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This exactly, and it's why I do disagree, to an extent, with @Weeters on having the elimination of all ownership limits being the solution to the problem. What good will it do when NexstarTegnaSinclairGrayScripps owns every channel when viewership for linear television across-the-board is vanishing and the networks will have already pulled stakes and fled OTA? What happens then? You'd wind up with another Penn Central, a massive conglomerate that merged in a survival attempt and yet went bankrupt within two years of the consummation in disastrous fashion. Is this a bad thing? You might as well get something for the spectrum if compensated accordingly by the FCC, especially if the transmitter land becomes more valuable than the station itself.

We're going to see more stations folding!

I don't think they're filling in for free. Whether or not they're getting paid salary or not, I would assume they would get some kind of bonus for doing the extra work, besides getting the national exposure.

With the tornado warning in Lake County right now, WMAQ stood alone as the only one in the market to not break in with live coverage, due to carrying the closing laps of the Indy 500. The thing that surprised me is that there was a good 5-minute span where they weren't even airing a warning crawl on the screen when the tornado warning first was issued. Looks like they got the crawl working now; however.

The race is usually blacked out live locally.

That per there NBC affiliation correct.

That just not fair, there getting national exposure to the point Maurice and Kristine are almost CBS News personalities. They should be paid, I know Maurice files for CBS Sunday Morning frequently he should be paid if this is a combination under this brand of local and National then it should be treated as such. Makes me wonder if the national talent such Elaine Quijano who doing WCBS weekend morning which feels like part time is getting paid herself. It feels like all the New York station who personalities fill in for the network talent on occasions get this exposure and yet they know it’s hard to get a national news job and there filling in for no pay seems unfair for me.

It took a massive rain delay at the Indy 500, but WTHR is now airing this year's race live. https://www.wthr.com/article/sports/motor/indianapolis-500/2024-indianapolis-500-air-live-wthr-channel-13-central-indiana-following-rain-delay/531-2b6eae3e-e4cc-4280-acd0-93f63c030930

Maybe it was intentional, in the way a radio station transitions from one format to another.

Funny enough KABC was really late to the NS2000+ scene...didn't pick it up until around 1990, so only had it about 4 years. Before that it was Cool Hand Luke opens plus their own synth version of Cool Hand Luke for the bumpers and close dating back to the mid 80s. For this month's update maybe there was some research or thought that the teletype sound has some brand equity among Angelinos or nostalgia among the staff. At least when they ran their anniversary clips I remember something about the Cool Hand Luke music being in there more than I thought it would. Going back to 99 when WABC picked up v2 of the EWN package they really amped up the teletype sound that got diminished when they moved from the CHL based package in 94.

The 1999 WABC cut might not be the perfect choice for KABC, but I think it’s a lot better than what they had been using.

Not sure. If they're salaried probably not. There is no traveling involved as CBS 2 and CBS News are in the same building.

Hearst buying WBBH is a unique one off, if you look at the demographics of SW Florida it’s very old, it’s the only demo that’s watches tv news and subscribe to cable in large numbers. Ft Myers is still a fast growing area. Just going by news ratings and how many people are watching in the market it’s likely far larger than its 55 ranking, possibly 5-10 rankings higher. Local news pay is really bad and in ft Myers for all stations especially WBBH it’s even worse. There is a bunch of injury lawyers and shady home remodelers in SW florida that purchases ads that make WBBH very profitable. Hearst isn’t going to buy your guys pet stations from owners that you don’t like. There is no one that’s going to purchase tv stations and “invest” in tv news in 2024 we are long past that point.

Agreed. Should it happen, it will likely be part of a larger bill related to FCC rules and regulations. I'd compare it to the FAA reauthorization law that passed earlier this month, where lawmakers added five daily long-distance flights out of slot/perimeter restricted National Airport just outside DC. A small piece of a must-pass bill that got more noise than more consequential parts of the law, and was heavily lobbied for by an industry with a few big players. (In this case, most airlines that aren't named United, which wanted to protect its hub at nearby Dulles airport.)

After almost 3 years, KVUT decided to call it a day on May 24 (last Friday evening). In local media articles posted online, no real reason was given for the move, but it was most likely a financial decision. By the tone of the quotes from UT-Tyler, it sounds like the university was the primary funder of KVUT, and not as much from listeners. The station's website and its content is already gone, and trying to click the website now gets a redirect to UT-Tyler's main website. With the loss of KVUT, it means the loss of a job for longtime TV newsman Mike Landess, who had been doing newsbits and longform interviews of local notables for the station. No word yet on what will happen to the 99.7 frequency and license. https://www.kltv.com/2024/05/24/ut-tyler-announces-kvut-997-will-cease-operations-friday-evening/

Funny to see that everyone on here almost universally pans KABC's switch to WABC music. I agree, but I can't help but wonder whether we might all have thought differently had they made these changes 10-15 years ago when CBS was similarly standardizing around the WCBS look. The WABC cut of Eyewitness News has become so recognizable with WABC for us that it feels wrong to hear it in Southern California. But, it's probably one of those things that doesn't matter a whole lot at this point. Most viewers are only watching for 5-10 minutes at a time at most, so who cares what the open music sounds like these days.

All the dead malls can merge together and you'd still wind up with a dead mall, just much larger and needing a bailout from the federal government when the entire system comes crashing down.

It’s still surreal that they’ve adopted this theme.

Former WRTV news anchor Tanya Sumner (neé Spencer), who later became a town council member in the Indianapolis suburb of Whitestown after leaving journalism, has died at 53 from complications from a rare form of colon cancer she was diagnosed with in November 2022. https://deadline.com/2024/05/tanya-sumner-dead-news-anchor-indianapolis-abc-affiliate-wrtv-1235941409/

And here it is. 2 different music packages used during one (extended) close:

Exactly. With all of the stuff going on in the world right now, I don't think in any way, Joe Biden is going to focus on the ownership caps.

I'm just gonna put this in the most blunt way possible: I do not expect "the cap" to survive under any political regime for much longer. It is a dinosaur. You can make a convincing case to either "side" as to why it needs to go away. It's been 20 years since Congress last meddled with it, it's just going to take one of the not-Sinclair groups to make a stink about it to the right people. It's a dated method of calculating "reach" in a world where everyone is connected to everything. I've theorized before that this isn't going to start from a company wanting to buy more stations, but a company trying to sell stations and not finding a buyer. Sinclair begging to raise the cap so they can buy more hits a lot differently than, say, Disney saying they can't sell the O&O group because nobody who wants to buy it can because of the cap. The ownership cap on television stations is the least of Biden's worries. I really don't think the general public cares all that much.

I’m guessing it’s not just branding concerns that caused the end of Eyewitness News.

Do anchors like Kristine Johnson who anchoring this Saturday broadcast and Maurice Dubios do they get paid for filling-in or part timing. I know they can’t be doing that for free, spending time away from their family and traveling and making no dough.

A lot of criticism about Nexstar stems from their treatment of employees. Do you have any issues with Nexstar's newscast quality? I definitely like the production value of tegnestations but a lot of them seem to suffer from the CBS O&O syndrome: generic-ness