No one would say the summer of 2014 suffered any shortage of breaking news.

From the crisis in Ferguson, Mo., to the cultural impact of Robin Williams' and Joan Rivers' sudden deaths and all the way up to recent round-the-clock coverage of U.S. strikes on ISIS, cable news has been heavily occupied. The last three months have been so big, Fox News Channel just clocked its first quarter with the most-watched primetime across all of cable in more than a decade — even besting USA and ESPN.

The average 1.79 million viewers between 8 p.m. and 11 p.m., Monday through Friday, gave FNC its first quarter atop the dial since the Iraq War broke out in 2003.

CNN's gains from the comparable quarter last year were modest, but they were still gains. Its 186,000 adults 18-49 in primetime (8-11 p.m.) marked a 4 percent improvement and even outpaced MSNBC — now back in third place. MSNBC, still holding slight second-place edge in total viewers, was down 21 percent in the key demo compared to last year. Pulling just an average 150,000 adults 25-54 in primetime, it meant quarterly lows for Chris Hayes, Rachel Maddow and Lawrence O'Donnell in the key demo.

The wondrous anomaly of Shark Tank encores also continues. With the ABC reality competition in heavy off-net rotation on CBNBC, those repeats are outperforming much of cable news and ranking No. 14 in primetime where adults 25-54 are concerned — besting every telecast on MSNBC.

The New York Times Co. said Wednesday it plans to cut about 100 newsroom jobs through buyouts, and perhaps layoffs, to cut costs and shift more resources to digital news products.

The company, whose advertising revenue fell 4% year-over-year in the most recent quarter, will offer buyouts to employees at its editorial and business operations. If not enough employees take the offer, it will resort to layoffs.

"The job losses are necessary to control our costs and to allow us to continue to invest in the digital future of The New York Times, but we know that they will be painful both for the individuals affected and for their colleagues," said newspaper publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and company CEO Mark Thompson in a note to the staff.