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This merger goes through as-is, and Nexstar not only gets duops in Seattle and Atlanta, but the junior station (KONG and WATL, respectively) will become CW owned-stations. That's not really good news for Gray, which unless something drastic happens (like a purchase of Cox Media), will potentially wind up with a full-power duop of independent stations in their home market.

An unfortunate error at WTOC concerning Michael Penix Jr:

It's so cute that everyone is just casually assuming that Nexstar would be obligated to sell anything when this merger is announced. The cold hard fact is Brendan Carr—a total right-wing hack of the worst sort—along with his lackey Olivia Trusty, will do all they can to get this cleared and approved as quickly as possible and will ignore any protests to the contrary. Why? Because Nexstar is the quintessential Republican company led by a typical Republican (Perry) whose lone purpose is to buy shit up. It's a company Brendan Carr loves and adores. We've seen in full display what he'll do with companies he doesn't like. Who cares if the current legislation doesn't allow it? No one else in this regime gives two shits about laws on the books they don't like, let alone one shit. Congress, who already just destroyed public broadcasting with a glint in their eye, wouldn't care if Carr superceded them (beyond the meaningless whining from the likes of Susan Collins or the tone-deaf tweets of an enriched, oblivious Charles Schumer) and you know it.

I prefer 28 Tampa Bay News but hey, whatever floats its boat.

Today in TWC history... Today marks 20 years since the longest-used logo in the history of The Weather Channel was starting to be used. It has been used ever since and is now one of the most recognizable logos in American broadcasting history.

Don't forget about R.B. Bugg, from "The Write Channel"...

No, they are not. The streaming windows are day-after-air. Sony acknowledged they are separate arrangements from the syndication pacts.

Which KTVK will also lose next year. Sony is pulling both shows from OTA when they go to streaming. It's the equivalent of waving a white flag and Ned Flanders' parents whining, "we've tried nothing and run out of ideas!" Just because excessive news worked for WHDH—which largely capitalized on Cox's neutering of WFXT and NBC Boston's newscasts struggling to get off the ground—does not guarantee the same success anywhere else. WPLG will inevitably suffer from diminishing returns (again, being in a billingual market) and WANF is headed down an unsustainable path because they've never been competitive. If Gray gets Cox before Sinclair can and merges WANF into WSB, problem solved!

At least his first name isn't Harry....

It was gonna happen sooner or later.

As far as WANF, they should also look at shows focused on the entire state of Georgia, perhaps a state legislature weekly on Sunday and opportunities to use locally-produced non-news programs in the future, airing them on the other stations they have in Augusta, Savannah, Albany, Macon, Tallahassee* and Columbus (and, if they can acquire, Chattanooga* and Jacksonville*) * probably in part, since they would need to share with adjacent states.

MyNetworkTV basically. A branding package and a programming block that can be aired as is, bounced around, or split in half. WATL tried the primetime news and it failed. How bad were the ratings?

That does sound like leaving wasn't something she wanted to do. I see a lot of her co-workers have left comments wishing her well and sad over her departure.

Just as many cities don't have two or three competing newspapers anymore, fewer local TV newsrooms would not surprise me.

Counting down the days until Gray or private equity or forces unknown takes over Sinclair.

That is definitely indirect news reporter speak for a non amicable departure but not saying too much for fear of being blacklisted. WABC has the least turnover, so Im curious aswell.

If news of this sale goes through, the lines for Talkback 16 will be lit up when it breaks like a Christmas tree!!!

Exactly. It's meaningless Kabuki theatre just like the same crap Susan Collins, Lisa Murkowski and Mitch McConnell (no longer a senate leader) pull so they can give the illusion of acting under their own free will and give the illusion of a sure-fire passage of an awful bill being "in doubt". But when push comes to shove, they'll fall in line with the regime. It's in their DNA.

Oh no! A strongly-worded letter? That'll sway them.

Their opposition being...?

CPAC of all organizations just came out with a 17-page filing with the FCC opposing media consolidation. Along with the CWA union. The assumption this will sail through without opposition is a fever dream

the question I have is , out of the whole duop and Triop, and now even QUADOPs , should the deal be even BLESSED, which one will get that "SPECIAL WAIVER" filed, otherwise known as "FAILED STATION WAIVER" translation...what station will become the proverbial sacrificial lamb for the other...?!

WMYT is a literal subchannel among WJZY's formerly record-high map under a channel sharing agreement, so a sale of them to TCT, and The CW Charlotte is 46.2. That channel position has been empty for years even back to the Fox days, as if they've always known a WMYT conflict sale can just have the license and channel share agreement, not the station IP and schedule and it's an easy move.

WMYT likely gets shoehorned away. WCNC and WJZY would be the duopoly in that case I would think, with Fox or CW on 36.2. (From my interpretation, top-4 rule no longer exists, but still cannot legally form triopolies)

From what I can tell, with that court decision, owning 2 stations is legal even if in the top 4. However, triopolies (and beyond) are not legal.

Nexstar wants to acquire TEGNA hmmm https://www.reuters.com/business/tv-broadcaster-nexstar-advanced-talks-acquire-rival-tegna-source-says-2025-08-08/

This. There are no "good' (or heck, mediocre) companies that will get the scraps *if* there are parts of the merger that won't be allowed by the DOJ and FCC. Some strategic swaps that are mutually beneficial for big companies to minimize single station operations? Perhaps. But any spinoffs are going to be strictly to sidecars, spectrum speculators, and maybe some godcasters.

It will be the messiest acquisition ever. At least 2/3 of them overlap, many of them with triopolies or quadropolies created. In Little Rock, it forms a quintopoly. I see no way they would be allowed to own THAT much, even though I am sure they will keep quite a few duopolies. The latest Gray moves do, interestingly, help somewhat in that the triopolies they have created can become trade pieces in some markets to possibly help both parties - to an extent. But there's going to almost certainly be a challenge.

Yes, and it wouldn't surprise me if it's written into the group deal with Sinclair that Nexstar has the right to yank the affiliation on any stations. WUAB was bundled into Gray's groupwide CW contract and it didn't prevent them from losing the CW to WBNX.

CW just signed with KUNS to become the CW station in 2023 are they going to break the contract for KONG to take CW?

Update: Current.org reports this morning that PBS’ board has voted to cut its budget by 21% and reduce station dues by $35 million in FY26, following Congress’ decision to rescind CPB funding for FY26 and FY27. To ease the impact, PBS is lowering dues for all stations and spreading out payments over three installments, and it’s giving bigger funding credits to national content producers like WETA, WNET, and GBH.

This comment completely ignores that KTVK (also an independent) airs both Wheel and Jeopardy!. Where are they getting the extra Big Bang episode? Last I checked, Warner Bros. distributes only two episodes per day for their weekday and weekend runs (ten total across the weekday runs and four for weekends, with stations getting the option of only running two of the weekend episodes either Saturday or Sunday). Ironically, although it is indicative of how much the syndication market has downturned lately, stations like WPLG, KTLA, KVVU and WANF have regional cable news channels (past and present, from NY1 to Bay News 9 to CLTV) as baselines for expanding news to fill their broadcast days to make up for the lack of adequate entertainment programming available on the market.

I had a feeling Troy Bridges was just at WWJ to fill-in and learn the systems before moving to WUPA.

CBS is building out the news and weather team for WUPA. Additionally, there will be local weather updates during CBS Mornings at launch.

RT!!!!!

Non-chamber of commerce Republicans. CPAC and Newsmax are only now starting to bring it to people's attention. Broadly, the media has ignored it. CPAC statement toward the end of their letter gives a good idea how the debate on the ownership cap will evolve very soon-ish: https://www.fcc.gov/ecfs/document/10804739414409/1 CPAC made a really cogent argument about everything, and drew big attention to the UHF discount calling it "technologically unjustifiable" and even illegal at one point. The 39% cap removal would have to pass the house and the senate. If the dominant conservative narrative, which CPAC would likely end up being heavily involved in, is the same as that letter they wrote then congress likely won't touch it. Or at least not before the midterms. And if it becomes a frenzied debate that isn't controlled by the Chamber of Commerce GOPers, we might live to see them lower the cap. This half-assed FCC stunt could actually end up backfiring on Nexstar, Sinclair et al spectacularly

So who gets divested in Charlotte? Isn’t WCNC higher rated than WJZY/WMYT? And WMYT is about to get CW.

Here's the WSJ story from MSN.

WCTX channel shares with WTNH, and WCCT's main channel is hosted by WTIC as the area lighthouse. Subnets notwithstanding, it's a very manageable conflict as we all know WCTX is the CW affiliate once Tegna's CW deal is done, and WCCT (which had their 'site' hosted on the CW+ portal for over a decade) is all but a zombie station once the CW moves off there (the only issue with CW of course is if WTNH prefers to keep the primetime newscasts as-is and they move to streaming/WTNH+ down the line). Worse comes to worse because WCTX and WTNH channel share is both WCCT and WCTX get sold off to someone like RNN, Weigel or HC2/Innovate, and 59.1 becomes 8.2 in a renumbering and is your new CW affiliate. And Nexstar still has a wild card with WFXQ-CD, which could be moved from being a WWLP UHF repeater in Springfield to a Hartford station without any regulatory conflicts rather easily. WTIC could even be sold off to comfortably fit Fox onto 20.1 because hey, it's #6 in the market until Fox moves there, so then it's a 'clean deal' in technicality. They will finagle these deals and conflicts in a way that makes Sinclair/Tribune look like a clean merger in comparison.

Janice Yu recently announced her departure from the station after three years https://www.instagram.com/p/DNDqWy7OoKz/?igsh=emtlNDRwcnR4ZG83