MSNBC will be rebranded as My Source News Opinion World, or MS NOW, later this year, as the network prepares for its spinoff from Comcast, while it also will shed the Peacock logo.The change, announced on Monday, comes as MSNBC has been building its own news division, as NBC News will no longer be a sister outlet following the spinoff. MSNBC and other Comcast cable networks will be part of a separate company, Versant, led by Mark Lazarus.It also is a bit of a surprise as expectations had been that the network would retain the name it has had since its launch in 1996. But executives determined that retaining the name would create brand confusion with NBC News.MSNBC President Rebecca Kutler wrote in a memo to employees on Monday, “During this time of transition, NBCUniversal decided that our brand requires a new, separate identity. This decision now allows us to set our own course and assert our independence as we continue to build our own modern newsgathering operation.”“The future of our success is not tied to remaining within the NBC family and using the peacock as part of our identity. While our name will be changing, who we are and what we do will not. Our commitment to our work and our audiences will not waiver from what the brand promise has been for three decades.”Kutler wrote that the re-branding will come with a “broad-based marketing campaign, unlike anything we have done in recent memory.” The switch to MS NOW appears to be a way of distinguishing itself from NBC while still retaining elements of its brand identity, as it already has been referred to as “MSN” for short. In adopting “NOW” as part of its name, the network is using a word that has also been used by linear outlets to identify streaming ventures, including NBC News Now and HBO Now, although those are not part of acronyms.There is some risk in making the name change, as Warner Bros. Discovery experienced with its rebrand of “HBO Max” to simply “Max,” only to change it back again.There is some benefit to establishing distinct identities, starting with consumer confusion. When Time Warner spun off its cable operations into Time Warner Cable in 2009, the latter retained its name, and for years had to remind everyone from customers to lawmakers that it was not part of the larger media conglomerate.On a recent episode of the Pivot podcast, Rachel Maddow, the network’s top anchor, made the case for the network distinguishing itself from NBC News, noting that “we’re spinning off with a huge standalone, newly built news gathering organization that is designed specifically for our purposes and nothing else. We have an incredibly loyal, very large audience, and and we’re universally platformed on a device called the television, which Americans use, despite media reports to the contrary.”In a separate memo, Lazarus wrote that CNBC would be retaining its name, noting that it stands for Consumer News and Business Channel. But it, too, will get a new logo.Lazarus suggested that it was the NBCU side that mandated the changes. He wrote, “As we all know, the peacock is synonymous with NBCUniversal, and it is a symbol they have decided to keep within the NBCU family. This gives us the opportunity to chart our own path forward, create distinct brand identities, and establish an independent news organization following the spin.”Sports programming on USA Network and Golf Channel “will come together under a new brand moniker of USA Sports,” he wrote, with new logos for USA Sports and Golf Channel.“As we all know, the peacock is synonymous with NBCUniversal, and it is a symbol they have decided to keep within the NBCU family,” Lazarus wrote in his memo. “This gives us the opportunity to chart our own path forward, create distinct brand identities, and establish an independent news organization following the spin.”MSNBC launched as a joint venture between Microsoft and NBC, with a special focus on growing internet connectivity in the mid-1990s. Microsoft sold its stake in 2005, and the channel has established itself with its lineup of progressive opinion hosts.In building up its news division, MSNBC has hired figures including The Washington Post’s Carol Leoning, Catherine Rampell and Jackie Alemany, while Jacob Soboroff, Vaughn Hillyard and Antonia Hylton are among those joining from NBC News.
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