Leaderboard

I know it's small market but that news writing is terrible! Almost as if the anchor is reading the press release itself. Doesn't help that she sounds robotic and bored.

A new compilation of WMAQ news intros from the 1940s (!) to the present:

The fine will be in the millions of dollars. No one's losing any licenses.

Elizabeth Matthews joined Anthony tonight at the anchor desk (which is, I believe, a first for her).

I'm guessing they will settle with a hefty fine (say, $100 million) and additional conditions (i.e. no new acquisitions for x amount of time, like 2 or 3 years). I can't see this ending up like RKO General nor do I see any forced divestments...that would end up going through the SCOTUS and creating a whole new can of worms.

I think Morgan Ratford has a bright future ahead of her.

Amarillo is a “fresh out” market - kiddos right out of college. I had a couple of college mates who started there right out of school (and then moved up and out after a year or two) - especially on the weekend, where crews are very thin. i’d just chalk it up to lack of experience. J

The problem is that Ajit Pai has distanced himself from President Trump, Pai was the one that brought up the "lack of candor" issues and had Pai not investigated Sinclair's actions (in spite of what President Trump says about Pai) the Dems would be calling for Pai to resign right now. The bottom line is this: Could licenses of the stations owned and/or operated by Sinclair be threatened? Yes, but it probably won't be pulled Will there be some form of divestitures whether it's from Sinclair itself, their shell companies, or both? Absolutely, especially the stations owned by the shell companies. Also the FCC might also order that parts of the original Standard deal be honored (i.e. the Sinclair stations that were part of the original deal) but other than that, the rest of the original deals in that now-cancelled Tribune deal is nullified and it won't be honored by the FCC Beyond that I fully expect a hefty fine and the FCC will probably prohibit Sinclair from making any deals broadcast-related (not related to divesting of the statiuons both the stations part of the Standard deal on the Sinclair side as well as stations owned by companies like Cunningham, and Deerfield which would likely result in some of the stations owned by Sinclair that are tied to the stations owned by the shells being sold as well) for a certain length of time

It's going to be a fine. There is a 0% chance that any political party, despite how loud they pander to their base, is going to force one of the largest owners of a dying medium to break up.

Skip to 3:38

WTAE, too... and with a sequel.

It's semantics. Code Red takes it a little too far over the top and should be reserved for a true emergency situation like a terrorism attack or weather event of the highest severity. At least the "weather alert days" make it about the weather and hopefully make people more aware of the risks they could be exposed to instead of the "you're gonna die" mentality which if it's overdone and overplayed, people tune out especially if the storm does not live up to the hype....

Let's all understand something about TV... When you go on the air and trash your employer, it's policies or practices ...EXPECT a bad outcome. You may not agree, but they sign your paycheck. If viewers want to revolt that's fine. But, don't expect some judge to entertain a wrongful termination suit based on publicly trashing your employer, while on their dime, and using their toys. And you wonder why stations won't let most on-air employees say "good bye" when the contract ends? I wish him luck...but if you come on my TV station and trash my station or programs you can expect to see the door...and maybe a boot up your ass. ...and once you pull some stunt like that , the station management of other stations won't trust you on-air...no matter how popular you were at you last gig.

Great news. WICS has dumped Code Red.

Mind blown. How could the FCC have thought that way back in the day, especially since denying people the access to life-saving information slaps in the face of a station operating in the public interest! Then again, this was the days before doppler radar, computer satellite imagery, and even qualified meteorologists at the local level in many places. I remember the days when all you would see on the screen would be the "W" graphic...then came the weather icon graphics with "WATCH" and "WARNING", and later, the county maps with the appropriate watches or warnings in different colors. And eventually, the "polygons" began to focus on affected areas within and encompassing counties. Plus, even in the era before VCRs, DVRs and on-demand television, if a show was pre-empted, you were truly SOL.

Danke. As much as I love my parents, their generation (Baby Boomers) just don't appreciate the fact that they do wall-to-wall weather coverage to save lives. They want the FCC to revert back to the old rules where you COULDN'T preempt regular programming to broadcast a Tornado Warning (and that's how many people lost their lives)

The second transmitter is probably irrelevant, especially since WICD is pretty much a total satellite of WICS now with no original content other than ids and maybe some ads. The "Code Red" is just worthless fear-mongering, that worsens the relationship between the viewer and the meteorologists. It puts an undue burden on the meteorologists to hype up a weather event that may not live up to its potential harm, and can make the viewer less-trusting of them when it fizzles out or isn't the "eye candy" that it was hyped up to be. And in the era of pissed-off viewers venting on stations for cutting into their programming, it only makes it worse when they have to. I'm just waiting for Boris to chime in on this, bonus points if he brings up the "terrorism alerts" that were used during the 9/11 era.... Here's the bottom line (see what I did there?) JUST LET THE METEOROLOGISTS DO THEIR JOB!!! They know the weather (at least the good ones do), and work in the best interest of their viewers to provide usable forecasts and potentially life-saving information. While it's not technically required, most stations that can put out a forecast will be on-air covering a life-threatening weather event for the affected viewers, or at the very least, have the warning up on the screen through maps, graphics, or at the very least, and EAS alert.

It was a longshot, trying to bring back a dead and buried programming form that no company had any interest in reviving, but I honor their effort, and I am surprised they've managed to make it this far. Could we possibly see Kids Click return in the future as a full network? They went through enough shows in the nearly 2 years to fill up a whole day's schedule.

I'm with Eat on this one. Companies have gotten away with some fines for much, much worse than "lying to the FCC." PG&E has blown up neighborhoods and burned down cities in California (killing people in the process) because of their negligence, and all they've gotten are some (big) fines and had to go through bankruptcy. Sinclair is going to get their knuckles slapped with a ruler, have to pay some fines, and maybe say "we're deeply sorry." This isn't going to be some Enron-level scandal.

A lot of people give Nexstar way too little credit lately. I've said it before and I'll say it again. The Media General merger is the best thing that ever happened to them and the Tribune merger will probably enhance them even further. Nexstar has improved the way they operate their stations tremendously since they merged into Media General, adding newscasts on stations, and trying to serve underserved audiences, to name a few. We're being way too hard on them. In my opinion, the way Nexstar operates could perhaps be viewed as better than Tegna or Scripps, depending on the perspective. Nexstar is working hard to shed their negative reputation.

"go away"??? where are they going to go??? gray and nexstar own over 300 stations combined... if they had to "go away" i can assure you many of those would cease to exist... poof... it will happen... eventually... there will be no buyers left... and it will be easier to liquidate assets and shut down... than wait around and try to sell off... happens all the time in a lot of industries... restaurants... stores (how many retailers have gone bankrupt in the past 5 years???) and one day it will happen to tv... then you will wish the grays and nexstars were still around... these companies are keeping the industry from reaching mach speed on the down slope to the end...