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this is why think reporters should get a *separate* friends only social media where they can post almost whatever they want. Keep your public profile clean and brand related. EDIT: and block your job from seeing your IG story, maybe even block them totally if you can.

The more I think about Dana getting demoted, the more it annoys me. I get if there are budget cuts to make, but to make her a fill-in anchor is such a classless move when she’s nearing the end of her career. If you want her off evenings, fine. However, why not just make her the official noon anchor at this point instead of having it rotate between Chris and Mary. Give that newscast some stability, similar to how ABC 7 has Sandra Bookman on at noon. Lighten their workload, give Dana her own newscast, and then if she has to fill in for the evening newscast it doesn’t appear as insulting, because we know she’s already there in the studio for the noon newscast. Just a thought. Or, they could also have her and Cindy do 9am and Noon so there could be some conversation, similar to how ABC 7 does their 10am show. Dana, Cindy, and John is a great pairing in my eyes at least. Plus it pairs up to two longest-tenured anchors, and they’re friends, so the chemistry is already there.

NextTV gave us more: So this isn’t meant to air exclusively in the morning hours like Live with Kelly & Mark is and Daily Buzz was. It will also premiere sometime this summer, before the preseason kicks off.

The University of Missouri released the results of a study on journalist burnout. In short, journalists — especially those in TV news — are burned out. SARCASM ALERT: Yep, I’m sure you’re just as surprised as I am. The study recommends several solutions to the problem, including: Flexible shifts (e.g. four-day weeks, hybrid/remote shifts) Manageable workloads and responsibilities A more-supportive culture The study acknowledged but did not suggest pay raises, because pay raises are often beyond a news director’s control and cannot be implemented unless some corner office suit in Irving, Texas or Hunt Valley, Maryland approves it. Read the study here: https://rjionline.org/news/addressing-burnout-in-journalism-means-flexible-shifts-more-supportive-culture-results-of-large-scale-survey-from-rji-and-smithgeiger/ My thoughts: Pay raises are the best solution, but corporate broadcast groups just won’t do it because that will affect the bottom line. You can’t have flexible shifts and manageable workloads without enough staff, and many TV newsrooms are short-staffed as is despite producing many hours of daily newscasts. TV news is a creature of habit and resistant to change. I question whether it’s already too late to reverse the brain drain.

As an elder millennial who spent more than a decade in the business, burned out, and quit without a plan, solving this problem is a complex puzzle—and to be quite honest, I don't think there is a simple fix if there is one at all. Some key points from my experience... 1. The business expects people to treat it as a lifestyle, not a job. People coming out of college recently have (SMARTLY!) refused to accept this, which leads to potential broadcast journalists not entering the field. And those who do enter still have their priorities in the correct place of needing balance. Just as an anecdote, in late 2016, when it appeared the minimum salary to be exempt (salaried) under Fair Labor Standards Act regulations was going to go up, producers where I worked at the time were switched from salary to hourly pay. They were upset they would get overtime pay for working over 40 hours a week instead of getting a comp day for an extra day or double shift. 2. The quality of life is crap, and the have/have not with desirable schedules is ugly in a 24/7 business. People would weaponize incompetence themselves into roles where they had maximum supervision but desirable schedules rather than advance into roles where they could be trusted with less management intervention. Drive and ambition lead to a lower quality of life, and if you say "yes" too much to management's requests to work a shift that isn't normal for you or an extra day - you'll get guilted if you stand up for yourself when you need to prioritize your life over work. Refuse to help, and you'll get left alone. 3. Every role in the newsroom is doing more with less, and every added platform needs your full attention and dedication - even if it is of minimal value to the operation. Does TikTok generate revenue? No. But it still matters for some reason. 4. The industry is delusional about its prestige and standing in 2024. Companies are still convinced there are 1994 levels of job applicants and still try to sign employees to employment agreements with MASSIVE financial penalties should they resign or quit—even if they leave the industry. Those tactics drive people away before they even start. 5. There's no delicate way to say this, but the only way to survive in TV news as you start your career - is to have financial support. Even as companies have pushed minimum salaries higher - they still aren't matching the escalating cost of living. This leads to newsrooms full of people from privileged backgrounds who don't understand what matters to the audience members living paycheck to paycheck. An anchor once told me the only place they got recognized was at Walmart or K-Mart, and smartly reminded our team we must keep that in mind as we decide what we will cover. 6. COVID-19 opened a lot of eyes and accelerated the brain drain. The people who got to work from home realized a higher quality of life was possible and were inspired to find their next career because of it. Many people who were forced to come into the station or work in the field during lockdowns felt like bosses considered their health and safety less important than the people who got to stay home. They got (very understandably) frustrated and left. The list could go on and on... But those are the big factors in my mind.

I broke off all the CBS talk into its own thread. There wasn't a clean break, so there may still be some of that here from late last year, but the soap and CBS talk continues here... https://forums.tvnewstalk.net/topic/20889-the-future-of-cbs-daytime/

I've split this discussion off from the NBC News Daily thread, as it veered way off course to the CBS discussion.

Welp so much for Y&R and B&B getting canned and NBC Waiting Room News being the future. CBS has a new soap in development.

This has Weigel, the CBS indies and the Fox Plus stations written all over it, along with Scripps just going by a raw eyeball of where it would air in NFL markets (Green Bay it'll likely be WACY for sure, likely KMCI for Kansas City, WCIU for Chicago and WMLW for Milwaukee).

Pay raises shouldn't be the only part of an answer. Extra pay is always nice. But there needs to be a larger more complex answer, and one person shouldn't make the decision. Station groups need to add to newsroom staff. But again, that's not sole answer. I think the two bits I mentioned above are small pieces to the overall answers. Many newsroom staff members feel like the entire shift rides on them. It's a feeling that is very overwhelming and quickly draining.

If it cuts The Talk down to a half-hour it's already succeeded; whatever that show was before, it now seems to be gliding by on its past glory, anti-GH viewers simply there out of spite, or sponcon.

Welp... https://variety.com/2024/tv/news/cbs-naacp-soap-opera-the-gates-bold-and-the-beautiful-writer-1235932548/ If it goes forward this would be the first new daytime soap since Passions in 1999. Hopefully, it succeeds, but it needs to not be written like any crap that's on soaps now. I'm honestly shocked.

I’m really trying to figure out which stations would end up going for this; the Fox-owned MNTs? Sinclair? I can’t see Nexstar cutting back those successful local morning shows to air this.

So instead of using it as a learning opportunity for everyone in the newsroom, let’s fire/cancel the guy? I fail to see how that helps anyone. It’s far more productive to heed the lesson from this experience so that people avoid repeating similar mistakes in the future. Not to mention, this cluster f goes beyond one person. If I’m not mistaken, scripts are supposed to be written, edited, and reviewed before going to air. Something went seriously wrong with that process if no one caught that phrasing before hitting air, and work should be done to correct that process. Unless this was done with malicious intent (which by all accounts, it wasn’t), they don’t need to go on a pink slip crusade.

Not only that, the station seems to have abandoned using the high shot (as above) that it promoted when they moved into 3B-East. Also, it appears that each director and/or producer is shooting the weather as he/she sees fit - no established shot pattern. Sometimes we see the weather presenter walk from the desk to the large video wall, other times the walk is covered by a graphic. There are times the master shot of that large video wall is head-on, other times the camera is farther to the left. Then there's a difference in now tight that shot it. Sometimes I can see shoes and then there are shots from the calves up. Who's running the store? No one!

I thought World News was in 2nd?

Or it could replace The Talk. Maybe CBS returns 12:30 to affiliates and moves Y&R to 1 and B&B to 2 and puts the new soap at 2:30 (if it’s 30 minutes). If it’s an hour it would likely just go right in at 2 ET.

If it airs on KDKA+, it'd have to air after the 2 hours of morning news from 7-9am because I'm not sure if they'd be willing to just push that aside for GMFB.

Surprisingly, MSNBC aired a good chunk Trump's Super Tuesday speech, despite past objections to giving him a platform for inaccuracy. I also noticed network NBC was the only one of the big three to air the speech. Moreover, NBC called Trump's performance a landslide MSNBC mildly labeled it as "victories". Obviously NBC attempts to stay more neutral then their cable counterpart, but it was still surprising to see.

Molly Grantham leaving WBTV and TV (will remain in Charlotte).