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The French Open needs NBC more than NBC needs The French Open, but the major tennis tourneys The French Open, Wimbledon, & US Open need to be on broadcast the Wimbledon finals are tape delayed on ABC for 3PM Sat & Sun after ESPN has aired them live, and now do air some live action to close out the first week of Wimbledon on Sat what NBC use to do when they aired it. They even did that for the US Open on a Sun afternoon last year on ABC I didn't watch it thou I was watching college football plus ESPN went dark for 10 days so missed most of the US Open. Yeah, just TNT trying to keep some sports rights on the channel is all. The French Open was right to get rid of Tennis Channel as right holders was kinda surprised that NBC didn't try to get The French Open for USA or Peacock when they renewed contracts for the rights years ago.

I think station groups small and large could be vulnerable. Small groups could be vulnerable because they lack the resources that the larger groups have. And the large groups could be vulnerable simply because they have grown so big that if they should fail, their failure would have a catastrophic impact on the communities they serve.

I still don't understand why it's 39% and not an even 40%. Did someone hate round numbers?

It's simple economics. With NBC locking down the NBA, it's not surprising they decided to pass on the French Open. They don't have an infinite amount of money to spend on sports rights and it's safe to say there's more value in having the NBA than the French Open. Sports rights aren't going to get any cheaper, so tough decisions have to be made.

No, what I'm saying is that the megagroups have resources that the smaller ones do not, and the megagroups are better situated to rapidly deal with stuff like disaster recovery as a result. Stations that don't have the same resources (i.e. WINK) get stuck pointing a camera at a laptop while their transmitter wails in the background. Even when WVUE flooded during Katrina, they had WALA to fall back on. They briefly used the KUHT control room before WFAA brought in their production truck, and eventually they rented fiber to run their shows entirely out of a secondary production control room at WFAA. Master Control was rapidly moved to WFAA as well. KUSA also did some stuff for them as the WFAA setup was patched together. The only thing they did with the KUHT equipment was switch cameras in the first few days, everything else was done from Dallas or Denver. They only used the KUHT cameras until the WFAA truck showed up, and they only used the WFAA cameras until they pulled their studio cameras (which were moved to the second floor as the building started to flood) out of the old building. The Dallas arrangement continued for many months until they got a trailer built out to "Tegna specifications" and brought production back locally. Save for the first day or so when they used the KUHT control room, all KUHT did was provide studio space.

I don't have to like what Lougee is saying, but I don't disagree with it. I am quite concerned that some of these smaller groups and/or solo owners will start to go under, simply because they do not have the resources the big ones have. Resources that range from disaster recovery (look at how Tegna propped up KHOU when their facility flooded, then look at what happened with WINK under the same scenario) to engineering resources to shared services like graphics or Traffic or Master Control. Like I have said before, I believe this is precisely the argument that's going to make things start to change, and whether that change is good or bad is up for debate.

Found this article about Kevin Adell being sued by family members over fraud and racketeering in the "theft" of land in Novi, Michigan. https://www.metrotimes.com/news/910am-superstation-owner-accused-of-fraud-racketeering-in-federal-lawsuit-34167968 This makes me wonder, how does this man even hold a broadcast license? Especially in a place like Detroit, he uses this as a weapon that has scared away major companies that have kept his WADL-TV from becoming a major factor becuase of his own ego, incompetence and greed. What does it even take to be stripped of a license anymore these days? This is even a picture the Detroit News pulled from Adell Media.

That won't happen though. In the CNBC article that I shared, it said, In that case, Sony would have kept Paramount and the studios, while Apollo would have taken CBS - and likely would have started to sell it for parts like they have done with Cox stations, maybe even reorganizing Cox stations around CBS.

Looks like The Jerry Springer Show repeats are ending in syndication come Sep.

It seems the contracts are getting shorter and shorter. Turnover is constant, and jobs in smaller markets are either stepping stones for larger markets or only stops for the journalists who take them. The recruiters are on colleges trying to snatch up any recent graduates (or even students) to fill the voids created by all of the turnover. In a way, this may create a future void, as current long-haul journalists and TV people leave the industry for a better life (and salary) because of their experience. When the experience goes away, these other jobs may suffer unless the schools teach for this kind of experience.

Looks like the old TVNewsTalk.net domain is active again. I accidentally typed it in, and it redirected back to here after being in limbo since the outage.

I know that, but previous articles stated the network was trying to rely less on scripted programming and more on sports and other programming. I'm assuming NBC didn't want to pay that much for it and wbd seems to be desperate since they're probably going to lose the nba.

Pay more, and put it on less accessible channels? They clearly weren't willing to fight for it. It's not complicated.

I thought NBC was looking to fill programming not only on the network, but also with peacock / USA network. By losing the french open, it doesn't help. If money was fhe issue, maybe they should keep the fench open and put most of it on peacock / USA network, with the finals on NBC. With NBC getting the NBA, putting the majority of the french open on USA network / peacock will reduce the chances of any programming conflicts with NBA or any other events that may occur.

Weekend morning anchor Samatha Chatman returned to the anchor desk today after 2 months of absence due to surgery. She sounded great on air today.

Affiliates and NBC News; they don't want special programming roadblocking the daytime with pre-emptions, and there are places to air it where only Supernatural rerun fans are inconvenienced. Outside the Olympics and golf, the days of gobs of broadcast daytime being sucked up for sports are over, and it's much cheaper to Zoom someone to drone on about today's 'dangerous' TikTok trend than to devote time, crews, resources and money to a sport where only four names win anything (you can bet with Novak's injury NBC knows tomorrow's swan song was going to go out with a whimper). Also as long as the FCC keeps up this silly charade of brain-dead travel and nature shows with only senior and banned Internet kids appeal being 'educational and informational' the affiliates and networks still have to work around putting that three hours somewhere. Weekend sports with low appeal get in the way.

The few times I've seen their newsroom on air, it looks worse IMO than the news set does. Lots of wires that should be hidden, ceiling tiles not completely in place or missing, just sad looking--especially in comparison to the other local newsgatherers.

Let me see if I can help you here. The rule is that a single entity can't own full-power broadcast licenses that combine to cover more than 39% of the country. (There are some nuances here like the UHF discount, duopolies, Class A stations, etc. But that is the basic rule.) The broadcast networks are subject to this same rule. Their O&O stations can't reach more than 39%. What is not covered in that 39% is programming reach. The broadcast networks, and syndication programmers for that matter, can set up agreements to have their programming broadcast by stations covering 100% of the country. So NBC Prime or Live with Kelly & Mark don't have a limit on their national reach. But NBC and ABC can't directly own stations that reach more than 39% of the country. Hope that helps!

Broadcast TV is likeky long past its chance to be broken up by the government. When Ma Bell (AT&T) was broken up into the RBOCs, it only took 20 years for many of them to merge back together as....AT&T. By then, cellular phones were a regular part of life and customers had options. Nowadays, the very POTS that comprised phone service is a rarity that has been largely replaced by VOIP and cellular. At least we still have competition in TV, even if it's the same three owners and many markets. The stations are going to have to start falling before anyone intervenes. I think on the internet end we could start seeing some regulation since the content pool is getting smaller.

I know Rand Paul has proposed a bill that removes all caps to the ownership rules. If that ever passed... As far as the Tegna ownership level, I think they are at about 32% with the UHF discount. That means they still have a bit of room to make moves, but there are no good options available that don't blow past the cap since they focus on larger markets - something like acquiring Graham or Hearst. In the Speculatron, I created a thread wondering what could happen if the caps were all eliminated and companies could go to 100%.

When I saw this in my RSS I had to laugh; if Soo Kim was any good at business he could've easily made this deal pass FCC muster but he got greedy, and now he has to lay in his terrible bed of misfit ABC affiliates and a Bootheel duopoly in a dead market.

It’s pretty bad. The building itself is a Soviet looking warehouse just outside of downtown Dallas. They have to have some sort of long term plan for updating that space.

Well Steve Edgar of FOX4 in Dallas I assume he's Republican just as I assume journalist Bill Ritter at ABC7 in New York is a Democrat. They're both have worked hard enough to have an opinion, FTVLive did a story and I don't believe everything they say on that site but Scott wrote a story after the 1/6 capitol insurrection of a former KDFW reporter calling Steve out over something on Twitter I can't remember what it was about though. I'll try to find it. KDFW is never gonna update their set. I'm convinced they’re in a competition with New York for the longest to have never changed their set. Of course, WNYW got a New set in phases in 2019, it wasn't reported on by The Other Site, but i'm convinced KDFW is trying to have the oldest news set in the world.

And it still hasn't been announced. Supposedly Shari Redstone is still thinking it over, after all, she has the final say. That she hasn't indicated anything yet is enough to make one curious.

I'm not familiar with Steve Eager's work, but I'm not a fan of this practice either. Granted, commentary is fine when it's a clearly labeled editorial (or when it's an offbeat newscast like "Next" at KUSA). And I know Bill Beutel at WABC occasionally inserted some mild commentary (ex: John Gotti "can only look at the moon through jailhouse bars"), but I don't think he ever waded into politics to this degree. Generally, there's a time and place for editorializing and commentary, and the middle of a supposedly impartial newscast isn't it IMHO.

Nothing new for Steve Eager, he’s allowed his own commentary to bleed into the news for quite a while now. Similar to what Bill Ritter does at WABC. In both instances the hubris of Steve and Bill to assume viewers care about their opinions rather than just the news is off the charts.

Anchor Steve Eager basically says "despite claiming his hands were tied for years regarding border security a looming election likely changed President Biden's mind..." during a report on Biden's new executive order. I know this is a Fox O&O and it's Texas but I'm still surprised to have this level of editorialization (wether or not it may be true) written into the script on local news. Typicay you'd get this as an adlib from anchors like Rosanna Scotto in NYC, and we don't even have to mention cable news. If I repost content from a local Fox station, I end up having to explain to people bias is generally centered at the Fox News Channel not really on the local level but this doesn't help lol. Note: this is not a critique on political policy or viewpoints just an observation on inserting editorial language into a newscast.

He'd have to actually be convicted of a felony or lie outright to the FCC and get nailed for it. Then the FCC would start a long process to strip him of the license. That's pretty much it.

Looks like nothing's permanent for Fox Weather First. Michael Estime is alongside Britta this morning, and Craig Herrera is going to be on Weather Command instead. It was the exact opposite yesterday. The afternoon America's Weather Center shift is indeed just a rotating cast of meteorologists, with Michael Estime or Bob Van Dillen most common during the early half of the week, and Jane Minar being most common in the second half of the week. Others pitch in as needed. Steve Bender is still the host of Fox Weather Live from 6pm-9pm ET with Kiyana Lewis being a contributing meteorologist to the show.

When you're trying to start a new sports network in an environment in which most RSNs are struggling, the last thing you want to do is pick a generic name. Given that the Bulls, Sox and Blackhawks are pretty bad (and likely will be for some time); a cool/interesting name would at least drum up interest in the network. I see this as a missed opportunity from a marketing pov.

Hell, if Reinsdorf was going to name this new channel, he should went old-school and brought back the "SportsVision" name. A better name than "Chicago Sports Network", in my opinion.

Reinsdorf wouldn't have spent the $$$ to buy NBC Sports Chicago. We all know how cheap this guy is which is why they went with converting Stadium to Chicago Sports Network and bringing in some random company (Standard Media) to help with distribution. And what kind of name is Chicago Sports Network??? That's the best they could come up with???

It's funny, this is how Fox Sports Chicago ended about 20 years ago, with those teams and the Cubs leaving there.

Everyone is compensated. No work happens for free. Having not worked there, I can't speak specifically to CBS. But I know when WNBC talent filled in on the network (either news or sports) they were paid as a freelancer. Typically a day rate. Don't get hung up on the name freelancer. They aren't an outside freelancer in a traditional sense, but they aren't network on-air talent. They are employees of the local station. There are also union rules and talent contracts to take into account. First, union rules differ by shop but it is highly unlikely that any union would permit a member to do additional work for something as arbitrary as an "extra day off" or "national exposure". The reason? The networks could begin to staff positions by offering national exposure. This isn't a work-study internship. I mention contracts because some local talent might be able to negotiate the inclusion of some national hits into their contract. But again, they would be paid for this work. Opportunities for local news talent to fill in at the network have slowly evaporated. WNBC talent occasionally appeared on the now-defunct "NBC News at this Hour" updates and filled in as the newsreader on TODAY. The newsreader position no longer exists in the same form. And when Craig is out, one of the other TODAY personalities fills in. Same at ABC as both shows have large "enable" casts compared to the past. The biggest opportunity for network fill-in work is weather-related. CBS doesn't have a network weather staff like NBC and ABC, so they lean on their local meteorologists regularly. Long way to say, every person is PAID. Heck, every guest on a talk show is paid. When Chuck Scarborough recently appeared on The Kelly Clarkson Show, he was paid.

Last week Diane said she applied for the job as everyone else has so they are looking at people outside as well since it's standard protocol, that on-air talent within the station apply for the vacant position.

I’d hate to be a TV news director these days. Imagine how stressful it must be to try to recruit people! I see recruiters from Gray and Scripps, among others, who post the same open jobs on LinkedIn almost every day. I’m also aware of some jobs that have been open for months. I’m no longer in the business, so does anyone here have first-hand knowledge of the recruiting crisis in TV news?

This is the exact mindset killing this industry. Current Boomer-aged executives are they to have their cake and eat it too. They’re trying to make money off TV in the short term, while setting it up to fail in the long term, but they’ll be retired by then, so it’ll be Gen Z’s problem. Prime examples of this are Nexstar’s ban on livestreaming news, or the industry’s move as a whole to grow more and more dependent on retrans agreements with dying cable companies as revenue sources. yes, these will maximize profits right now. but what about when everyone has cut the cord, so there are no retrans agreements to be had, and everyone who watches news watches it via live stream, but they won’t know nexstar stations exist. but we’ll let the future generation deal with that. let’s squeeze this sponge for all it’s worth first and the take our golden parachutes.

From my experience, news directors in mid sized markets are now hiring people who just graduated or are about to graduate from college. I'm not against that as no one wants to start in market 177. The problem is many colleges ONLY teach written journalism (print/online article writing) and theory of journalism (bias, philosophy etc). Broadcast skills like teleprompter reading, video editing, conducting interviews, mastering extemporaneous speech during live shots, mmj cameras and meeting tight deadlines are learned on the job in sink or swim environments.