The double-murder case against football star and actor O.J. Simpson, who died of cancer Thursday at age 76, forever transformed the TV landscape. Network news was still a buttoned-down institution in 1994, when more than 30 million viewers were tuning into the evening newscasts each night. The anchors of the time — Tom Brokaw on NBC, Peter Jennings on ABC and Dan Rather on CBS — were powerful arbiters of what the public needed to know.
'' The downside, as Whitaker saw it, was that the lines between serious newscasts and more tabloid-style outlets and entertainment-driven programs became blurred. 'It changed the media landscape,' he said. 'In the mind of the TV viewer, it put all of us in the same basket.' The old-guard news divisions had little choice but to cover the story as cable networks were giving it to viewers around the clock.