Keith Olbermann’s show tweaks MSNBC on Twitter

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Search for MSNBC on Twitter and you know what comes up at the top of the page? A tweet promoting Keith Olbermann’s new show on Current TV.

The clever folks at Current TV bought an ad on Twitter that puts a promotional tweet for Olbermann’s ‘Countdown’ on the top of any search on the site for ‘MSNBC.’ Given that on Thursday MSNBC made national news itself when Time magazine’s Mark Halperin called President Obama a bad word on its ‘Morning Joe’ program, Olbermann’s show is no doubt getting a ton of publicity. The tweet is not from Olbermann’s personal Twitter feed but from CountdownKO, a feed Current TV set up to hype the show.

The tweets range from plugging what is on upcoming shows to telling people how to find Current TV on their cable and satellite distributor.

Olbermann, of course, worked at MSNBC until earlier this year, when his clashes with management finally reached the point of no return and he left the cable network. He started his new show on Current last week and immediately became the biggest program the channel has ever had.

Although Olbermann likes tweaking MSNBC, he did drop the idea of running his show an extra three minutes just so it would bleed into the opening of Rachel Maddow’s show on MSNBC. Such a move would only serve to annoy fans of both commentators and not really have any effect on the ratings. Olbermann did it for a few days and has since cut his show back to an hour.

-- Joe Flint

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