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Forget whether Americans really want them or not, do people at the stations themselves want these extra newscasts? Especially when stations are already short-staffed and most certainly aren't adding extra bodies for these (both because people don't want to work there and because companies don't want to hire extra labor — it's a two-way street)? If anything, stations should be dumping newscasts outside of core hours to help give their staff a break. Mornings, noon, 6, and 11pm are all you really need. The 9ams, 3pms, 4pms, 7pms, weekend morning shows of the world can go if you don't have the staff. Not only is it overkill and repetitive, but it's a lot of work when most stations are stretching their staffs thin. If you have to make your people pull double shifts to get both the morning and evening shows on the air, that's a problem. If you have college interns anchoring your weekend morning show because no one else wants to do it, that's a problem. Although I'll argue that syndication has not been very compelling the past few years and has gotten pretty cliche. It's either "talk show with big name celebrity" or court show. There's no ifs, ands, or buts. These companies really need to do something different. I'd also love to see a local station do something other than news or pay-for-play, but unfortunately local stations stopped being daring and creative once quirky local individuals sold their stations to hedge funds. (I will give Graham Media Group credit in San Antonio, KSAT can and has produced a lot of non-news local shows in the past couple of years, mostly for their digital platforms but they'll air it on TV as weekend filler, most notably Texas Eats)

Those just look like they took the existing Tribune weather graphics and changed the fonts... probably why they look better than most of the rest of the O&Os.

Why is a political correspondent giving commentary? Hasn't local news learned not to emulate cable news? (Oh wait, never mind, they're owned by the same people attempting to do that with their cable network because unbiased programming failed on it). Not surprised KABB didn't take it, kind of makes sense given that they have WOAI in that duopoly. If people want to watch it, there's an option in that duopoly, and if they want an alternative, because, (surprise!) not everyone cares about politics, it's there. Actually that's kind of why I'm not freaking out as much as a lot of you will when stations don't carry these events, it's on every other channel. I'm all for providing an alternative.

Confirm is a strong word for something that isn't true. WJZY had coverage of the hearings and it was all local and they aired the hearing Thursday night. It was even on their program guide.

Neither do I, but apparently, this is America, and it’s all about greed. Honestly, if TV is nothing But News, I really don’t see how this makes America the greatest country in the world. Anyone loving all these newscasts must have about as much personality as a slab of wood.

Unproven? I’m just going to leave this here

Funny you mention Bozo. David Arquette bought the character last year and is looking to bring him back to the limelight. That said, I don't see any evidence that local TV stations are part of the equation. As for local stations making more diverse programming, I think the last major push for that kind of thing came from USA Broadcasting, who used WAMI in Miami as model for CityVision, which was supposed to be a group of stations emphasizing locally produced programming. Unfortunately, the WAMI experiment was a ratings disaster, and the rest of the USA stations abandoned the idea of a big local push in favor of just being run of the mill independent stations at a time when The WB and UPN were pushing those out, and Barry Diller gave up on the whole experiment within a few years, selling the stations to Univision to form the basis of Telefutura, now called UniMas. I can imagine the failure of the CityVision concept left a massive stink over the concept of local programming outside of news and pay-for-play, and it's probably why stations haven't been more daring. Still, that was in the late 90s and early 2000s, when cable was at its peak and internet video was barely a thing. Maybe it'd work better today, but I can still imagine some executive thinking back to CityVision and saying "Nope! Not again!"

I’ve come around to thinking this way myself, but in all likelihood, station groups will continue to add newscasts for the time being. The amount of ad revenue they generate will be attractive to station owners, and they don’t yet see the implications of overworking the staff. There has to be some sort of breaking point for this expansion, but I don’t see it happening yet. If they don’t slash the non-core time-slots entirely, I’d like to see stations do news differently in those time slots. I’d love to see a local Ros Atkins-type analysis show at 4pm, where major stories are broken down/explained, and multiple perspectives are examined. I actually give Tegna a bit of credit for trying alternative newscasts in certain time slots at KUSA and KTVB. I personally wish they would focus more on analysis instead of commentary/opinion, and Kyle Clark can come across as being a bit arrogant at times, but the format seems to work, at least at those stations. Plus, they relieve the pressure on the rest of the staff and make the station stand out. I don’t think they have to revive “Bozo the Clown” or anything, but it would be refreshing to see local stations produce their own content. The way the TV market is going, they might just need to in order to stay relevant. The networks are prioritizing streaming, and the affiliates have become a secondary concern (Ex: CBS was willing to leave top-rated WRAL for basement-dweller WNCN just so they could receive reverse compensation.) Producing local programming other than news and the generic pay-for-play crap would at least be a step in making stations more relevant in their own communities again.

WJZY has aired all the hearings I’m pretty sure, except for the first daytime one which they aired on WMYT. Just now seeing this. I’m not sure how they got on the list of the Fox affiliates not carrying the hearings.

With The next round of hearings scheduled for September, it's going to be interesting to see if the networks will preempt the new fall shows if any of these hearings are in primetime.

The NOW aka NewsCentral 2 REPLACED the 9 pm WCBS newscast on WLNY in DMA 1. There is no other newscast on WLNY.

Honestly it was better when it was the WGN Superstation. Simulcast the WGN Morning News and 9pm news again. Run Blue Bloods and ITHOTN reruns during the day. I’m sure that’ll get them higher ratings than what they’re getting now. Problem solved. Money & dignity saved.

Yeah, I know. I know I'm not an average viewer. But then again, who else is? Pretty much everybody else here. Haha. I know average viewers don't care.

It’s not a Tegna set in a box!

I'm calling it "Life Raft News".

This will be chasing the lawyer and political money - hell, I wouldn’t be surprised if we end up with a segment sponsored by a sports book since that money was still flying around for a bit. This isn’t for ratings, it’s for revenue - and it’s a whole hour they control the ad slots. If it gets some eyeballs, great, but that’s lagniappe. And it also gives them “unique” content for the local CBS News steaming stations, which explains the branding.

Because it’s a left wing network and Sinclair is not . Anyways, They are just trying to get ad revenue that’s all this is . I don’t see why they just don’t make it a regular local newscast live to tape , with maybe one or two of live reports edited in to make it seem live. All the back and fourth take WFOR for example ,Tom Hansen in NY talking national then Elliot Rodriguez doing a cut in from Miami then having WFORs meteorologist then a CBS national meteorologist is just plain stupid . If they want New York to make the newscast they should have them do the whole thing . It won’t take that long (similar to radio because they won’t have to wait for reports to air and commercials, they will be able to tape the whole newscast in 15-20 min .Then have a producer insert the local reports. Then pull a WNYW and just tell a feel good story at the end and say good night . Cheap and simple but of course CBS is always ass backwards.

With all the turbulent weather the Midwest had dealt with (and still continues to deal with), I think the new weather forecast branding signifies how important the weather is, rain or shine...

Although unlikely, it would be neat if NexstarCW became more of a full network. With a nightly NewsNation block once or twice a day. Maybe other cheap programming cobbled together from their various resources. Although unlikely, it would be neat if NexstarCW became more of a full network. With a nightly NewsNation block once or twice a day. Maybe other cheap programming cobbled together from their various resources. Nexstar being in a unique position of being able to own many of their stations. Would Nexstar have to swap their network affiliates? Seems like it would be awkward running affiliates for other networks. Also,is there any possibility this doesn't become WGNA 2.0. Trib wanted to compete on the scale of USA and TNT and failed big time.

I think this business about CBS daytime started with the suggestion of KDKA having an hour-long noon newscast, none of which would be produced by the CW affiliate, and I did my fair share to contribute to it.

FX aired NASCAR in the early 2000's

Probably the first time FX has aired any sports in a number of years.

Plans are finalizing for the 2023 season. New cities Las Vegas, Orlando and San Antonio join the list of eight franchises -- replacing L.A., NYC and Tampa. Kickoff is on February 18. https://www.espn.com/xfl/story/_/id/34290066/las-vegas-orlando-san-antonio-new-cities-join-xfl https://deadline.com/2022/07/xfl-2023-season-cities-teams-coaches-1235076488/

Longtime WTVF sports anchor Mark Howard has passed away.

Godspeed Johnny Beckman... Atlanta's legendary weatherman. WSB, WXIA, and WGNX (WGCL) were lucky to have a meteorologist like Johnny. JB, say hi to another weather legend; Harold Taft from all of us here.