mre29

Nexstar is apparently providing a New Year's Eve special to its stations that aren't carrying coverage from one of the big networks. From LateNighter: Nexstar's independent station here in Connecticut, WCTX, is, according to the listings on the WTNH/WCTX website, showing it from 11:00pm to 3:30am, preceded by a "Top Stories of 2025" special at 10:00pm. (Curiously, the listings also show two episodes of Dateline at 8:00pm and 9:00pm; normally, WCTX airs three hours of local news a la early NewsNation.)

I know WMUR is in the Boston-Manchester market, but I don't see it as contributing to the oversaturation of news outlets in Boston as it generally stays focused on NH. Maybe Gray's looking to purchase Coxapollo and wanted to get their foot in the market in advance of that.

CBS is saying the town halls will continue in the new year....with a title sponsor.

This brings up a good question: If someone wanted to buy a subset (read: one or more, but not all) of the cable channels, would WBD (or Discovery post-split) be open to that?

Ratings? I don't think there were even advertisers. Big Advertisers Appear Wary of CBS News’ Bari Weiss Town Hall Format https://variety.com/2025/tv/news/advertisers-wary-cbs-news-bari-weiss-town-hall-1236608265/

So, here's a thought: Could Sinclair's interest in Scripps actually be interest in *Ion*? They watched Nexstar acquire the CW, realized that was a pretty good idea, spent some time looking into options, and eventually settled on Ion.

Having both "Kids" and "Jr." in the name seems redundant.

Do tell. I know nothing about the guy.

Are those bottomless pits on either side of the desk?

Note that the still-planned spinoff of the cable networks (minus HBO) and Discovery+ will happen first. According to the Hollywood Reporter:

One of those rare occasions when a station flipping to shopping is an improvement.

And for those of you who prefer not having to constantly scroll past ginormous logos...

Some of you have probably seen this before, but I just came across it now, so....

So, how bad's the overlap between the two companies? I know they both own stations in Baltimore, Cincinnati, Nashville, and West Palm Beach, and I'm sure there are others -- and I'm not even accounting for the Ion stations.

Honestly, I'm surprised smaller broadcasters such as Graham, Hearst, Morgan Murphy, and others haven't spoken out in opposition to this deal.

Sounds like they plan on being the last station standing. More power to 'em.

If Tegna insists on all of the stations being kept together regardless of conflicts and FCC rules (or Tegna insists that only the buyer's stations are sold), then yeah, there really isn't anyone.

Meh, feels like a loophole to me. But, then, I'm not an accountant or business person. Okay, this is a good point I hadn't considered (for reasons indicated above). And Nexstar being saddled with more debt might not be a bad thing in the long run.

What Tegna (I refuse to put the name in all-caps) should have done was put their stations up for sale individually (well, without breaking up the duopolies) to maximize how much they sell for. Instead, they're taking the easy way out to reduce the amount of time and paperwork involved.

Anyone else notice that the downloaded file has the filename "REDACTED_-_Project_Nimbus_-_Comprehensive_Exhibit_(with_attachments).pdf"? I haven't read through the document yet, mostly because it's a lot, but also because I have a low tolerance for legalese reading than most of you. But I'm generally opposed to this deal and hope that, at the very least, Nexstar is forced to sell off stations in all conflict markets. That said... I'm actually okay with this idea as there'd still be three news-producing stations in the market (WTNH, WFSB, and WVIT), so it'd be similar to what Hampton Roads (for example) has now. They'd have to merge with Sinclair for that to happen -- and if that happens, there should be pressure put on them to name the combined company "SinStar", for what I hope are obvious reasons.

Don't give them any ideas! Hence my wondering.

Deadline's article about this news has one particularly interesting tidbit: Kinda makes me wonder if this is an attempt to get back at Disney for forcing them and Nexstar to carry Kimmel's show.

For some reason, I thought The Weekend was an evening show and that it seemed like an odd choice for when to have the switchover. Meanwhile, the website has switched over. It's visually similar to how it looked as msnbc.com except for the branding changes, but the URL has changed to www.ms.now. More importantly, Taboola is gone! Or maybe it just needs to be manually updated -- which I hope never happens. Suggestion for the moderators: This seems like a really good time to split off these last several post (starting with Geoffrey's post about the new graphics) into a new thread and lock this one.

Curiously, MSNBC.com's homepage has no mention of the impending change.

Makes you wonder what other non-political news the channel will cover...