A news ticker (sometimes referred to as a "crawler") is a small screen space on news television networks dedicated to headlines or minor pieces of news. Usually, news stations will have the bottom tenth of the screen devoted to a horizontally scrolling banner giving brief descriptions of news stories. The name "ticker" comes from the paper ticker tape machines, which once printed news onto a moving paper tape.
Financial news channels often have two or more tickers progressing at different speeds, normally displaying stock prices. Networks that focus on sports often use a slightly different system, where the scores and status of current and finished games are displayed one by one, along with minor sports highlights.
The first record of a news ticker as part of a regular broadcast is from NBC's Today show on its debut edition, January 14, 1952. Without the benefit of computer-generated headlines and graphics, the ticker was vastly different than the one we would know today. The Today ticker was an actual piece of paper with typewritten headlines superimposed on the lower third of the screen. The ticker was never very successful as a communications tool, and was dropped not long thereafter.
By the 1980s, in northern parts of the United States, many local television stations in the used a ticker placed over morning local and network newscasts to pass along information on school closings due to weather. Severe weather watch and warning information was also commonly run on local station tickers. In both cases, the start of the ticker's cycle was often accompanied by an attention signal, usually the station's channel number in Morse code.
One of the first networks to regularly utilize a ticker was CNN Headline News. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the ticker featured stock prices during the daytime, and sports scores during the evening and weekend. CNBC also debuted a ticker featuring stock prices during business hours. By the mid-1980s, ESPN featured an update ticker at the top and bottom of each hour, scrolling up-to-the-minute sports scores and news. By 1996, spin-off network ESPN2 debuted a ticker, dubbed the "BottomLine," which featured non-stop sports scores and news nearly twenty-four hours a day. ESPNEWS, when it debuted in 1996, became the first network to keep their ticker going during commercial breaks.
While tickers had been used occasionally by other networks over the years, it was the September 11 attacks of 2001 that made the ticker a ubiquitous part of the television news experience. Needing a way to provide a continuous stream of vital but repetitive emergency information to viewers, Fox News Channel placed a ticker on-screen at 10:49 a.m. CNN launched its own ticker at 11:11 a.m., and MSNBC started one at approximately 2:00 p.m.
Although the need for attack-related tickers lasted only a few weeks, the management at all three major U.S. news channels quickly decided that news tickers would help increase viewership amongst younger viewers with shorter attention spans and the ability to process multiple simultaneous streams of information. As a result, the tickers have been permanent features on all three channels ever since. On the 5th anniversary of 9/11, CNN replaced the ticker with a repeated list of the names of the 9/11 attack fatalities.
Financial news channels often have two or more tickers progressing at different speeds, normally displaying stock prices. Networks that focus on sports often use a slightly different system, where the scores and status of current and finished games are displayed one by one, along with minor sports highlights.
The first record of a news ticker as part of a regular broadcast is from NBC's Today show on its debut edition, January 14, 1952. Without the benefit of computer-generated headlines and graphics, the ticker was vastly different than the one we would know today. The Today ticker was an actual piece of paper with typewritten headlines superimposed on the lower third of the screen. The ticker was never very successful as a communications tool, and was dropped not long thereafter.
By the 1980s, in northern parts of the United States, many local television stations in the used a ticker placed over morning local and network newscasts to pass along information on school closings due to weather. Severe weather watch and warning information was also commonly run on local station tickers. In both cases, the start of the ticker's cycle was often accompanied by an attention signal, usually the station's channel number in Morse code.
One of the first networks to regularly utilize a ticker was CNN Headline News. During the late 1980s and early 1990s, the ticker featured stock prices during the daytime, and sports scores during the evening and weekend. CNBC also debuted a ticker featuring stock prices during business hours. By the mid-1980s, ESPN featured an update ticker at the top and bottom of each hour, scrolling up-to-the-minute sports scores and news. By 1996, spin-off network ESPN2 debuted a ticker, dubbed the "BottomLine," which featured non-stop sports scores and news nearly twenty-four hours a day. ESPNEWS, when it debuted in 1996, became the first network to keep their ticker going during commercial breaks.
While tickers had been used occasionally by other networks over the years, it was the September 11 attacks of 2001 that made the ticker a ubiquitous part of the television news experience. Needing a way to provide a continuous stream of vital but repetitive emergency information to viewers, Fox News Channel placed a ticker on-screen at 10:49 a.m. CNN launched its own ticker at 11:11 a.m., and MSNBC started one at approximately 2:00 p.m.
Although the need for attack-related tickers lasted only a few weeks, the management at all three major U.S. news channels quickly decided that news tickers would help increase viewership amongst younger viewers with shorter attention spans and the ability to process multiple simultaneous streams of information. As a result, the tickers have been permanent features on all three channels ever since. On the 5th anniversary of 9/11, CNN replaced the ticker with a repeated list of the names of the 9/11 attack fatalities.