tyrannical bastard

WCJB's logo is a carbon copy of WRDW/WAGT, but it's a nice improvement.

It would be very ironic if WHAG...er...WDVM uses "must carry" to get themselves carried on cable, since Nexstar invented the game of shaking down cable providers for retransmission money. Since they're a non-factor in most of the DMA now, they have no value...yet. Even more ironic if Tegna is a takeover target for Nexstar, as FTVLive had rumored before. The former WDVM (WUSA) would gain a sister station with their former calls.

Add New York Magazine to the list of misinformed sources... It's shoddy reporting like this that ENCOURAGES Sinclair that they are being unfairly targeted. In this case, they are. Any ammunition they can state as fact only makes their spreading of other falsehoods that much worse.

Speaking of News Blues, today is the Surly Editor Mike James' final newsletter before passing the reins to Rick Iller.

And as for the "big names", maybe if they hired competent journalists instead of washed up buzzworthy divas like Swann and Reed they would at least be respected instead of being ridiculed into oblivion...

I wonder what the deal with Bob Prather leaving Gray was all about. Was there bad blood with him and the board? If so, he may be resistant to ever consider being swallowed up by his former company.

I would expect that Antenna TV and thisTV would be part of a Tribune sale to Sinclair....especially given the many stations that carry either network and Sinclair having other joint ventures with MGM to begin with...

Add another company that's leaving the business and cashing out to Gray....Mt. Mansfield Television's WCAX... http://www.tvnewscheck.com/mobile/index/article/id/103820

The one thing worse than a lousy news open? Not having one at all. It's a troubling trend as some stations have given up entirely and just dump straight into the news as if they're coming back from break. Maybe a breaking news stinger to start it off, but that's it. Some stations have made the compromise to make the "breaking news" open that's quick and serves the dual purpose.

I guess WWL and WKYC would fall into the stations mentioned above as well. I have to wonder how WWL's morning show is doing now that they've been forced to move the 7-9 am portion to Siberia on WUPL...

WKRG has had one for several years, dating back to before their current on-air look.

Scripps buying WBNS would be an interesting about-face because it was Dispatch that pulled the plug on the JOA that would have kept the Scripps owned Citizens Journal over 30 years ago. Now that both companies have divested their print properties...The bad blood is gone.

The way things are going, they can have them. From their inbred syndication efforts, cost cutting of experienced talent and needlessly re-inventing the wheel, Nexstar may be a positive... But such a deal would be LADEN with conflicts. It would likely put WTSP on the block so a real owner could undo the damage... From one deathstar.... To another...

Seems almost like a trade, since WKRG/WFNA's former GM is now heading up WSFA.

WKRG is "expanding" their news AGAIN.... As posted on their Facebook page! Funny since they announced the same thing last year on this day..... Happy AFD!

Rev. Ernest Angley is in trouble AGAIN for not paying his employees. http://www.cleveland.com/court-justice/index.ssf/2017/03/televangelist_ernest_angley_or.html#incart_river_mobileshort_home_pop Makes me wonder how WBNX is staying afloat. Could the "volunteerism" bug be rampant there? Or are they the cash cow of the whole ministry, along with the gullible folks who write them a check once a month... Or maybe they're waiting on that spectrum money. One things for sure, don't count on Tribune owning them at this rate. It may be Sinclair's bidding IF they get a hold of Tribune and/or WJW.

As long as they aren't actively pre-empting network programming (if something goes against their "views"), that's the only way a network could cry foul. Now if they try the same stunt they pulled with Nightline back in 2004, then that may cause a problem. Given the growth of retrans and network reverse compensation since then, the obligation to carry network content is heightened even more.

I guess ads like these weren't enough to keep them going...

It sounds like he has major disagreements over how things were run under prior management. Earlier this week, FTVlive documented the numerous openings that had developed under prior management. While I get that Nexstar/MG wanted to wait to fill them, the fact that so many jobs opened up to begin with was a direct result of the prior management chasing off or laying off employees. And to put this "sane" move in perspective, this new GM was the same guy who mailed a dead rat to the landlord of his prior station WOIO/WUAB after a rodent problem at their studios.... http://www.cleveland.com/tipoff/index.ssf/2015/05/19_action_news_mails_dead_mous.html

Looks like the Nexstar hiring system is starting to take hold. The old MG one is still active for now and has some of the same openings.... Most of the openings existed before Nexstar took over. More like an "exodus" than a housecleaning. WJTV's GM was moved to WIAT in Birmingham pre-merger when their GM left for WOIO.

Not only does the "new and improved" WNWO use the same SET as WOLF FOX 56 from South Bend.... ...it uses the same ANCHORS! https://www.ftvlive.com/sqsp-test/2017/3/8/the-news-from-another-state

...And they're distributing this new channel on Roku, something I wish a lot of other diginets did to make themselves available in markets that don't carry them. Putting it on broadcast TV is like selling someone a texting plan for their landline phone...

Mission could still technically cash out their 2 stations or any other of their sidecars with Nexstar. It only said Nexstar was not cashing out their spectrum. If Mission is the licensee, that's their spectrum.

Especially Youngstown, Dayton and whatever is left in Albuquerque...

Nexstar released 4Q earnings and they will not be selling any legacy spectrum of theirs. However, some former Media General spectrum is going away... http://www.tvnewscheck.com/mobile/index/article/id/101870 The question is....Are Mission and the other Nexstar sidecars selling?