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In another major sports coup, The CW has acquired rights to NASCAR’s Xfinity Series. Deal starts in 2025.

Nexstar is in many of those markets and can just put the affiliation on their own stations.

While the virtual 1A is a bit jank, honestly so glad they finally did this, the Saturday editions with the insanely tight shot the entire show was always horrible, it didn't look like the level of quality you would expect from a national network. They didn't necessarily need to make a full blown virtual set but the camera was always way too zoomed in and you could tell the lighting was not great. The new virtual set: Looks 100x better than the old setup:

https://6abc.com/6abc-hall-of-fame-lisa-thomas-laury-dave-roberts-walter-liss/13559168/ WPVI now has its own Hall of Fame at the station.

Will there even be a CW in 2025? If Sinclair pulls their stations, it might be bad for them…

With all due respect, you sure use a ton of words to say the same damn things, over and over.

And local ACC markets like Atlanta and Pittsburgh can benefit from this package, as well.

Wouldn't it just be easier just to say reporting from Miami, Jose Diaz Balart? Why the make believe he flies from Miami to NY to Miami every Saturday? Then they don't have to do a virtual copy of 1A, or 3C in the past and any future 3X studio.

I mean with how many editions Lester does from LA, DC, etc. it's hardly uniform as is already

Can we get back to talking about the current ABC logo and the new O&O graphics package please? I swear we get carried away by the smallest things in these threads. All I can say about the new O&O package now that we've seen the full package on WLS is... I don't really like the look of the graphics. It's too cluttered for a (somewhat) simple package. Very few packages have successfully shown the 3D look with simple gradients (both the current CBS O&O look and NBC O&O look). The only thing I can give the look credit for is the time, temperature, and current weather conditions ticker in the opens.

KRCR Newschannel 7 1999 KRCR Newschannel 7 2000 WTVO Newschannel 17 1995

The inevitable has happened; RNN Associates, which turned several major market stations into zombies carrying ShopHQ programming, has purchased ShopHQ's parent company out of (duh) Chapter 11 bankruptcy. They're probably going to keep their viewer-hostile 'only appeal to 50+ers until they're in the grave' strategy going. Great job, FCC; your spectrum auction turned a broadcaster into a shopping network-owning literal waste of electricity for a channel that should've died decades ago but hangs on because of must-carry. Really great for that 'diversity of voices' thing you used to judge licensees on in the old days.

Those opens are a mess. Way too much going on, and a weird mash-up of 25+ year old music gives it an outdated vibe instantly. It’s like they said “let’s make this local” by plastering literally EVERY photo of the given city in the graphics. I wonder how this will look in Raleigh/Durham or Fresno?! This is one of those instances where the “KISS” approach should’ve been applied. Take one element away and it gets closer to a viable package. Even switching out the two city photos above and below the “Eyewitness News” panel with some solid colors would help immensely! Also, not a fan of the use of red/blue for Breaking News and yellow/blue for everything else. It almost looks like a mash of a WABC version and a KABC version (with colors those stations have historically used). I would’ve done red/yellow for Breaking News. As for the lower thirds and on-screen newscast elements, I actually like them. They could be a bit more subtle, but I like the treatment of talent names and the overall visual hierarchy of the headline and supporting details.

My prediction is that the sun/cloud icons will eventually be made bigger and placed in a more traditional location, while also maintaining the photography in each day's background. Otherwise I think it takes a little more time for viewers to decipher the seven-day.

That how I used to feel about KTRK's 6&10pm broadcasts up they started making bad decisions like the elimination of 13 Undercover, whatever or whoever made their former news director Dave Strickland to quit, and of course, pushing Dave Ward out. Strickland was the best ND that station ever had. He lived, breathed, and bleed Eyewitness News when he was there. Reading things like this, really gets me: "They don't let you in the building and they said they were busy and would call me back and never heard from them. Marvin [Zindler] would be ashamed of them." --Google Review, a few hours ago KTRK used to have "CrimeTracker-13", and just like Action 13, 13 Undercover, and 13's HealthCheck, got rid of that too. The "Safety Tracker" thing is such a rudimentary version of what they had 15 years ago, in part because it only covers one county, and because they rarely ever use it on air. I have to concur. The lower thirds have too many movements during live reports. And what's up with using 2D logos, but having 3D graphics? To warp it up, boy if you wanted proof that one size doesn't fit all, just look how tiny many of the fonts on the new weather graphics at KTRK. People have been complaining that they literally can't see some of it because it was designed for a greenscreen, not a full-body video wall. Giant spaces for the weatherman to stand are still there, though they don't need them, so everything is pushed into one corner in some graphics and proves less info than before. I am so disheartened to see that ABC OTV doesn't even care enough to put out a product that people can read on smaller screens or for people who don't have perfect vision, and that has a forecast that so busy, harder to understand, see and remember. None of the sky images looked anything like those pictures would have led you to believe (very dark brownish-looking pictures vs a pretty much clear partly cloudy blue sky with a tiny bit of haze). No question, what they had before was better.

I've noticed that on Christmas morning. Here in Yakima, there's no morning news on any stations (KAPP and KIMA go for network news rebroadcasts, KNDO airs holiday specials), but in Seattle, KIRO 7 made their crew work Xmas morning, the last time the holiday fell on a weekday. I can picture a family full of excited kids opening toys at 6am Xmas morning...'"quiet down Johnny, the weather's on!" Byron Allen's 'Happy Holidays America' has been a yearly staple at KNDO on Christmas morning, and I believe KOMO in Seattle also airs it. KIRO USED to air some barter cartoon specials. Red Boots for Christmas often preempted the noon news on 12/25. Some stations also aired The Little Shepherd, and yes, Santa Claus is Comin' to Town was once in local syndication along with ABC's yearly broadcast. I notice fewer and fewer religious specials every year. NBC usually airs a yearly liturgical program but most stations stuff it early in the morning before the kids wake up. This would be a GREAT opportunity for local churches to put their Xmas Eve services on local TV, either that or air local HS/college choirs singing carols. WGN used to do that. Would be a public service at little or no cost to the station. Anyways, nothing's changed with the morning news schedules here. KIMA and KAPP start at 5AM. KNDO starts at 4:30. Even during the height of COVID shutdowns, that never changed. There was a time, 25 years ago, where there was only a half-hour of local morning news on these stations.

And then there's stations like mine in Yakima where the anchor tosses to what seems like a 'live' report, even sounding as such, asking the taped 'reporter' a "question"!! like this: "(Reporter's name) joins us now, (Reporter's first name), what's going on with the city council?" Toss to taped report. They do the same thing with the meteorologist from Tri-Cities 'on tape,' asking the 'tape' a question. Once in a while, the weatherman's report will magically start talking over the anchor's last few words of banter. Can't make this up. Even Missoula stations have a live weatherman at the studio and they are even further down the list of small markets than we are. We're #117, Missoula is #162. One thing I miss about Seattle local news was the reliance on live reports. Here, the reporter...I meant, 'multimedia journalist,' takes a camera, sets it up, does the report pre-recorded (very occasionally live when warranted), edits it before the newscast, boom, done. In this age of streaming and viewing news on social media, perhaps the trend might be changing, however.

Another one out the door as of this morning: Christine Romans Leaves CNN: ‘Early Start’ Anchor and Correspondent Exits. What a career. Early Start has totally been tossed aside for years. I wouldn't be surprised if Rahel Solomon got the appointment at the end of the replacement trials and hopefully it comes with some investment into the program. (But I somehow missed this - another CNBCer being poached by CNN - Kayla Tausche Joins CNN as White House Correspondent). The article also states Mattingly is one of the leading contenders to join Poppy at CTM. Funny how there was so little movement in CNN's White House department for a while and now it's poised to move around even faster. Anyways, I think I'm feeling kind of neutral on Phil at CTM. I'm ok with his reporting in general and I've seen him on CTM before...he's alright, I guess. I'm envisioning he'll end up being kind of like a Dokoupil if he gets that seat -- the suburban serious but also goofy dad type. Still not a ton of anchoring experience, but it doesn't seem to matter these days.

Former longtime WALA chief meteorologist John Edd Thompson was attacked at a gas station this past Tuesday. https://www.fox10tv.com/2023/07/28/retired-fox10-chief-meteorologist-john-edd-thompson-attacked-81st-birthday/ Thankfully, he is ok. Why someone would do this to an 81 year old man, even one that is considered legendary in the Mobile area is absolutely sickening.

Likely depends more on advertisers who MUST get their message out on Thanksgiving or Christmas for some godforsaken reason; most local news orgs rightly don't bother with a morning or noon newscast on those holidays, but then you have a few that do force it upon their employees. The other problem is that the syndicated Christmas special market is down to the leftover shows which are just religious orgs fundraising in disguise or cheap drivel like Santa's Funniest Moments, and remote corporate accounting drones consider taping local holiday specials (or even just those Happy Holidays from staff pieces) to be 'money losers'. It's cheaper to talk the fresh out of college reporter to do the Christmas shows for overtime than spend money on studio decor and setup (or remote time) to actually serve the community. I only fear this is going to happen more and more for Scripps stations.