Geoffrey

At 5:00, Otis Livingston was at Jets headquarters for the introduction of the head coach and general manager, and then he announced that Krystle Rich, standing next to him, is the newest member of the CBS New York sports team. She posted that she'll be reporting for NY, Philly and CBS Sports. https://www.instagram.com/p/DEyAg5jpTy4/?hl=en

Interesting first broadcast. No cold open tease. Just the open and right into the first story, which was talking with Margaret Brennan about the new Chinese AI app that scared Wall Street today. Then a 60 Minutes-like piece from Jim Axelrod on Chinese intelligence threats. CBS got lucky with today's news that made that story, which they had to have been working on for a bit, seem extra relevant. The new president who is sucking up so much oxygen everywhere else got about ten seconds of coverage during a headlines roundup. Lower-thirds are very different than anything else on CBS, and only seem to be used for talent. (I don't think lower-thirds need to be permanent on the screen but they can be useful for identifying people and places.) There is not even the small CBS eye on the screen. The circular CBS Evening News logo appears on the top left of the screen during video playback. The studio looks nice, but it feels like local news. They have this nice newsroom but chose to have that behind the cameras, not in front. Perhaps they'll make more use of the newsroom in shots later on. WCBS also mentioned that the set will feature augmented reality but I didn't see any of that tonight. During the first commercial break, they had some text headlines/teases on the bottom of the screen, some "world temperatures," and a small box showing Maurice and John in the studio. The camera just kept swaying from left to right and back showing the talent just sitting there. Not very exciting. Is it really necessary? Why does the logo say "Eye On America America"? Love that theme song. Is this the third time they've used it, going back to the 1980s? Definitely a nice first show. Still not sure I understand why they need two anchors. Wonder how fill-ins will be handled. Will be interesting if CBS stays the course or gets impatient in 6 to 12 months.

They switched to the new weather banners as of noon today. They also started using a new bug during wildfire coverage, giving viewers a QR code to make it easy to donate through the Red Cross. ,The way it slides on is elegant. Interestingly, it uses the CBS 2 logo instead of the CBS News New York one. I know it may be due to space reasons but it's still interesting because we've been led to believe the CBS 2 mark is being phased out.

At 12:05, it switched to the newscast in progress. I'm watching on YouTube TV. Perhaps they were taking the wrong feed. Strange.

Something strange is happening on ABC 7. It's currently 12:03 p.m. and they're airing GMA 3 instead of the noon news.

Alisyn Camerota signed off from CNN just before 5:00 tonight. (She was filling in for Fredricka Whitfield, but anchoring with Wolf Blitzer because of the Syria situation.) https://www.instagram.com/p/DDUsc5PxdVI/ She was great on New Day with Chris Cuomo and later John Berman, but CNN didn't seem to know what to do with her once she left mornings. (I believe she said at the time that it was her decision to leave because she was tired of mornings.) Personally, I really appreciated her coverage of Covid in 2020 when I was overwhelmed by watching too much news.

John Elliott's shift seems to be weekend mornings, plus Wed-Fri at noon. Yesterday, he did noon, and also filled in for Lonnie at 5, 6 and 11. This morning he was live in Lake Hopatcong, NJ to cover the snow for CBS Mornings, and he was verbally and graphically described as "CBS Saturday Morning meteorologist."

An end of an era. We all knew it would come one day, but wow.

Looks like both the NY and DC editions of CNN News Central are back to using the monitor walls the way they used to. I guess it really was due to preparing for election coverage.

Allen Devlin is anchoring the 8 p.m. on Halloween night. Right at the top, he pronounced where the big parade is taking place as "Green-Which Village." He's lucky that this newscast is on WLNY and no one is watching, but wow. This is why you don't take someone who is totally unfamiliar with New York and plop them on weeknights as an anchor.

Since Craig has been out on medical leave, Tony and John have been splitting weekends, each usually taking one weekday off in return. So team weather had already been reduced to three days a week in recent weeks. At noon, Rob said he "was happy to fill in for Tony and John today." And John's "Weather 101" promo still aired at noon, so it seems like he's not totally gone. Still very disappointing if it is what it looks like again.

Did not expect to see "national weather correspondent" Rob Marciano doing the weather this morning. No mention of John or Tony that I noticed (though they often don't acknowledge when half of the weather team is out)).

That would be incredibly disappointing if they took John off of weekday mornings again. He basically is the life of that show. Sure, Tony and Chris are great, but it all seems to revolve around John. I agree with you that team weather always felt gimmicky, and yet I liked the energy it brought. But it was kind of telling that they'd never have someone fill in for one of them if either was off. It's hard to imagine any other interpretation of this, though. They edited him out of the promo, and even shot the group shot with and without him months ago so this must have been in the works the whole time. I'll have to say, if this is what it looks like and John knew, then he should be commended for being the most team player of team players. The way he hyped Tony and everyone else up... Just amazing on his part. Do we think this is effective immediately?

For the last few weeks, WCBS has been using CBS's virtual studio for some weather hits. It seems to mainly be used for the short weather in the first block of the 5pm, but tonight it was used for the main weather around 5:20pm. (I don't watch every night so I don't know how common this is.) I was having trouble finding video on their YouTube so I'll have to settle with screenshots. It seems gimmicky to me. It looks cartoonish. It's dizzying going back and forth between the left wall, the right wall, the floor in the middle. The live camera used to create the "window" look in the background is grainy and cuts off most of the skyline view. The wood design is tired. The "daily capsules" look odd and the text is way off, even more than a month after debuting. And they try to make the studio look big at the expense of making Lonnie look small with way too much headroom. Does it help tell the weather story better? No, I don't think so. Does it look cool? Not really. Anyone else feel differently?

The morning edition of CNN News Central is much lighter on the graphics and videos used on the walls of the studio this week. There used to be multiple graphics, charts and video boxes displayed for most stories. Apparently the inspiration for the format were the CNN election night broadcasts. But now it's very stripped down. I wonder if this is the result of budget cuts/layoffs (the people needed to design the graphics and run the extra graphics in the control room), though it seems strange to do this right before the election in two weeks. Perhaps some of the usual staff is in election night rehearsals. Meanwhile, the afternoon edition has been mostly at the desk. They've been doing this a lot, but I feel like they sometimes go back to the original format, tough I'm not certain how long it's been since they did that.

A couple of strange design choices by CBS 2 CBS NEW YORK at the NY-17 debate tonight, streaming online and airing on Channel 55. First, the bug seems to be frozen in a strange place where the "CBS News" is larger than "New York" at the beginning of the intro animation. (Usually they're either about the same size, as you see on the background, or sometimes the "New York" is much larger.) Second, the backdrop makes it look like they're using SD video and putting a graphic on the sides. It's like they designed this without thinking about how it would look on TV.

I hope they don't bring in an out-of-towner for the 5:00. That feels like the WCBS of the 2000s, when they kept bringing in fresh faces for prime slots. Also, while Devlin's video announcing his move to WCBS is very polished, it seems just a bit too much. We shall see.

Cindy Hsu and John Elliott were given a chance to briefly thank viewers for tuning in at 9 a.m. the last two years. Sounds like the entire show is ending and will not continue on streaming, even though they made it a point to add live news in the 7 a.m. and 8 a.m. hours in the past year. It appears Cindy will be the noon anchor. For the last year or so (probably more), Chris and Mary would alternate anchoring solo, and often anyone filling in in the morning would be given the noon duties that day. It'll be nice having a set anchor there again. Just stinks to lose the 9 a.m. show. It was built around Cindy's personality and being positive and helpful. Now I wonder if the "Start With Kindness" tips will stay. I hope so.

CNN's 5-7 a.m. CNN This Morning got a new look (and studio -- the one used for The Lead and State of the Union) today: https://www.instagram.com/p/C-kppW6pY44/?img_index=1 Gone are the wood tones and in are bright blue and yellow colors.

Kind of surprised that they would announce this before the election. Makes her seem like a "lame duck" anchor through one of the busiest periods of the news cycle. Not a fan of rotating anchors as a permanent replacement. They've done this in the past for a few weeks/months between anchors, but this feels extremely cheap and as if they do not care about the CBS Evening News. Will the broadcast remain in DC? Back to NY?

Has ABC used this style of lower-third before? Indicative of something to come or just special for this Biden address?

The opens no longer mention the time of the newscast, which feels cheap to me. The lower-thirds and anchors still say "CBS 2 News" and the CBS 2 logo remains everywhere. Are they trying to be gradual or is this really as uncoordinated as it looks?

Interesting that the red stars disappear when the bug turns red, and they recenter the logo.

CNN has been using that style of bug for online videos for years. Definitely doesn't match the TV look and perhaps it was simply a careless editing mistake.

I've had trouble logging in here over the last week but just figured out a way... I was in shock when Dana signed off from the station. Others have already said it better but it felt so abrupt. I've been a fan of Dana's for nearly 28 of her 34 years at WCBS-TV and even had the honor of working with her for a few years. Yes, she is a perfectionist but she makes everyone better and most people really appreciated that. That's exactly the kind of person you'd want as a captain of a news organization. Dana deserved better, as did the viewers. Wild speculation time: Might she somehow end up with WPIX? Their ND is a WCBS veteran and goes way back with Dana. I believe they have a lot of respect for each other. Not sure they'd have the budget but I could see *something* being worked out somehow. Even if it's just weekly Broadway reports and maybe serving as a fill-in. I don't know. The new 6:00 is interesting. Looks like Maurice and Kristine will take turns anchoring it. Tonight was Kristine's turn. Nice use of different areas of the studio. Colors look nice, though weird to go with dark colors and a sunset photo when the sun is now setting well after 7pm. Couldn't tell if they had more sit-downs with reporters, or if they would have done those anyway but at the desk. Maybe a bit of both. Also, there was no sports. I can't help but think Dana would have pulled off this modified format brilliantly, but I guess Paramount really needed those budget cuts. Quite a shame.