Don Hewitt, the legendary creator and executive producer of 60 Minutes, told Fordham University students on Tuesday, April 3, that he intends to launch a website patterned after the long-running television newsmagazine targeted at young people that will be “by students for students.”
“I want to start a 60 Minutes-type [website]to give people like you a chance to talk to your contemporaries because you … aren’t interested in talking to mine and mine aren’t interested in talking to yours, either,” Hewitt told a gathering of communications students at Keating Hall. “So there is a great moment right now to set up some sort of Internet magazine … and I think I’m going to have it heavily laced with back-and-forth political stuff.”
Hewitt was a guest of Beth Knobel, Ph.D., the Emmy Award-winning former Moscow bureau chief for CBS News and professor of communication and media studies at Fordham. Hewitt retired as executive producer of 60 Minutes in June 2004 after 36 years at the helm of the groundbreaking program that is one of the most successful broadcasts in television history. Hewitt’s Internet site will feature video reports as well as articles written by college students, and like 60 MinutesHewitt expects the site to be financially viable because people in their 20s represent a lucrative market for advertisers.
