In June 1980 Turner sold WRET for $20 million to help finance his latest idea, an all-news cable network. He launched the Cable News Network (CNN) to mostly negative press. Most journalists believed that no one wanted to watch news all day, a view with which the major networks, ABC, CBS, and NBC, agreed. Further, the prevailing view was that covering news for television required spending a huge amount of money that only the major networks could afford to spend. CNN originally included many long feature stories into its mix of news coverage, and it received some criticism for covering too much soft news—that is, news without much presentation of data. On January 1, 1982, Turner responded to this with CNN II, also called Headline News, which repeated the top stories of the day every half hour.

CNN did not make a profit until 1985, but by then it was evident that the bottom line did not motivate Turner as much as his unrelenting desire to be the first to do something. Nonetheless, wealth seemed to flow to him. In 1985 he launched CNN International, offering his broadcast services to cable and satellite television services around the world, and he founded a companion network, CNNRadio. In an effort to put some of his social ideas to work, he founded and funded the Better World Society, through which he advocated disarmament of nuclear weapons, environmental protection, and peaceful international relations. In that year his wife persuaded him to see psychiatrist Dr. Frank Pittman, who diagnosed Turner as having bipolar disorder and put Turner on heavy doses of lithium to try to control the disease. After several months Turner's colleagues noted improvement in his behavior, although Turner never completely let go of some of his wild impulses.

In 1986 CNN introduced flyaway dishes—satellite dishes that could be folded up for transport in aircraft or trucks and then set up anywhere—allowing CNN reporters to broadcast from anywhere in the world in real time, with no delays between when events occurred and when television viewers could see them. Turner tried to buy CBS, but CBS's management successfully fought him off with a harsh negative publicity campaign. On March 25, 1986, Turner gave up his effort to buy CBS and instead purchased MGM Entertainment Company, including United Artists (MGM/UA), from Kirk Kerkorian for $1.6 billion, acquiring 3,650 motion pictures, including popular classics such as Gone with the Wind, Citizen Kane (Turner's favorite), and Casablanca. Lacking the financing to hold MGM/UA together, he retained all the rights to the motion pictures while selling everything else back to Kerkorian, losing $100 million on the deal and generating much negative press about the bad deal he had made. However, that year alone, he made $125 million in revenue from the old MGM motion pictures.

Next, hoping to buy the broadcasting rights to the 1988 Olympics, he approached the Soviet Union to become partners with WTBS in purchasing the world broadcasting rights. The Soviet Union turned down that offer but joined Turner in creating the Goodwill Games, an opportunity for the world's athletes to measure themselves against each other in a non-Olympic year. The first Goodwill Games were held in Moscow in 1986, and Turner lost $26 million on the venture.

In 1987 Turner began colorizing MGM black-and-white motion pictures, generating protests from film critics and filmmakers. Eventually, Turner made millions of dollars from colorizing old favorites such as Miracle on 34th Street, and he applied the technology to Gone with the Wind to bring back the vibrant colors that had faded on the original print. In 1988 he expanded his cable network empire by creating Turner Network Television, which quickly became a staple of cable offerings. That year he and his second wife divorced.

In 1989, as Communism waned, more than a million young Chinese filled Beijing's Tiananmen Square, calling for a democratic government. On May 20 that year the Chinese army, led by tanks, plowed into the square, killing thousands of young people. CNN covered the event live, showing everything exactly as it happened. It marked a revolutionary moment in broadcasting that not only made people immediately aware of faraway events but also made CNN indispensable for governments everywhere. Direct feeds were installed in government buildings and embassies. The CNN crew was even able to broadcast Chinese officials shutting down CNN's broadcasting site, up to the moment of ending transmission.

In 1990 the Goodwill Games were staged in Seattle, and Turner lost $44 million on them. In 1991 he was named Time magazine's Man of the Year for his influence on broadcast communications. He purchased the cartoon collection of Hanna-Barbera, consisting of more than 8,500 cartoons, and used them to help launch his Cartoon Network in 1992. In addition, he closed the Better World Society and created the Turner Family Foundation, which gave away $10 million in 1992. Amidst this flurry of activity, he started dating Jane Fonda in 1991 and married her on December 21, 1991.                                                      

(http://www.answers.com/topic/ted-turner/3.11.2009)

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