• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, June 3, 2015

“NBC Nightly News” is still without Brian Williams, four months after he falsely claimed he had been in a helicopter hit by enemy fire during the Iraq War — when, in fact, the helicopter had not been hit.  

As time goes on, we can guess this may not matter much. It’s not really about the lying, and more about how we don’t need star TV anchors .

NBC’s replacement for Williams, Lester Holt, continues to do a good job -- even as the show is now in a tighter race, jockeying with ABC’s “World News Tonight with David Muir” as the top early evening broadcast news show. When Williams was at the helm, NBC held a dominating lead. Still, the network hasn’t been heavily promoting the show, which is probably affecting viewership.  

TV news show shouldn’t have a “star” anchor;  the journalism should be front and center. But, right now, having an anchor still matter,  especially to those older TV viewers who watch a lot of news.  Perhaps ten or 20 years from now it might be a different scenario, when more millennials may be viewers.

Do you think the young-skewing news organization Vice Media, which will soon have a daily news show on HBO (as well as taking over A&E Network’s H2 Channel), will have“anchors”?

In other parts of the world, TV networks view news differently -- like the U.K., where on-air people, who “present” the news, continue to be called “news readers.” That brings a different profile for TV viewers.

If Muir, Holt, or Williams want to go out and do a bit of reporting work -- with their respective on-the-ground producers who share in the journalism work -- that’s okay. But I’d downplay their efforts and hype up the stories instead.

Do we really need big “star” TV brands to sell the show? Perhaps that’s why NBC got in trouble with Williams in the first place.