webcast returned. Among the anchors of the broadcast during this period was
David Muir
David Jason Muir (born November 8, 1973) is an American journalist and the anchor of ''ABC World News Tonight'' and co-anchor of the ABC News magazine '' 20/20'', part of the news department of the ABC broadcast-television network, based in N ...
, who eventually became co-anchor of the newsmagazine ''
20/20
Visual acuity (VA) commonly refers to the clarity of vision, but technically rates an examinee's ability to recognize small details with precision. Visual acuity is dependent on optical and neural factors, i.e. (1) the sharpness of the retinal ...
'' and became anchor of the weekday editions of ''
ABC World News Tonight
''ABC World News Tonight'' (titled ''ABC World News Tonight with David Muir'' for its weeknight broadcasts since September 2014) is the flagship daily evening television news program of ABC News, the news division of the American Broadcasting ...
'' in August 2014,
who co-anchored ''World News Now'' from July 2003 to August 2004 (originally with
Andrea Stassou and later with
Tamala Edwards).
On June 8, 2006, ABC
White House
The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. president since John Adams in ...
Correspondent
Martha Raddatz
Martha Raddatz (; born February 14, 1953) is an American reporter with ABC News. She is the network's Chief Global Affairs Correspondent reporting for ABC's '' World News Tonight with David Muir'', ''Nightline'', and other network broadcasts. In a ...
learned of the death of terrorist
Abu Musab al-Zarqawi near
Baqubah
Baqubah ( ar, بَعْقُوبَة; BGN: Ba‘qūbah; also spelled Baquba and Baqouba) is the capital of Iraq's Diyala Governorate. The city is located some to the northeast of Baghdad, on the Diyala River. In 2003 it had an estimated populat ...
,
Iraq
Iraq,; ku, عێراق, translit=Êraq officially the Republic of Iraq, '; ku, کۆماری عێراق, translit=Komarî Êraq is a country in Western Asia. It is bordered by Turkey to the north, Iran to the east, the Persian Gulf and K ...
. Upon confirmation of the tip, ABC ran a
breaking news
Breaking news, interchangeably termed late-breaking news and also known as a special report or special coverage or news flash, is a current issue that broadcasters feel warrants the interruption of scheduled programming or current news in orde ...
at 2:38 a.m.
Eastern Time
The Eastern Time Zone (ET) is a time zone encompassing part or all of 23 states in the eastern part of the United States, parts of eastern Canada, the state of Quintana Roo in Mexico, Panama, Colombia, mainland Ecuador, Peru, and a small por ...
, helmed by ''WNN'' anchors
Ron Corning and Tai Hernandez. The show, which is normally repeated on tape after the initial broadcast, instead went live in all time zones and into the early-morning news program ''
World News This Morning
''America This Morning'' is an American early morning news program, broadcast on ABC on weekday mornings. The newscast is anchored by Andrew Dymburt and Rhiannon Ally, who also serve as anchors of ABC's overnight news program ''World News Now''. ...
''. The on-air and behind-the-scenes staff stayed on-air until ''Good Morning America'' began and took over coverage of the story at 7:00 a.m. Eastern Time.
In January 2007, ''World News Now'' celebrated its 15th anniversary, with the brief resurrection of the National Temperature Index (see below) and a new version of the "World News Polka". On August 2, 2007, ''WNN'' abandoned its normal format and ran nearly continuous coverage of the
I-35W Mississippi River bridge collapse that occurred in
Minneapolis
Minneapolis () is the largest city in Minnesota, United States, and the county seat of Hennepin County. The city is abundant in water, with thirteen lakes, wetlands, the Mississippi River, creeks and waterfalls. Minneapolis has its origins ...
the day before; coverage on the program was anchored by Hernández and Stephanie Sy, and continued into ''America This Morning''.
Tai Hernandez left the show on December 18, 2007, in order to spend more time with her children, while Ryan Owens announced on February 29, 2008, that he would be leaving the show to become a full-time correspondent for ABC News. During the week of January 7, 2008, ''WNN'' celebrated its 16th anniversary on the air with retrospective segments on the early days of the broadcast and its anchors.
Jeremy Hubbard
Jeremy David Hubbard (born August 19, 1972 in Glenwood Springs, Colorado) is an American news anchor for KDVR-TV and KWGN-TV in Denver. He was a New York-based correspondent for ABC News, and reported for all ABC News broadcasts and platforms, in ...
was named co-anchor of ''World News Now'' on March 17, 2008, with
Vinita Nair
Vinita Chandra Nair is an American television journalist currently working for an NBC News affiliate in Texas. Nair is the former co-host of ''CBS This Morning Saturday'' alongside Anthony Mason. She was replaced by Alex Wagner, starting with ...
being named as Hubbard's co-anchor on September 17 of that year.
2009–2011
On September 22, 2009, ''World News Now'' became the first network overnight newscast to begin broadcasting in
high definition.
On July 9, 2010, Jeremy Hubbard left ''WNN'' to become a full-time correspondent for ABC News; he was replaced as Nair's co-anchor on the program by
Rob Nelson. In Hubbard's honor, the ''World News Now'' staff looked back at his time with the program and as is tradition when an anchor leaves the show, Hubbard had a picture of his likeness raised into the ABC News rafters. There was also a polka, sung to Hubbard's dog Jake, and Jeremy received a cutout of his likeness as a going away present while also welcoming his replacement, Rob Nelson.
On January 24, 2011, ''World News Now'' debuted new graphics for all of the program's segments and began using a new set, a side view of the existing set of ''ABC World News''. On February 17 of that year, Nair announced that she would be departing as co-anchor of ''World News Now'' after the next night's broadcast; the February 18 edition paid tribute to Nair in each of its three segments, including appearances from current and former colleagues including Jeremy Hubbard. Her legacy was to treat the crew to a hot breakfast on her last day. A brief send-off by Nelson to Nair was also given at the conclusion of ''America This Morning''. Correspondent Peggy Bunker (then a former anchor at
Fox
Foxes are small to medium-sized, omnivorous mammals belonging to several genera of the family Canidae. They have a flattened skull, upright, triangular ears, a pointed, slightly upturned snout, and a long bushy tail (or ''brush'').
Twelve sp ...
affiliate
KDVR
KDVR (channel 31) is a television station in Denver, Colorado, United States, affiliated with the Fox network. It is simulcast full-time over satellite station KFCT (channel 22) in Fort Collins. The two stations are owned by Nexstar Media Gr ...
, where Jeremy Hubbard incidentally is now employed) was named as interim successor.
On March 11, 2011, the program provided live coverage (in all time zones) of the devastating
Tōhoku earthquake and tsunami in Japan, featuring updates and pictures from
NHK World-Japan
NHK World-Japan (formerly and also known simply as NHK World) is the international arm of the Japanese State media, state-controlled public broadcaster NHK. Its services are aimed at the overseas market, similar to those offered by other nationa ...
; the coverage continued during ''America This Morning'' and ''Good Morning America''. On July 21, 2011, Bunker announced that she would be leaving ''World News Now'' after the July 22 broadcast, which acknowledged her departure in the first and last of its three, half-hour segments during that following night. In addition, a brief send-off by Nelson to Bunker (who subsequently became morning and midday anchor at
Seattle
Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
ABC affiliate
KOMO-TV
KOMO-TV (channel 4) is a television station in Seattle, Washington, United States, affiliated with ABC. It is owned by Sinclair Broadcast Group alongside Bellevue-licensed Univision affiliate KUNS-TV (channel 51). Both stations share studios w ...
) was given at the conclusion of ''America This Morning''.
Beginning on July 25, 2011, ABC News correspondents Tanya Rivero, Diana Alvear and Linsey Davis began rotating as co-anchors alongside Nelson until a permanent co-anchor was named; this lasted until Rivero was named sole co-anchor of the program on September 19, 2011. On October 14, 2011, Rivero shifted to a correspondent role on ABC's daytime news programs and was replaced by correspondent Yunji De Nies as a substitute anchor beginning the following day. On October 27, 2011,
Paula Faris
Paula Faris (born October 26, 1975) is an American journalist and television correspondent, formerly of ABC News. She is known for her tenure as co-anchor of ''Good Morning America Weekend'' from 2014 to 2018 and as co-host of '' The View'' from 2 ...
was named co-anchor of ''World News Now'', taking over the role on January 2, 2012.
2012–2020
On January 6, 2012, the program celebrated its 20th anniversary. Clips and outtakes of the first two decades of ''WNN'' were shown throughout that night's broadcast. On June 11, 2012, the longtime "Morning Papers" segment was replaced by "The Mix," which instead of featuring offbeat headlines from various national and international newspapers, focused on stories trending online.
On January 18, 2013, Paula Faris announced that she would be departing ''World News Now'' after the January 22 broadcast; on the night Faris left the program, a brief send-off by Nelson to Faris was given at the conclusion of ''America This Morning''.
Diana Perez was named as Faris's successor. On March 12, 2013, Rob Nelson announced that he would be leaving the program effective March 15, 2013 to become a full-time correspondent for ABC News.
John Muller was named as successor.
Marci Gonzalez filled in for Diana Perez while she was on maternity leave from January 6 to March 26, 2014. Perez later announced on May 29, 2014 that she was leaving ''World News Now'' to spend time with her family; John Muller and the staff celebrated her tenure in all three half-hour segments during the May 30 editions, including a visit by former co-anchor Rob Nelson, who remarked that she was the last of 16 co-anchors he had served with on ''WNN''. On June 12, 2014, John Muller announced he was leaving the program to return to his previous employer, New York's
WPIX
WPIX (channel 11) is a television station in New York City. Owned by Mission Broadcasting, it is operated under a local marketing agreement (LMA) by Nexstar Media Group, making it a ''de facto'' owned-and-operated station and flagship of Th ...
, to become its lead news anchor. In October 2014,
T. J. Holmes and
Reena Ninan
Reena Ninan (born April 18, 1979) is an American television journalist, most recently working for CBS News, based in New York City.
Career
Ninan anchored CBSN, and was the anchor from 2016-2020, of the Saturday edition of the ''CBS Weekend News ...
were appointed as co-anchors of ''World News Now'' and ''America This Morning.'' Ninan's appointment became official on April 8, 2015.
Around August 2015, TJ left "World News Now" and "America This Morning" to focus on his contributions to other shows on the network. He "unexpectedly" left the show around August 7, 2015. Kendis Gibson has since served as co-anchor of the show.
On April 4, 2016, Reena announced she was leaving the show to work dayside. Reena had a special sendoff on April 8, 2016 and left the network for an anchor position at CBSN, the CBS online streaming news service.
Diane Macedo, formerly of ''
Imus in the Morning
''Imus in the Morning'' was a long-running radio show hosted by Don Imus. The show originated on June 2, 1968, on various stations in the Western United States and Cleveland, Ohio before settling on WNBC radio in New York City in 1971. In Octobe ...
'', took over as World News Now co-anchor, alongside Kendis Gibson.
On Friday, January 6, 2017, World News Now broadcast an elaborate 25th Anniversary special. All three half hours, except top of the show news summaries, were devoted to archival show clips and reminiscences by former anchors. Predictably irreverent, WNN creator David Bohrman and original anchor Lisa McRee were live in studio to comment on the show's history. Barry Mitchell, accordion in tow, performed a special 25th Anniversary polka ("The work we do's important here, that's what the bosses say/We're warming up the cameras later on for GMA"). Throughout the hour and a half, Bohrman, McRee and a cardboard cutout of Aaron Brown joined then current anchors Kendis Gibson and Diane Macedo at an on-set open bar, along with past and present World News Now staffers.
2020-Present
As of late summer 2020, a number of stations in major markets dropped World News Now in favor of daytime talk show reruns.
These include ABC-owned stations in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago, Philadelphia, Raleigh, San Francisco, and Fresno. To quell viewer complaints in affected cities, the show pointed out that the complete broadcast can still be viewed online at 2am Eastern time, five days a week, at abcnews.com, in the "Live" window. Later in 2020, the decision was made to cease production of World News Now's third half hour, cutting the show down to two separate half hours, aired back to back from 2 to 3am Eastern time, and rerun from 3 to 4am Eastern time.
Production
Newscast structure
First half-hour
''Airs live beginning at 2:00 a.m. Eastern Time. Re-airs at 3:30 a.m. Eastern Time.''
Second half-hour
''Airs live beginning at 2:30 a.m. Eastern Time.''
Third half-hour
''Airs live beginning at 3:00 a.m. Eastern.''
Regular segments
* Top Stories – a summary of national and international stories
* Weather – a summary of expected weather conditions and high temperatures for the upcoming day
* Kicker story – a selected off-beat or human interest story
* ''What to Watch'' – A summary of stories to follow throughout the day (2009–present)
* ''Our Favorite Story of the Day'' – a segment usually featuring a human interest or off-beat story (2012–present)
* ''The Skinny'' – a segment focusing on entertainment news, celebrity gossip and pop-culture (2008–present)
* ''The Mix'' – a
soft media segment features off-beat stories,
viral video
A viral video is a video that becomes popular through a viral process of Internet sharing, typically through video sharing websites such as YouTube as well as social media and email.Lu Jiang, Yajie Miao, Yi Yang, ZhenZhong Lan, Alexander Haupt ...
clips and funny photographs (2012–present)
"B," "C" and "D"-blocks
After the A-block, the rest of the half-hour is produced using the following segments:
* ''
Nightline'' – a rebroadcast of the primary story package from the previous night (or if aired on a Monday, the previous Friday)'s edition of ''Nightline''.
* ''
This Week'' (Monday mornings only) – a broadcast of the
political discussion program's "Roundtable" segment, featuring a debate of
pundit from both sides of politics.
* ABC News Vault – a look back at how ABC News covered a story of historical importance, which usually corresponds to the date of the broadcast.
* American Landscape – Team coverage of a major national or international story from the perspective of a local ABC owned-and-operated station or affiliate that covered it, with excerpts from that station's newscasts (commonly the late evening newscast). The segment, which is now rarely seen, is often edited for time (this is noticeable due to sudden jumps of the time/temperature bug used by certain stations whose segments are sourced, and jumps between and during story packages).
* GizWiz –
Dick DeBartolo
Dick DeBartolo (born October 19, 1945) is an American writer, most famous for writing for '' Mad''. He is occasionally referred to as "''Mads Maddest Writer," this being a twist on Don Martin's former status as "''Mads Maddest Artist." De ...
talks about and demonstrates the newest gadgets and technology.
* Viewers' Voice – a segment in which the anchors read viewer opinions about a specific topic from the program's
Facebook
Facebook is an online social media and social networking service owned by American company Meta Platforms. Founded in 2004 by Mark Zuckerberg with fellow Harvard College students and roommates Eduardo Saverin, Andrew McCollum, Dustin Mosk ...
page or e-mail inbox.
* Insomniac Theater – Appearing on Fridays, the segment features a ''World News Now'' staff member giving their review (from a score of 1 to 5) of a recent movie release. This segment is ad-libbed and usually contains a
SOT from the movie ''
press kit
A press kit, often referred to as a media kit in business environments, is a pre-packaged set of promotional materials that provide information about a person, company, organization or cause and which is distributed to members of the media for pr ...
''. Previously, the films were reviewed by the anchors.
* Insomniac Kitchen – ''WNN'' anchors visit a local New York City restaurant to get ideas for late-night snacks that viewers can make at home.
Special segments
* Friday mornings close with some version of the "World News Polka" – usually performed by the song's composer, comedian
Barry Mitchell (most commonly, the version recorded in 1998) – aired while the show's production credits are scrolled.
* When a full-time anchor of ''World News Now'' finally leaves the program, a ceremony of sorts is held on their last broadcast. As the first few anchors moved on, cardboard cutouts were placed in the rafters of the studio for the "Anchor Hall of Fame." Today, this is done with a graphics sequence of a head-shot of the anchor moved into a graphic of the original set's rafters and monitors.
Former segments
* Randomly, throughout the broadcast, a "new e-mail" sound effect will be heard. This is then followed by the ABC News announcer Bill Rice reading aloud an e-mail from a viewer. The anchors then respond (sometimes humorously) to the message.
* The National Temperature Index (NTI) – ''WNN'' featured the National Temperature Index (NTI), which is the sum of the day's forecast high temperatures for
Boston
Boston (), officially the City of Boston, is the state capital and most populous city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, as well as the cultural and financial center of the New England region of the United States. It is the 24th- mo ...
,
Massachusetts
Massachusetts (Massachusett: ''Muhsachuweesut Massachusett_writing_systems.html" ;"title="nowiki/> məhswatʃəwiːsət.html" ;"title="Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət">Massachusett writing systems">məhswatʃəwiːsət'' En ...
;
Casper, Wyoming;
Dallas
Dallas () is the List of municipalities in Texas, third largest city in Texas and the largest city in the Dallas–Fort Worth metroplex, the List of metropolitan statistical areas, fourth-largest metropolitan area in the United States at 7.5 ...
,
Texas
Texas (, ; Spanish: ''Texas'', ''Tejas'') is a state in the South Central region of the United States. At 268,596 square miles (695,662 km2), and with more than 29.1 million residents in 2020, it is the second-largest U.S. state by ...
;
Denver
Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...
,
Colorado
Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the wes ...
;
Fargo, North Dakota;
Las Vegas
Las Vegas (; Spanish for "The Meadows"), often known simply as Vegas, is the 25th-most populous city in the United States, the most populous city in the state of Nevada, and the county seat of Clark County. The city anchors the Las Vegas ...
,
Nevada
Nevada ( ; ) is a state in the Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. Nevada is the 7th-most extensive, ...
;
Miami
Miami ( ), officially the City of Miami, known as "the 305", "The Magic City", and "Gateway to the Americas", is a coastal metropolis and the county seat of Miami-Dade County in South Florida, United States. With a population of 442,241 at ...
,
Florida
Florida is a state located in the Southeastern region of the United States. Florida is bordered to the west by the Gulf of Mexico, to the northwest by Alabama, to the north by Georgia, to the east by the Bahamas and Atlantic Ocean, and to ...
;
,
Louisiana
Louisiana , group=pronunciation (French: ''La Louisiane'') is a state in the Deep South and South Central regions of the United States. It is the 20th-smallest by area and the 25th most populous of the 50 U.S. states. Louisiana is borde ...
;
Raleigh, North Carolina
Raleigh (; ) is the capital city of the state of North Carolina and the seat of Wake County in the United States. It is the second-most populous city in North Carolina, after Charlotte. Raleigh is the tenth-most populous city in the Southe ...
; and
Seattle
Seattle ( ) is a seaport city on the West Coast of the United States. It is the seat of King County, Washington. With a 2020 population of 737,015, it is the largest city in both the state of Washington and the Pacific Northwest regio ...
,
Washington
Washington commonly refers to:
* Washington (state), United States
* Washington, D.C., the capital of the United States
** A metonym for the federal government of the United States
** Washington metropolitan area, the metropolitan area centered o ...
. The NTI appeared during nightly weather segments until January 6, 2003. It was reintroduced on January 5, 2007, but was dropped again one month later in mid-February. The NTI was originally discontinued when staff meteorologis
Gerard McNiffrevealed the method used for its calculation to
San Francisco Bay Area
The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...
meteorologist Jan Null, who published the formula in the ''
San Jose Mercury News
''The Mercury News'' (formerly ''San Jose Mercury News'', often locally known as ''The Merc'') is a morning daily newspaper published in San Jose, California, in the San Francisco Bay Area. It is published by the Bay Area News Group, a subsidia ...
''.
* Leah at the Movies – a movie review segment in which now-former ''
People
A person ( : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of prope ...
'' magazine film critic Leah Rozen gave her top picks for the week's new feature film releases, along with
box office projections.
* Their News Now – a segment in ''World News Now'' anchors would check in with news producers at local ABC affiliates around the country each night to see what stories they were working on in their local market, or broadcast the first few minutes of an affiliate's late local newscast during a breaking story (for instance, a blizzard in
Buffalo, New York
Buffalo is the second-largest city in the U.S. state of New York (behind only New York City) and the seat of Erie County. It is at the eastern end of Lake Erie, at the head of the Niagara River, and is across the Canadian border from Sou ...
would have the opening of that night's newscast on
WKBW-TV
WKBW-TV (channel 7) is a television station in Buffalo, New York, United States, affiliated with ABC. Owned by the E. W. Scripps Company, the station maintains studios at 7 Broadcast Plaza in downtown Buffalo and a transmitter on Center Stree ...
shown), or occasionally for a British story pre-
BBC America
BBC America is an American basic cable network that is jointly owned by BBC Studios and AMC Networks. The channel primarily airs sci-fi and action series and films, as well as selected programs from the BBC (such as its nature documentary seri ...
, the opening of that night's ''
BBC News
BBC News is an operational business division of the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) responsible for the gathering and broadcasting of news and current affairs in the UK and around the world. The department is the world's largest broad ...
BBC News at Ten
''BBC News at Ten'' formerly known as the ''BBC Ten O'Clock News'' or the ''Ten O'Clock News'' is the flagship evening news programme for the BBC News channel and British television channel BBC One on weekdays and Sundays at 10:00pm. Huw Edwa ...
''. This was usually rotated between four or five local markets, which included Seattle and Denver, and was discontinued sometime in 2005 when "American Landscape" was expanded to a nightly segment.
* World News Now "InsomniACTS" – a music performance segment featuring local jazz bands, typically from around the New York City area, that were invited into the studio to play a number on-air.
* World News Knows – featured on some nights, a quick trivial knowledge fact was flashed on-screen following the conclusion of a commercial break.
* ''WNN'' also featured a full sportscast, which became a scene of comedic fodder for many anchors on the show since many of them did not have a great deal of experience calling sports highlights. This was later replaced by a scoreboard graphic displaying sports scores coming out of a commercial break, leaving time for more general segments.
* Asia Business Now – a daily segment summarizing overnight business news headlines from
Asia
Asia (, ) is one of the world's most notable geographical regions, which is either considered a continent in its own right or a subcontinent of Eurasia, which shares the continental landmass of Afro-Eurasia with Africa. Asia covers an are ...
, provided by Sumire Sugimoto, an anchor from Japanese broadcaster
NHK
, also known as NHK, is a Japanese public broadcaster. NHK, which has always been known by this romanized initialism in Japanese, is a statutory corporation funded by viewers' payments of a television license fee.
NHK operates two terrestr ...
; this was referenced in the early versions of the "World News Polka" as ''"business news from Tokyo."''
* Financial News from the BBC – a business news segments featuring anchors from the
BBC #REDIRECT BBC #REDIRECT BBC
Here i going to introduce about the best teacher of my life b BALAJI sir. He is the precious gift that I got befor 2yrs . How has helped and thought all the concept and made my success in the 10th board exam. ...
...
(regularly reported by Declan Curry), presenting an update on the European financial markets from the