• Broadcasting & Cable , Tuesday, August 11, 2009 9:30 AM

"American Idol" judge Paula Abdul became the latest household name to usurp the breaking news power of traditional media by making a big announcement on Twitter.

Abdul's scoop came on the heels of the July 27 announcement that Ben Silverman would be departing NBC. That news broke via the Twitter page of Ryan Seacrest, well ahead of an NBC press release. "It's the democratization of media," says Brad Adgate, senior VP at Horizon Media.

Programming executives at newsmagazines hope Twitter will actually help them in the end. "All it does is whet the appetite for viewers to come to us to get the full story," says one. But Shari Anne Brill, programming director for Carat, is skeptical. She believes there are still entertainment news consumers who haven't heard a chirp about Twitter. "A lot of people don't seem to understand why it exists," Brill says.

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