CNN, Facebook to Team on State of the Union

By Ira Teinowitz

Barack Obama’s inauguration speech generated some record setting Web-video streaming traffic for CNN and its partner Facebook, but will the public be quite as interested in the new president’s State of the Union like address to Congress?

The world gets to find out the answer Tuesday as CNN and Facebook join together for a second time on live programming around a presidential speech.

As at the inauguration, Facebook will offer its members a chance to stick a link to the CNN content on their own Web sites. The link, active for one day, will open a CNN live video player with special content different from CNN’s cable network.

That content includes an hour-long special Internet edition of John King’s State of the Union at noon followed by a two-hour, Internet-only State of the Economy program hosted by Ali Velshi and Christine Romans. That will be followed by other special programming before the speech at 9 p.m. Tuesday.

Jennifer Martin, a CNN spokeswoman, calls the inauguration and the traffic it brought “a bell weather moment” for Internet video that isn’t likely to be repeated Tuesday.

She said the inauguration provided a lesson that both CNN and Facebook wanted to seize on for other events. She said the link also provides a way to engage Internet surfers and highlight coverage on CNN.com and reach a different audience from the cable network.

(Editor: Baumann)