mre29

6 hours ago, GoldenShine9 said:

They did nothing to solve the 2 critical issues:

 

1) Apollo is bankrolling both companies and essentially has Cox and Tegna as subsidiaries of the same company. As a result, there are five markets where both companies are in place, and no effort was made to adjust for such. Graham made that clear last year in a petition to deny.

 

2) There is too much foreign money involved, coming from the Cayman Islands, Bermuda and the Turks and Caicos (I believe). As a result, it is illegal on that alone. In addition, they failed to disclose such.

You put that in plainer, more clear-cut language than Rosenworcel did. Maybe you should've helped draft the order. 

6 hours ago, MediaZone4K said:

We really new some new blood in daytime, not just more newscasts and not current events discussion shows that regurgitate the pop culture stuff on newscasts.

And not conflict talkers (Jerry Springer, Maury Povich, et al) and court shows, either. I'd rather have all-day news than those.

17 hours ago, Megatron81 said:

Byron Allen waiting in the wings to buy TEGNA and will sell how many TV stations to get the deal done, I don't know how many Allen would have to sell to get deals done the only one I can think of is Fort Wayne IN. Soo Kim blew it sell the TV stations you needed to from different TV station groups than Cox.

Hopefully he's not the only one waiting to make a purchase. I'm sure Graham, Hearst, and any company that has room to buy even one station (yes, even the networks, though they're undoubtedly pickier) is keeping an eye on this saga.

8 hours ago, Myron Falwell said:

Byron bought his former employer (BNC) after they collapsed and used the distribution contracts (even on Pluto) for TheGrio.tv. So of course this comes off as payback and sheer pettiness on Roland’s part.

I honestly didn't know any of that. Thanks. And good for him.

3 hours ago, CircleWXYZ said:

Expansion of morning newscasts are official.

Complete with footwear.

1 hour ago, Georgie56 said:

KCNC has been assimilated.

5 hours ago, Big Rollo Smokes said:

Again, Martin thought it would be more advantageous to partner with another "minority" who understood those challenges rather than one of those white-owned companies who may have only a handful of POC executives or board members.

Which is why I'm surprised Martin didn't partner with Allen Media. Right now, the only advantage he gets from partnering with Kim/SG is Tegna's relatively greater reach in terms of reaching the population as the company owns stations in large markets that AM isn't in. But, of course, that's all hypothetical until Kim/SG actually owns the stations.

Is he aware that the issues with the deal have absolutely nothing to do with Soo Kim being a POC?

Also, I think Byron Allen might like to have a word with him...

So here's a question I just thought of:  If the deal falls through (as it should), what happens to the sale of Standard Media's stations (KBSI/WDKA, WLNE, and KLKN) to Coxpollo and Coxpollo's WFXT to Standard Media? Is that deal strictly contingent on the larger Tegna deal, or does Apollo have its own reason to sue SG for breach of contract?

4 hours ago, Myron Falwell said:

I’m taken aback by Soo bullying the FCC to vote on the deal. He’s given the D commissioners every reason in the book now to vote “no”, so it’ll fail in at least a 2–2 tie. Is he hoping for it to fail so he can litigate and cry that the system is prejudiced against him? Or is he consumed by delusions of grandeur? Or both??

It'd be poetic justice if he manages to push at least one of the R commissioners into changing their position.

But based on who nominated them, I'm not holding my breath.

What @nycnewsjunkie said. All SG had to do was agree to put the Tegna stations in Atlanta, Charlotte, Jacksonville, and Seattle up for sale (no need to make Coxpollo sell its stations when this whole thing was Soo Kim's brainchild) and the deal would've happened. Instead, Kim/SG and ApollCox are joining Sinclair in sitting in the corner wearing egg on their faces. Eggs are for eating, not wearing.

1 hour ago, tyrannical bastard said:

With the amount of time that has passed on this deal, Soo Kim should have found a new backer other than Apollo.  That alone would have made this deal closed by now.

Heck, he could have teamed up with another broadcaster -- Hearst, Graham, Allen, one of the networks, etc. "Look, help me out here and I'll let you pick which stations you get to keep." (This may very well have been how he got Apollo on board.)

1 hour ago, tyrannical bastard said:

Tegna would probably spiral into bankruptcy and get auctioned off piecemeal to the highest bidders.

Hopefully Tegna would have the sense to start selling stations well before then.

5 hours ago, CircleSeven said:

Hearing Designation Orders usually be the "death kneel" of any transaction. It's even more of a rarity if the parties to actually go to the hearing itself. Because that process could take up to a year to actually see the judge.

Tegna's fate could be up in the air for another year? Ouch...

9 hours ago, Myron Falwell said:

By 2025, you’ll see “NewsNation New York”, “NewsNation Chicago”, “NewsNation Los Angeles”, “NewsNation Cleveland”, etc., fully replacing local brands as the cable channel evolves into a cheap program supplier for the local stations.

"NewsNation Billings".... "NewsNation Elmira".... "NewsNation Escanaba"... "NewsNation Podunk"....

I can see their competitors having a field day. "Would you trust news for Escanaba that's coming from CHIGAGO?"

On 2/14/2023 at 6:23 PM, mrschimpf said:

They're simply an artifact of the late 90s when we thought multiple networks and pay-per-view movies with staggered start times were the future, not realizing we'd need all the bandwidth they took up for on-demand services where waiting for "VCR Theatre" would be pointless because the movie could be accessed at 2:47pm in a few remote commands rather than 1am on a VHS tape set on a timer. They remain only the same reason we still have an MTV2 or Nicktoons Network; PG won't pare them out until they have to capitulate to provider demands. Nobody needs a live and streaming version of Flix because their movies are already in the Showtime streaming tier.

I for one am looking forward to the great culling of cable channels. It's long overdue. The multiplexes should be among the first to go, of course -- all the extra HBOs, Showtimes, MTVs, Nicks, VH1s, etc. It's 2023; who needs eight flavors of HBO (plus their west coast feeds) when you have HBO Max?

But the absolute first channels that need to go? Music Choice and its ilk.

They could have easily kept the "Decades" name and simply slowly added more sitcoms, so the name change is all about the marketing.

You can actually get all of those?

On 2/13/2023 at 1:03 PM, T.L. Hughes said:

It would make sense not to rebrand Showtime at all, considering it’s an established brand, plus the “Paramount+ with Showtime” naming scheme is very unwieldy for a linear network, even moreso when applying it to Showtime’s multiplex channels or its sports and documentary units… and don’t get me started with branding the network’s boxing and Bellator MMA broadcasts using that name.

I can't wait to see how they re-brand The Movie Channel. "Paramount+ with Showtime and The Movie Channel"?

This just feels like Paramount is either raising the white flag of surrender and acknowledging HBO's superiority in the premium cable space...or doing the equivalent of saying, "Hey! No one messes with my son Shoey! He's a PARAMOUNT!"

1 hour ago, GodfreyGR said:

With MLB taking broadcasting in-house with the bankruptcy (as they have claimed they are prepared to do), I see deals with Fox O&O's, for example, to put MPB on the MyNets (WFTC in Minneapolis, KUTP Phoenix, KDFI Dallas, etc.)

They could brand it as "MyBall".

12 hours ago, CircleWXYZ said:

Just speculation, based on some questionable decisions WDIV has made, in relation to NBC.

What, is the NBC logo missing from the station's website? 

Someone want to rename this thread? The current title isn't really appropriate anymore.

I'm thinking "Disney's A Tale of Two Bobs" would work...

For the record, that's eight stations -- all in fairly large markets (the smallest is Pittsburgh).

Of course, it'll be interesting to see which other station groups follow CBS's lead here.

On 2/2/2023 at 11:15 PM, JCB4TV said:

It takes 6 months to construct a new studio in a microscopic market?

You try building an entire TV studio out of subatomic particles.

14 hours ago, Adam MadMan said:

It was mentioned in another thread about Nexstar buying The CW, through a report by Scott Jones of FTVLive. While Scott spins it as being a protest against the LIV Golf deal (long story), @Myron Falwell said it was more likely that it was just CBS washing its hands of the struggling network.

Said report is paywalled...and I have no interest in becoming a FTVLive patron.

1 hour ago, BluesNews said:

I mean I get people here are upset and are looking for some kind of justification to Gray ditching the CBS46 brand, even down to speculating a possible disaffiliation with CBS but we’ve known since Gray purchased the Meredith stations that they planned to blow up WGCL. We’ve known this entire time they had plans to make it a more serious news-centric operation with its own brand and less influence on the network it was affiliated with, they’ve made zero secret about that.

 

What I don’t understand is why everyone is so upset with WANF and the Atlanta News First brand, sure, it’s unconventional but it does exactly what Gray said they were going to do.  [...]

 

So to come on here and have a meltdown over a brand and say that Gray is destroying the station when we’ve known all along this was their plan is kind of ludicrous. To also speculate that CBS is unhappy with Gray and WANF and plans to yank the affiliation for their own station in Atlanta is also ludicrous. If CBS really wanted WUPA to be a CBS affiliate, they would have done so decades ago.

 

[...]

 

I think we need to focus on the fact that WANF is finally trying to make a name for themselves in the field of news, and Gray is pouring money and resources and time in that Meredith didn’t in order to make it work. And that should be applauded, not lambasted.

THANK YOU. It's a relief to see I'm not the only one confused here.

  [Replying to a few replies to my comment on the CBS News Detroit thread...]

5 hours ago, DirtyHarry said:

CBS doesn't own a station in Hartford.

I know that, but the logic in the specific post I was replying to -- your logic -- didn't say anything about CBS owning a station in Atlanta, so I didn't take that into consideration.

5 hours ago, Myron Falwell said:

CBS has a station in Atlanta which is currently an affiliate of the CW (and possibly could be going indie). They aren’t going to keep the running the station as a stand-alone indie in a top 10 market. Nor do they have anyone to sell it to (friendly reminder that this is no longer a buyer’s market for TV stations or for large-scale M&As). 

 

Given that WWJ-TV is merely simulcasting an OTT/SVOD with a smattering of syndication and CBS programming, it’s not TOO outside the box to see CBS make WUPA, WTOG and KSTW in-house CBS O&Os. And even that LPTV in Indianapolis, WBXI-CD. Sure, CBS could use WTOG, WBXI-CD and KSTW as bargaining chips to get further established stations—and they probably will—but WWJ-TV and CBS News Detroit might be giving them a road map for the future that’s already under all of our noses.

I think I missed the part about the CW being dropped from WUPA. Has that been confirmed and/or announced?

And.... how has this thread not been shoved over to the Speculatron?