Geoffrey

Lonnie Quinn returned to WCBS and CBS this evening. He announced March 14th that he was taking several weeks off to recover from a concussion that was later determined to be a traumatic brain injury.

He returned to the newsroom to applause, hugs, balloons and cake today:

Very concerning. CBS News feels the need to bow down to a president with authoritarian tendencies to have their Paramount/Skydance merger go through.

Monday morning, Gayle King is scheduled to go into "space" on an eleven-minute joyride as part of a PR stunt for Jeff Bezos and his Blue Origin. CBS Mornings will have a special hour at 9 a.m. to cover "Gayle Goes To Space."

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/cbs-mornings-gayle-king-space-blue-origin-crew/

Now that it's mid-April and winter weather seems to be in our rear view mirror, CBS 2 CBS News New York has rebranded the Mobile Weather Lab, which launched in March 2012 (I took some of these photos) and was redone in August 2016, as the First Alert Weather Tracker. John Elliott says it has "so many cameras," including a "slush cam" down below, though they only showed a roof camera today.

Interestingly, the CBS 2 logo square appears on its own, instead of next to the "CBS News New York" portion of the logo. The truck also uses the "CBS New York" (not "News") version of the logo.

What is the purpose of the "LIVE" box rotating with "BREAKING NEWS" when "BREAKING NEWS" is already on the lower-third?

Deborah Norville announced today that she's leaving Inside Edition after 30 years when this season ends: https://www.tvinsider.com/1184654/deborah-norville-leaving-inside-edition-final-episode-date/

Mary Calvi anchors the weekend edition and fills in for Norville during the week. I wonder if she's in line to take over, and if that would affect her duties anchoring the morning news.

Rob's shadows on the wall ruined any illusion that the wall is anything other than a screen.

The Times Square location never made sense as they never took advantage of the location. The show could be broadcasting from a basement in Kansas for all we know. Might as well not waste money using expensive real estate if there's nothing to gain.

Virtual weather studio for CNN.

Looks like an Apple Store.

On 3/21/2024 at 6:39 PM, Geoffrey said:

This bug appeared at 5:30 for about a minute this evening, before being taken away and replaced by the normal blue one.

 

Pretty weird. The ugly gradient reminds me of CBSN's old "Red & Blue" look (and also 1990s web design).

 

This strange bug appeared for the first 30 seconds or so of yesterday's noon broadcast, before being taken down and replaced by the usual blue one.

Anyone have any theories as to what's going on? Do they use this for streaming at all?

is there a way to make this message more prominent? I just happened to notice it but I don't usually check the site announcements section.

CBS and Gayle King are getting hammered in the social media comments for this by fans. It might have been somewhat controversial last year, but now with Jeff Bezos cozying up to the current president and his dramatic changes at The Washington Post, this is a very bad look for a news anchor. She will no longer be able to report honestly on a major newsmaker, at least up until the launch, and she will likely feel indebted to him for the rest of her life. The question is whether CBS will be similarly tied.

On 2/26/2025 at 6:16 PM, MediaZone4K said:

No matter how you feel about the undocumented immigrant issue, Ritter inserted his own bias when calling them "critical to our economy" in the video below. Even his tonality in "now to the confusion that is the federal round up of undocumented immigrants",

"Ciritical" may be a bit of a subjective word but otherwise this is a pretty well known fact. Just because it doesn't fit someone's narrative doesn't make it an opinion or a bias.

The fact that others reported the story without this fact doesn't prove your point. Context is important in any story, and perhaps leaving that important piece of information out of stories could be considered journalistic malpractice.

On 2/21/2025 at 5:14 PM, Jase said:

'Plus' shouldn't have been launched in the first place. The focus should have been on strengthening 'Evening News' before even thinking about having a companion program.

Plus is essentially a different broadcast. I doubt its existence takes resources away from the main broadcast, especially since they've already had a 7 p.m. streaming show.

Very nice new studio. ABC 7 finally looks fully modern with their presentation. I like that the skyline isn't just a plain old skyline, but seems to be somewhat artistic with some animated graphics mixed in. 

Anchors seem to be sitting close to each other. Michelle made mention of that at the end of this morning's farewell.

They tried to show a timelapse of the studio's construction but they started it too soon and they didn't show anything of consequence before they cut away from it. Perhaps we'll see more of that tomorrow morning or Monday.

Looking forward to seeing the rest of it used on other broadcasts,

39 minutes ago, MediaZone4K said:

Very Today Show.

 

My first thought was actually: Very Fox & Friends.

Next step should be to get the weather graphics to match.

A few quick notes...

CBS 2 is now using a bolder/wider font in the lower-third tab. I think it looks much better.

Also, as the picture shows, Elijah Westbrook has been doing traffic lately. Guy Staniar, who was the regular traffic reporter but never appeared on-screen, has been out for at least the last four or five weeks. In the beginning, the usual off-camera fill-in, Anique Evans, was there. Then they had reporter Natale Duddridge do it a few times on camera, even at least one morning when she was also anchoring. (Natalie was the regular traffic anchor back when Alex Denis left, but then the station eventually dropped traffic for a bit.) Now it's been Elijah the last few weeks. I've heard them mention at least once or twice that he's "in for Guy" but it's been a while. Hope everything is OK. But I definitely prefer having the traffic anchor on camera.

Also, now that Paramount/CBS are apparently about to be in a dispute with YouTube TV, they've been doing that ticker thing we've seen on other stations. (Does this show up only for YouTube TV users or does everyone see it?) They had a two-line version this morning but a slimmer one as of noon.

Meanwhile, over on Telemundo...

Not a fan of it. It's both large and also a bit hard to read the scores at times. Saw social media comments saying it looks unfinished and felt like an old PowerPoint presentation -- my thoughts exactly.

For years, we were trending toward smaller graphics, perhaps adding more information but still everything getting smaller. Which is everything getting bigger these days?

I get that they're making a point of not being a daily newscast of record anymore, but I think CBS was too obvious about it this Friday night. Tonight's lead story was a surge in flu cases nationwide. The first soundbite for the top story was from an expert detailing the number of cases at her hospital this week, including the words "and it's only Wednesday."

Another new face on CBS 2 today: Erica Lunsford, who spent the last two years at WBTV Charlotte, is the new Bronx reporter.

5 minutes ago, TheNewsTV said:

 

Apparently, it looks like the CBS Special Reports will be done by CBS News 24/7 correspondents and not Maurice and John. Maybe Kristine will do these late ones since there probably won't be any anchors there after the Daily Report ends. Of course, it's just my guess, let's see what the next ones will be like.

Chris Welch anchored the earlier special report just after 10 p.m. Not sure if they had any in the 9:00 hour.

With Lester Holt and David Muir anchoring their broadcasts from D.C. tonight, Maurice and John remained in the studio, saying they'll devote much of tonight's broadcast to the crash.

On another note, it's surprising to me that CBS let an apostrophe in Charlie D'Agata's last name confuse them when typing it out. Twice.

Interesting to see Kristine Johnson anchoring a CBS News Special Report on the DC plane crash shortly after 10:34 last night. Then Dick Brennan did the local tease at around 10:58, but Kristine anchored the local news solo, with Dick reporting from the newsroom. (Jessica Moore was already in DC specifically to cover the RFK, Jr. nomination hearing, which turned into covering the federal funding freeze and reversal, which then became reporting on the crash.)

I think they listened to our feedback. During the first break, the "world temps" started with the stock indices. And the camera shot was a little more active, with someone delivering scripts to the Maurice and John and the camera doing a 360, going behind the desk.