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If anyone thinks this has nothing to do with Paramount/Skydance capitulating to 47, then I have some proverbial oceanfront property in Montana for you all to buy. The timing is all too coincidental. Don't be surprised if The Daily Show folds next.

But we’re not in danger of authoritarianism, right? This. Is. Vile.

Of course it's financial. Letterman's final Late Show episode got nearly 14 million viewers. A decade later, the Late Show has an audience of just over 2 million boomers who forgot to turn the TV off before falling asleep. It's not worth paying Colbert $15 million a year on top of the staff's salaries and the costs of maintaining that theater anymore, especially when its spot in the cultural milieu is now occupied by podcasts with postage-stamp budgets by comparison. Not to mention, this isn't new for CBS. This is the same network that was already too cheap to keep the SEC or the Grammys. They are cutting costs to the bone in any way they can. Not everything in life is hyper-politicized. Sometimes it actually is just about the money.

No! This is not what needs to happen, at all. This is how we're going to end up with more "Shovelcasts" (this is a new term I just invented, you're welcome) like Scrippscast being shoved into the schedule. Nobody is asking for more news, period, and any 11:30 newscasts that get created in summer 2026 are going to be canceled by November 4th of that year. Folks, we're talking about a genre that used to have 15 million sets of eyeballs a night. Colbert's "most watched" status is 16% of Carson's audience. Any profit the show makes is likely sliding every year, and it would not surprise me at all if the bean counters determined it would slide into "unprofitable" territory during his next contract. The Internet is the one holding the smoking gun here.

Shocking news:

Here’s what happened, in image form: Easy prediction: Jon Stewart and Stephen Colbert will be lobbied hard by the streaming platforms, and wherever they go, they’ll get way better numbers than they ever have on linear media. If this was a so-called “hit job” by Trump it honestly missed the mark, and badly so.

Hey, from a housekeeping standpoint for the mod staff, some users need to do better and actually look to make sure there isn't already a thread for a certain topic before posting their own. Just had to merge four threads into one on this news. Too many frustrated, aspiring journalists around here that are too focused on being first on stuff. End of rant. Then cancel everything else, too. 60 Minutes, the Evening News, The Price is Right, and the Late Show are the absolute last things that should be touched, if you're trying to look competent and inspire confidence. I'm not giving Trump credit, but there is a very obvious message being sent here. Either that, or you might start seeing other top talent walking across the network before they get told they can't get paid.

Sure it was. And I chose not to be considered for People’s Sexiest Man Alive. Heck, that might be more plausible than buying anything CBS is pushing here.

Whether the guy with the vein issue and cognitive decline directly demanded this isn’t the issue. It’s one more in an endless set of preemptive conformity by his allies and those who have or may have business before one of his crony-led agencies. This was a targeted hit that they’re wrapping in nonsense.

Not unexpected is ensuring any voice contrary to the regime will be silenced.

I already mentioned this on Out and About. Here's how some CBS affiliates handled it:

I don’t love it. I don’t hate it. It’s just there. Kind of like Scripps as a company.

Alabama's Meteorologist James Spann will start his own televised weather network "The Alabama Weather Network" beginning August 11. It will serve all 67 counties of Alabama. As for now, he will still stay with ABC 33/40 as their chief met.

KNWA/KFTA/KXNW in Northwest Arkansas is currently remodeling a portion of their set, specifically for the Weather Authority team. This entire set in the main studio dates back to 2019. The secondary studio was updated in the recent past and is primarily used for Pig Trail Nation sports reports and various news segments. https://www.facebook.com/share/r/17AkkmdkBv/?mibextid=wwXIfr

The franchise that David Letterman built is getting cancelled! As shaky as Late Night ratings have been I thought the cancellation of one of its mainstay shows was coming in a few years not next year! Then again, after Corden left Late Late it came out that production costs exceeded revenue which makes The Late Show's cancellation for business reasons believable....but bending to 45/47 is not implausible. I like Colbert but like Kimmel it's the same thing every night, Trump, for the last 10 years. It got stale which is why I prefer Fallon's show. He'll talk about you know whom and then move on to fun segments. Of all the networks why is CBS specifically struggling so much when it was once the most watched network?

It’s disingenuous to act like this was a financial decision while being the #1 late night talker at a struggling network. It would take ignoring all of the other developments preceding this move to be believable.

At this point in time, Paramount (as well as Warner Brothers) are better off dead than alive. Get their past assets in someone else's hands. Stephen Colbert is the ONLY reason I have left to watch CBS. He'll likely end up elsewhere. Probably on streaming like Netflix since I doubt NBCUniversal or Disney/ABC are interested. I guess I can live with Jimmy Kimmel.. But there's no way I'm watching Fallon.

I’m going to be That Guy that is saying this has more to do with CBS dying on the vine than anything else. Giving Trump any credit for the cancellation of The Late Show completely and unnecessarily absolves Shari Redstone of blame for her mismanagement of Paramount Global and CBS, let alone her utter incompetence in trying to sell it all off. CBS was in awful shape prior to this. The cracks were showing during the SAG-AFTRA strike and were never repaired. Honestly I wonder if CBS even survives or just fades into oblivion like Dumont 70 years ago.

This is just the first late-night show to get cancelled, it won't be the last. Like I said in another thread a while back, these shows offer nothing that podcasts don't. Is anyone under 50 even still watching them?

All because Stephen Colbert spoke out against the lawsuit settlement?

I’d tend to agree with that. I’m just imagining reporters of the past like Max Robinson in the age of social media where you’re inclined to share as part of the engagement strategy. Imagine Mark Giangreco or Steve Bartelstein in the current age of social media given how unhinged they could be on air at times?

Dan said they were taking out the wall the separates the green screen and the set to have it more open for him or whoever is at the weather wall to communicate with the others in the weather center. It’s not fully done but this is what they did.

nah. The old guard just didn't have socials so the only way you'd know someone on TV had disordered personality would be to work with them or somehow interact. God forbid if they're the ND's or GM's favorite... newsies can tell stories. Just recently we learned about Barbara Walters, although discerning people would've picked up on what she's really like just by watching her interviews. The late Ike Seamans from WTVJ said this in the late 2000s too - most new talent coming in wants to see themselves on TV, not do journalism. The socials made this even more apparent and now they get to feed off it twice - TV *and* socials. All that's much harder to hide nowadays probably why you're noticing it and think there's more of it. It's always been there. Come to think of it the news business, from my interactions with people within it for 25 years, tends to attract a lot of unsavory people, narcissists primarily, who can feed off small things like saying they work at so and so station up to the fact they're on air and known. This especially true of the big-name stations. Which isn't to say there are no nice, normal people. I don't think you should let the messyness stop of you from trying out a career you might enjoy. I believe there's a video of Marilyn Mitzell, who used to work at WSVN, on Youtube where she specifically tells people - keep your head down, stay away from office drama - simple yet 90% effective imo. And if you land at a shop whose management does not suffer employee drama it very likely would end up being a very fulfilling career.

It was also mentioned on the first post of this thread.

I can't believe WREG still says "it's 10 o'clock; do you know where your children are?"

Noticed this week that they’ve removed the talent open from the 5pm show reverting back to the standard intro.

I found the WDJT one had that mischievous Weigel spirit behind it; you can tell that love was put into that graphic, even if management never wants to see it on air and would work in analog just as well. Otherwise, you can definitely tell the KX4 graphic was made pre-merge into KVLY, and I like that WREG planned out a good promo as a technical difficulty loop (that they didn't have to air forever thankfully).

Apparently WHNT wants people to switch to another station. The same VO playing over and over and over again is maddening. Just put up a fullscreen and leave it at that. I will say I was impressed by WAFB. Looks like they started their news a few minutes early rather than allowing the dead air.

Thanks, David. Glad to know that. I agree that is breaking news.

So, if this outage was so widespread, how has it not been mentioned on the various entertainment sites (Variety, THR, Deadline, TV Insider, TVLine, etc)?

Woah. A major technical failure took place during CBS Primetime's last hour (10pm ET/9pm CT) last night. Here's how some CBS affiliates handled it:

Gee, I never saw that one coming . Once upon a time, going from WSYX to 10TV was a move up.... My how times have changed....

Wowww. That's a hot take bro. I like her becasue she’s from North Carolina she's an NC State grad. She’s only in her late 20s and is already in a top 15 market. Nah not really. They all have to bow down to the Chief Betty Davis another ex-North Carolina broadcaster.

If it was pre-Nexstar WYTV, they would’ve put on a random *Coach* episode during the difficulty.

Yeah. She's known as a diva who's on TV strictly to want to be on TV and nothing else. I won't watch her as much anyways since my allegiance is still on WSVN 7. Unrelated: Stacia Naquin is coming back home to Columbus. This time... to WBNS 10TV. https://www.dispatch.com/story/entertainment/television/2025/07/15/stacia-naquin-columbus-ohio-10tv-news/85205481007/ Also unrelated: Sara Knox has been KIMT's "Chief" for a few months now, with Aaron White departing for WBNS. I put it in quotes because it was unofficial. Today, it became official. She's the new Chief and considering she's been there for 8 years (outside of a year-long hiatus to work at KUTV), its well deserved. https://www.facebook.com/story.php?story_fbid=1361726218711352&id=100046219613394

Ay! Betty and Julie finally have someone else to fight with

It should be another lesson to media writers that they need to stop being 'viewer HR' and that day-to-day work status of TV show hosts is not a story that needs to be reported, and that these people deserve to have private lives and grieve. This is especially cruel because they helped spread the same trash to her Wikipedia article and folks had to edit around vandals that yes, she still works for the show. So much sympathy for her and her family, and I'm sure everyone at 1A feels the same.

(as in will not produce a replacement talk show at 11:35) https://deadline.com/2025/07/the-late-show-with-stephen-colbert-ending-next-year-cbs-1236461787/ https://www.instagram.com/p/DMOhWKsxT_G/

The Great Media Knee Bending of 2025 continues. Pathetic.

This was over a month ago and I'm sorry but I had to share it because I laughed at this very hard. https://www.facebook.com/watch/?v=2362341860807818

Something tells me that Gen Z tv personalities especially females will be very colorful people. My generation is just weird man. I like the millennial tv personalities a little better, I just have this awful feeling about my generation it why I’m afraid to go into tv news I’ve considered to look at other things.

A new channel popped onto my Spectrum lineup today, and I was confused because I had never heard of this network before...but the logo style seemed very familiar. Looked it up, and Gray holds the trademark to the name "Local Look Today", and it seems like it's going to launch throughout the month, with it launching tomorrow as part of Gray's new RTC cycle with Spectrum. It's in the exact same slot Circle was in the past. Is this intended to be complementary (carrying station features and weather), or a replacement for Local News Live? There's little about the channel I can find outside trademark registrations and provider notices, so I guess we'll likely find out together, and you'll certainly see their stations promoting it.

This is pretty impressive. There's a streaming weather network for Northern California, Eastern Tennessee, Southern New Jersey, and even a replacement for TWC en Español: Canal Meteo, among others. I'm excited to see it further develop even more.

The All-Star Game was last night and the entire lineup outside of Colbert was repeats, so it's probably just more of a 'nobody really noticed' kind of story, or they're waiting for word from CBS about what actually happened is more likely.

I was going to say, after checking her socials, she's got an awul lot of time off to froclick around the world for a tertiary employee. Her socials are giving 'influenza' vibes and I thought FTVlive will end up roasting her but I see she already got in Scott's crosshairs https://www.ftvlive.com/sqsp-test/2024/10/27/gold-digger she's actually not half bad on air. Rather smooth, and comes off competent Well I for one cannot wait to hear the stories

I know, but that's how she got into trouble before at WTSP, which eventually led to her getting fired by just caring more about social media and the social life than the job she is hired to do (especially if you do so on a station-branded account). I won't get into it more, but yeah... I probably won't watch her, and that's just my own opinion (and mine alone. Its okay if you like her). She'll fit the Miami lifestyle wonderfully.