Leaderboard

Granted, but there are some things that we've known for years and those things won't change I fear. Like the fact that Michael's chemistry seems forced with everyone but Robin, he stumbles over every other word, his delivery on GMA is like a dear caught in the headlights ("umm okay" "uhh alright coming up" "oh okay here's a look at..."), and most of all the fact that he's being forced into actual news stories when he lacks any journalistic qualities. I've always felt that one of the morning programs should have a dedicated sports anchor, why not create a position like that for Michael? It's painful watching him sit with the big boys and girls and pretend that he's on the same level as George or even Robin, I mean at least with Lara she just sits there during serious news topics. Also, Lisa McRee and Kevin Newman turned out be disastrous for the program but even that era of GMA had lots of integrity led by journalist who were capable of displaying enough personality for the program. Michael's missing at least one of those.

Exactly Early Today and First Look were essentially the same program with different graphics and a different closing segment (Scrambled Politics on MSNBC). Now it appears that Betty Nguyen is no longer doing Early Today but solely First Look. Totally agree about Way Too Early - Willie was the best and after all the show was designed to fit his personality. When Brian Shactman and Thomas Roberts hosted it seemed like they kept the same style which didn't work with the hosts.

I don't know exactly what year newsrooms became "pussyland", but I think it was right about the time they outlawed indoor smoking.. Fights and flying objects were common things in local newsrooms. Maybe it's because there was also ample booze dispersed from producer's and assignment desk. News Directors were also much skinnier and moved quicker because they didn't want to be targets. They also tended to last more then 2 years at a time.

We all have have our feelings about Al (obviously), but you cannot deny that he was absolutely correct about the Ryan Lochte situation. He said what we all thought loud and clear, and what Bush did to change around the ordeal for an interview during the interview was absolutely wrong (pathetic even). I know Bush is not a true journalist (you don't need Robin Red to tell you); but even as an entertainment reporter, he really seemed desperate to get Lochte to change his story/actions after the incident to make the latter look like a victim and clear the misconceptions about the network's Olympics coverage, and foolishly winded up making Lochte look even more like a disgrace (to his swimming team, Team USA as a whole, the people/city of Rio and his country), himself look like an idiot, the coverage still divisive, and his bosses look like half-wit numbskulls. Whether Roker grinds your gears or not, you gotta admit he was right to speak the truth and call Bush out about it. And the fact that the executives are "embarrassed" about it and tried their hardest to shush Al straight after says so much now about them than I ever thought before. Plus, the fact that Bush told Al to "calm down" made me angry and want to track him down and smack him on the head like Al looked like he wanted to do.

Propane and propane accessories I tell ya hwat.

Say what you will about Bill Applegate, but you never had property damage and shouting matches at Reserve Square during his tenure. Looks like Raycom might need to clean house (AGAIN!!!) and possibly take Cleveland 19 News out behind an alley.

I watched yesterday morning and I thought it was decent. I think give them some time to work out the kinks and it could work well. I give them credit, the first hour is MUCH better than it's been for the past two years, hopefully they keep the newsier first hour after the election ends. I'm interested to see what Lara's role is when she returns. My guess is she'll still have a big presence in the second hour with Michael. I wonder if as "co-anchor" she'll sit next to George when the show opens, when she gets back or if it'll just be Robin, George and Michael. Also, if you ask me, I think Amy would be a great replacement eventually for Robin (whenever she does decide to leave, be it in 20 years...). If you ask me, Amy is a great anchor at ABC, and she's improved so much since she joined the network.

Something I reported last week on my blog. Other notables from today on my blog: - WPHL 17's in-house morning newscast has expanded to 5:00am. - KTVZ 21 is expanding to half-hour news at 7:00pm. - KEZI 9 and KDRV 12 are both adding hour-long 4:00pm newscasts. KTVZ 21, KEZI 9 and KDRV 12's new newscasts all debut on September 12th, which is this year's day of "adding newscasts" left and right, across the country.

I have to give a proper ending to my thread (as in the "how much of a difference have we made?" ghread) right now, and this will be a rant. Yes I may have gone a bit overboard with the activism thing, but seeing many of these news stories really just grinds my gears (and I mean with a screeching sound). And as much as I hate how a lot of police procedurals (Law and Order and its spinoffs being the most infamous) make it look like they're glorifying police brutality (and maybe are, but I don't know if they are or not), there's at least the wire, and I even prefer watching criminal minds over law and order. What I do think though, is that, contrary to popular belief, not only is there a liberal bias in the media, but also a conservative bias as well. In other words, it's either conservative (sometimes extreme conservatism) like Fox News, Sinclair, and possibly Nexstar, or liberal (sometimes extremely liberal) like NBC, Gannett and TEGNA, Raycom, CBS, and more recently, ABC, and there is almost no middle ground except Time inc (as in Time magazine), PBS (which is most of my use for my tv set recently), and, to a lesser extent, time warner and tribune. Also, there's quite a chunk of BS on the news media about stuff like bravery and cowardice (which if I even discuss that again, it'll go as horribly as last time), female oppression (there's actual female oppression in third world countries like Syria and Lebanon, and ISIS are a well know group of sexists who don't care if no means no), and even crime stats (crime has gone down, but many think its on the rise). And btw, I don't think most whites have white privilege (despite what the media tells us) or they wouldn't have to move out of gentrified cities like many minorities do because the rent is too damn high (which goes for many middle class people regardless of race). I also want to talk about the fact that I just thought that if I could find people here that would join me in becoming activists in the TV industry, I would have a good start and a good structure as to what issues we'd tackle, but it turns out I was completely wrong. So there, go ahead and speculate, gossip, and be misinformed about stuff in the TV industry, I'm finding some other group of people that will join me, and even if I can't do that, I can still solve (or attempt to solve) the gentrification problem that Austin has, travel the world and have my own adventures.

Spot on. If the suits want to be mad at someone, they should be mad at Billy for his defense/justification of Lochte's lies. THAT, brings down the reputation of the Today, the brand and the people associated with it. Entertainment reporter or not, he seriously went overboard with the excuses for Lochte. At one point you could tell that even Natalie got tired of the crap that came out of Bush's mouth when she spoke up against it and sided with Al. I get the need for Billy to make his mark, and fit in with the program, but I think in this case he did NOTHING to endear himself with his colleagues. I see nothing wrong with what Al said- unorthodox for a weather man, but whatever, he is right. Plus, it's not like Lauer gave Lochte a free pass during his sit down interview with him, so why are the brass so upset about what happened? At the end of the day, being truthful and calling Lochte out on his BS would help the overall image of Today and get some heat off the USOC/USA Swimming-- that way the people/media could move on from this story. And if NBC/Comcast was worried about what they had invested with Lochte and the reality show, etc. Then i'm sure they're thrilled at the prospect of him jumping to ABC to join DWTS...

I'm surprised he didn't get a new contract when he took over Sunday Today. I would have thought that would have been part of the new contract getting rid of 3rd hour of today

The viewers here identify ABC as a part of what Channel 7 is. It's always been station then network not the other way around. It was put in the copy as "7's Action News" for a long time when Bill Bonds was here. They've used just 7 for a 35+ years in promos and its alternated with Channel 7 here and there. Never has ABC been a consideration in the brand even though for all intents and purposes it's 100% an O&O still...

Well..in this crazy world of TV..some changes over at WPLG: First: Christina Vazquez who ran the Consumer Investigative portion of Local 10 left to do PR. Now it is looking like Constance Jones will be leaving the station. Her traffic duties have already been handed over to Nicole Perez and FTVLive mentioned that she will be headed up to FOX 5 in Atlanta in the mornings.

I kept screaming to my TV saying... "Hit his ejector seat Al...do it, do it!" Then I woke up.

There are plenty of current and former TV folks working as drivers and call screaners for escort services. They seem to be very detailed oriented and cut straight through the bs associated with booking the calls.

Wouldn't quite say that Today's ratings are great, they're down an average of 2 million ~ compared to a decade ago. The "great ratings" have more to do with GMA losing so much rather than Today gaining (which they haven't)

So I guess "Detroit 442" is out of the question.