'Breaking News' No More: CNN to Reserve Often-Used Graphic For Big News Only

CNN's omnipresent “Breaking News” banner, emblematic of the network's often breathless live news coverage, is on its way out.

In a memo sent to staffers (and obtained by The Hollywood Reporter) Thursday, the network's new CEO Chris Licht bemoaned the term's overuse industry-wide, writing “It has become such a fixture on every channel and network that its impact has become lost on the audience... It certainly will need tweaks, so we are open to feedback, but this is a great starting point to try to make ‘Breaking News’ mean something BIG is happening.”

Licht went on to write “We are truth-tellers, focused on informing, not alarming our viewers. You’ve already seen far less of the ‘Breaking News’ banner across our programming. The tenor of our voice holistically has to reflect that.”

Over the years, CNN's breaking news banner has become such a fixture that there's a meme generator dedicated to it, and at least one Twitter account tracking the network's each and every mention of the term (where there's been a notable drop off since May 3rd, just one day into Licht's tenure as CNN CEO.)

Licht joined CNN from CBS, where he most recently served as executive producer for The Late Show with Stephen Colbert.

A version of this story originally appeared on our sister site TV Tattle.