With the Spitzer story, Toobin first brought Skype to broadcast news.

Jeffrey Toobin: Well, I didn’t realize, I have a place in technological history. I was on vacation in Maui when the Eliot Spitzer story broke. And CNN had no ability to get an actual camera to Maui, so they got a Skype camera to Maui which broadcast live, and it was the first Skype to broadcast television ever. And I found that I was mentioned and shown on all these technology blogs I never even heard of because of the Skype [role].

I think in many respects, the advance of technology has allowed technology to get out of the way rather than be so present. It just, you can concentrate more on the journalistic functions if it’s just easier to set up a camera and do the technological part.

Now, certain parts of technology have certainly helped. John King is famous for using our [magic board]. I use it occasionally although it’s really John’s board. That is fantastic. And it’s just extremely good use of data and data representation, and that is I think sort of pure technology at its best. But a lot of the technology is simply allowing things to be done more simply. Although, it is amazing when you’re at CNN and you just see how many people are involved and just getting you on the air. It’s still pretty complicated.

September 5, 2008