tyrannical bastard

And MORE expansion at WKRG beginning on December 5th....they are adding a newscast at 6:30 PM!

https://changingnewscasts.wordpress.com/2016/11/30/wkrg-finally-expanding-430-am-also-add-local-news-630-pm

This comes after WPMI cancelled their 6:30 show on sister station WJTC earlier this year.

More shocking is that this newscast will displace Andy Griffith, which has aired in that time slot for well over a decade...maybe longer...usually ranking 2nd to WALA's airing of Wheel of Fortune.

Andy will be moving to 9:30 on sister station WFNA after their 9pm show.

Something has to give sooner or later in Mobile/Pensacola. I don't think there is any other market in the country where you have FOUR LIVE newscasts competing against each other at 9PM.

I wish someone would counter-program WALA in the mornings and bring back a 7-8am or 7-9am newscast or replay the 5-7 on their sister station during that time.

WKRG in Mobile is FINALLY expanding their morning newscast to 4:30AM beginning on December 5th.

Aside from WPMI, (which is maxed out news-wise and had to drop theirs last year), they become the last station in the market to move up their AM news.

Speaking of WPMI...

DirecTV and Uverse subscribers could lose them and sister station WJTC on December 1st.

http://local15tv.com/news/local/wpmiwjtc-may-be-dropped-by-directv-u-verse

This must only be an isolated occurrence....WEAR/WFGX and other Sinclair-owned stations are unaffected. Not even Deerfield stations in other markets are affected either.

Something about that screams this...

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And I'm sure just like HLN when these efforts fail, you'll end up with a schedule full of Forensic Files reruns...

RIP Robert Vaughn.

If you've worked in the TV or advertising industry, this is probably how you've seen him in many markets across the country.

And may he MEAN BUSINESS!!! in heaven.

WWL has been losing ground over the last few years, and this move could be what puts either WDSU or WVUE ahead of them in the ratings.

If their CBS affiliation was ever in jeopardy, WWL would do just fine as an independent.

Sad, sad day in New Orleans for this finally happening.....

But it is the LAST CBS affiliate to clear the show on its main station...meaning that CBS has finally found a morning show that works? I prefer local newscasts from 7-9, but CBS's morning show is a great alternative to Today and GMA without all of the hype and lack of substance.

Took them long enough for them to put the lottery ball logo on their iOS app.

 

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

TVSpy still has it up for their story of Jackie Fernandez and Somara Theodore (on their main feed).

Sooner or later, they're going to realize that virtually NO ONE is accepting this abomination of a logo!

I'm sure the folks at WEWS are working REALLY HARD to make sure the RIGHT LOGO is being used! ;)

WEWS' new logo is so bad....I'm still seeing the old one EVERYWHERE!!

Mic flags, break slates, reporter jackets...even their Roku app still has it and is STILL called NewsChannel 5!

It's like they're not even trying...

That really sucks about the vacation time. I know they started giving 3rd year employees a third week of vacation time about a decade ago. Even sadder is that if anyone who's been around long enough to be screwed out of their 5th week could be vulnerable to salary cuts, buyouts or reductions in force.

Years ago they had CIGNA insurance. You basically got for what you paid for....cheap insurance with limited coverage. When the company was cutting left and right, co-pay plans were eliminated in favor of deductible plans. That was a final straw for many. I believe they switched to Anthem BCBS soon after.

WKRG's news director Mike Rausch is leaving later this month for the same job at KRDO in Colorado Springs.

http://lagniappemobile.com/lagniappe-now-taking-legal-advertising/

Fred did wonders during the "glory days" of WUSA....(when WJLA was running circles around them)

If he leaves WOIO, will his severance pay be whatever the vending machine owes him?

I'm going to need FTVLive to get it right. WIAT is not WOIO sister station (unless they are referencing them both being CBS affiliates) because WBRC is owned by Raycom...

The other thing these stations have in common is they're both circling the drain. However Nexstar may actually do WIAT a favor and whatever is going on at WEWS will bump up WOIO....

Bonten is reportedly exploring strategic alternatives for its stations. They're so far-flung it seems like they'd prolly go to several different buyers instead of just one, don't you think?

 

http://www.ftvlive.com/sqsp-test/2016/9/19/not-the-memo-you-want-to-get-on-a-monday

Raycom could probably swallow them whole without any conflicts, but each of their markets has key conflicts that affects Gray (WITN and WCTI/WYDO/WFXI), Heartland (KRCR/KAEF and KNVN/KVSL) and Cordillera (KPAX and NBC Montana's stations) from a straight buyout. WCYB/WEMT would be good for Gray and Raycom could benefit from the New Bern stations.

I know WATN did when they first re-launched under their new call sign and "Local 24" but it has gone away.

I noticed WSYR is another that still does....that goes back to their Newport ownership (and still uses the Inergize streaming platform).

Hopefully this is finally a "thing" for Nexstar. Doing away with it post-merger will put them at a SERIOUS disadvantage in the markets they serve. The fact that's it's Livestream is encouraging since they support the NewsOn service and allow for the on-demand aspect of it. Sinclair's streaming in comparison....to put it nicely....SUCKS!!!

I've worked with the Livestream for producers software...it runs on a normal PC...and it even allows me to record other web streams (by capturing a computer monitor on my system).

Holy crap....I found a Nexstar station that STREAMS their newscasts!

And it's their original set of stations, using the Livestream platform (using the WBRE feed since it's the main station of WBRE/WYOU).

Here's hoping they don't mess up what Media General has already done with theirs.

Roger Ailes' name has been removed from the WOUB Student Newsroom that he funded for his Alma Mater...Ohio University

http://woub.org/2016/09/12/roger-e-ailes-name-to-be-removed-from-woub-newsroom/

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Now, if they would stop the "Perry and Sandy Sook Academic Center"....

yes....THAT Perry Sook.

WPMI Local 15 in Mobile debuted "Gulf Coast Today" at 12:30 today...shortening their hour-long noon newscast to only a half hour.

Andrea Ramey, their Sunday anchor anchored the show since Kelly Jones left the station several weeks ago. No replacement has been named....yet, and it looks like it be a week-to-week thing until someone is hired or promoted into the now-vacant morning/noon anchor slot.

Also, WFNA CW 55 is giving longtime radio host "Uncle Henry" his own show from 5-7am beginning September 29th.

http://newsradio710.iheart.com/onair/uncle-henry-40446/the-uncle-henry-show-goes-back-15095129/

This will likely be a 2-hour simulcast of his morning drive show originating from his radio studio. iHeartMedia's facilities are upstairs from WKRG and WFNA, and his station (WNTM) was once WKRG-AM when it was under common ownership by the Giddens family.

FTVlive picked up on WEWS's identity crisis...

It's been in the making ever since they ditched the "NewsChannel" from their bug and started referring to themselves as "Channel 5" in non-news time periods.

However, I think they will fare much better than Raycom has done with "Cleveland 19".

I wish they would have NEVER ditched the original "Circle 5". The 1998 "NewsChannel" version was tolerable, but the 2004 mess of a logo set WEWS into the tailspin it has become over the last decade. The relaunch in 2007 was never the same. And since then, even WPTV has thickened their logo, which plays off the original much better.

Cleveland was such a late-comer to the website game, that NewsNet5 was the FIRST full-fledged, full-time website of a top-4 station in Cleveland. NewsChannel5.com had been snatched up by now-sister station WTVF long before Cleveland could get WEWS.com up and running.... (WJW was first with their part-time website in 1995 powered by ZDepth, followed by WBNX in 1996).

It wasn't until 2000 that ALL of the Cleveland stations were online. WOIO and WUAB were the last and only because they sold their souls (and the rest of Raycom) to WorldNow.

So why did WMBB have to use an external company to live-stream their coverage? Here's their response from their facebook page:

So, a little story for you guys.

 

A week ago one of our servers which handles our internet video and has the ability to stream in emergency situations literally caught fire in one of our racks. A power connection inside had overheated\gone bad\something and melted.

 

We worked off of a backup system that doesn't have the ability to do live streaming on it, waiting for the replacement. Replacement arrives a day or so ago and doesn't work. Don't know why, but it has an issue.

 

So Hurricane Hermine is heading towards us and we *know* we have to get a live stream up for you guys, so that if you lose power you can watch. And that's where Neves Media Solutions Group came into play. After a quick phone call to Ryan, he was at the station first thing this morning with a device that we thought would do the trick. After a bit of trial and error, we had a live stream via YouTube.

 

We'll get our equipment fixed (the part should be here tomorrow, go figure!). But it's nice to know that when we needed a friend to help us out, our friends over at Neves were there.

 

So from all of us here at WMBB, thanks guys. You helped us serve our viewers today.

It is a good thing they have that capability to stream in emergency situations....this was an unfortunate occurrence that happened to happen before a major event.

For whatever reason, probably well above them by Nexstar Corporate, it's a rarity to see ANY Nexstar stream their newscasts online. WMBB, and other acquisitions used to stream regularly. They are not only missing out on reaching viewers, but by selling online advertising, and giving outside viewers a sampling of their product AND/OR vital information when they are away or unable to watch on TV.

Once the Media General stations come aboard, here's hoping the masses will force Nexstar to abandon their strategy of poorly-named websites and lack of streaming video.

Playing at this level will hopefully change their ways and give the viewers what they want and deserve.

Nexstar has really shot themselves in the foot with the lack of live streaming. Even worse, the fact they TOOK IT AWAY from stations that had it before they were sucked up by Nexstar.

It seems like a case-by-case situation, they somehow got one up on WVLA's website during the Baton Rouge officer shooting coverage, but it was absent during flooding coverage. Their competition rolled over them with non-stop streaming coverage.

And now that Hurricane Hermine is about to hit close to Panama City (Apalachicola is in their DMA), WMBB looks like it has had to contract out streaming to another company (Neves Media) to put a stream up on their site via YouTube live.

Situations like these are when live streaming comes in handy....since people need to evacuate, and especially since a tower could be rendered inoperable by the conditions. In fact, WMBB was one of the first stations to live stream their coverage back in 2005 (during Hurricane Dennis).

Over on WJHG and WECP (as well as WCTV), they're set up to stream and it's always been a part of their infrastructure.

This is why I have serious reservations about Nexstar and their takeover of Media General...they just don't get it and are moving their company backwards with moves like these. Sad thing is, the web platforms they've acquired (Inergize) have supported streaming in the past and many livestream (and NewsOn) streams could be eliminated post-merger.

Before I go deep into wild speculation....here's my thoughts on where the Dispatch stations COULD end up...

VERY unlikely: Nexstar, Sinclair, Tribune

Somewhat likely: Raycom, Gray, Scripps, Graham, Cox, BH Media

VERY likely: Tegna, Hearst, Meredith

In a perfect world, I still would like to see Dispatch join forces with either CBC/Raleigh, Griffin, or both. THAT would be a merger for the ages.

Agreed on CBS 19 being their next brand. Even though it was already used from 1996 to 2000, "CBS" is the best thing going for them.

And their logo already represents it anyway.

Gray has bought more stations of potential interest from large LPTV station owners.

 

In a $470,000 deal with Randall and Adrienne Weiss, Gray picked up two LPTVs in Alexandria, Louisiana, and a third in Monroe; two LPTVs in Meridian, Mississippi; and one station in Branson, Missouri.

I'd be very curious to see how Gray uses these (and other LPTV recent acquisitions) They are all in markets where Gray has dominant stations (KALB in Alexandria; KNOE in Monroe; WTOK in Meridian; and KYTV (KSPR) in Springfield. Could their weaker competition in these other markets be cashing out in the Auction?

WOIO's GM will be resigning at the end of the month.

 

http://www.ftvlive.com/todays-news/2016/8/15/cleveland-gm-out

 

I guess the rebrand to Cleveland 19 didn't go so well

Cleveland 19 is a mess. Their triple digit-market stations have put on a better product than WOIO has put on post-Action-News. Given Cleveland's size, I would hope that it puts something on the level of WBTV or WVUE. Part of the problem seems to be the number of anchor teams, as they simply have TOO MANY ANCHORS to begin with!

Hopefully they can hit the reset button in the post-Dick Goddard era and put a little more ACTION into their product. As former "Dirty Dining" reporter Scott Taylor used to say....they need to "CLEEEAN UP!!!!!"

I know KTRK has been one of ABC's most struggling O&O's, and if this story gains any traction, they could be in for a bigger fight back to dominance...or even 1st place.

 

http://www.chron.com/life/articleComments/Dave-Ward-says-he-was-ushered-out-at-KTRK-9136464.php?cmpid=twitter-mobile

I think had it not been for Dave Ward and Marvin Zindler, KTRK would have remained a non-factor in Houston.

I guess Dave Ward didn't have a "lifetime" contract like his former co-worker. And it was Dave Ward who hired Zindler in the first place!