CNN is a 24 hour television news network broadcast across the United States of America and Canada.

CNN was launched in 1980 by entrepreneur Ted Turner, and is America's first all news television network. The channel has a reach of over 93 million households, thanks in part, to it's extensive availability on most cable platforms, satellite distribution services and in nearly 900,000 American hotel rooms.

CNN broadcasts from state of the art studios in Washington DC, New York City, Los Angeles and from its headquarters at the CNN Center in Atlanta. Some of CNN's domestic programming airs through CNN International and has combined branded networks and services that are available to more than 1.5 billion people in over 212 countries and territories.

The Launch of CNN

CNN was launched on Sunday 1st June 1980 at 17:00 ET, with the first anchors on the air comprising of husband and wife team of David Walker and Lois Hart. One of the first segments in the innaugural newscast was an interview of President Jimmy Carter.

Contrary to the belief of many, the current CNN Center was not the original home of the network. In the early days, the studio's were located at a former country club on the outskirts of Atlanta. As the network grew in it's launch years, it became apparent that the country club home of CNN was too small, and Ted Turner moved to purchase the failing Omni International development from developer Tom Cousins, and moved it's operations to the newly christened 'CNN Center'.

Shows which launched in the early days of CNN include Moneyline, which was presented by Lou Dobbs, and Evans, Novak, Hunt & Shields which featured in-depth political discussion.

Crossfire and Larry King Live quickly followed in the early to mid eighties.

Other shows of note from the first decade of CNN include Sports Tonight, a nightly roundup of sports news which began airing from the network's launch.

The Nineties

In 1990, Ted Turner appointed former publisher of the Los Angeles Times, Tom Johnson, as president of CNN, and quickly, one of the most defining moments for CNN was to develop. In 1991, the first Gulf War broke out and for the first time, war was covered as it happened, in a 24 hour news environment.

CNN beat the main television networks by having the ability to broadcast live from Baghdad, albeit in audio format, during the initial outbreak of war and the start of the Allied bombing campaign.

Bernard Shaw, John Holliman and Peter Arnett were staying in the al-Rashid Hotel in the centre of Baghdad as the story developed, and stayed on the air until the Iraqi's arrived at their hotel room and ordered them to stop.

CNN's successful coverage of the Gulf War led to the Pentagon developing the now infamous phrase - 'The CNN Effect'.  The term was used to explain the impact of realtime, round the clock coverage of military operations, and how governments react in a continuous news cycle.

John Kiesewetter summed up the 'CNN Effect' by saying; "CNN has changed news. Before CNN, events were reported in two cycles, for morning and evening newspapers and newscasts. Now news knows no cycle. When a plane has crashed, or shots are fired in school, we expect to see it immediately on all-news channels. We don't depend on the Big Three broadcast networks. The turning point point came shortly after CNN's 10th birthday, when Bernard Shaw, Peter Arnett and John Holliman provided play-by-play of the 1991 Gulf War from a Baghdad hotel. The Gulf war proved how CNN had changed the world. U.S. military leaders chose their words carefully during televised press briefings, knowing that Sadam Hussein was watching CNN, too."

Rival News Channels Launch

The turn of 1996 saw the first major competitive challenge to CNN's 16 year dominance of the 24 hour news business with the launch of both Fox News and MSNBC. Even with the launch of competing networks, for the rest of the 1990's, CNN and Larry King Live remained the most viewed news channel and most watched news show respectively.

Into the 21st Century

On December 31st 1999, CNN broadcast a marathon live show to welcome the new millennium in every timezone across the globe.  Initially the show was flung into some sense of chaos with the unexpected announcement that the then President of Russia, Boris Yeltsin was to stand down with immediate effect.  The program went on however, to be a resounding success for CNN, and has subsequently been released on DVD.

The management structure of CNN began to change in 2000 and 2001 with the departure of Rick Kaplan in 2000, and Tom Johnson who returned after 10 years at the helm of CNN in early 2001.

September 11th 2001

CNN was the first to break the news about the attacks on the World Trade Center in New York City at 08:49 ET on September 11th 2001.  After cutting abruptly back to the CNN Center in Atlanta, midway through a commerical break, anchor Carol Lin said;

"This just in. You are looking at obviously a very disturbing live shot there. That is the World Trade Center, and we have unconfirmed reports this morning that a plane has crashed into one of the towers of the World Trade Center. CNN Center right now is just beginning to work on this story, obviously calling our sources and trying to figure out exactly what happened, but clearly something relatively devastating happening this morning there on the south end of the island of Manhattan. That is once again, a picture of one of the towers of the World Trade Center."

CNN then went into rolling breaking news coverage reporting on the aftermath of the attacks, and the responses from Government's around the world.

CNN HD

CNN launched a High Definition simulcast of its output in September 2007.  CNN initially only broadcast programming from its New York studios in HD, however all of CNN's broadcast studios have now been converted to transmit natively in 1080i high definition.

CNN's HD service offers additional graphical information on-screen to accompany the current coverage which is airing.  Initially, carriage of CNN's HD service was limited to just DirecTV.  The satellite operator began carrying the service upon its launch.  Within a year, most major satellite and cable operators across the United States had either begun or had totally rolled out the service.

Business News

CNN has a position on the floor of the New York Stock Exchange, where hourly market updates are broadcast from.