channel2

Children's programming on OTA was dying well before KidsClick happened. As far back as 2002, Fox - having sold Fox Family and basically all of the Fox Kids program library to Disney - scrapped Fox Kids's weekday afternoon block and decided to lease out the Saturday morning block. 4Kids won that contract, of course. (I know 4Kids has never had a good reputation given their butchering, but the alternative was DIC! )

CBS and ABC's kids' blocks became rerun farms for corporate siblings around that time - I believe that CBS used the Viacom merger as an excuse to break off the deal it had with Nelvana for the CBS Kidshow and replace that with Nick Jr. reruns. But somehow, Kids' WB! managed to straggle into the year 2008...on The CW! There was hardly any cross-pollination with Cartoon Network either!

Local stations don't want children's programming other than what they're federally mandated to run anymore. They can only run twelve minutes of ads per hour, they can't run ads during the shows featuring characters from the shows (the cereal-hawking past of many cartoon stars wouldn't fly now!), and they probably wouldn't be able to get good-quality product anyway. As I've said before, 90% of the worthwhile content is owned by Disney, WarnerMedia, Viacom, and NBCUniversal. I can't imagine any of those companies are too eager to open up the vaults to over-the-air broadcasters they don't own - although the arrival of The Flintstones to MeTV indicates that attitudes might be changing. That show is a traditional all-ages bedrock, yes, but it's a highly valuable property owned by a company that long preferred to keep it "in the family," going back to when Turner controlled it. But as pay TV continues to erode, and even the future of the Boomerang streaming service seems cloudy, the childrens'/family entertainment behemoths may be looking into alternatives.

I can't imagine Sinclair gets along with other station owners very well anyway. They strike me as blustering, selfish, and not particularly amenable to collaboration.

They could also just not try to fix what isn't broken. But I know big corporations are run by people with big egos, who can't resist the temptation to mess with success...

Veteran talent gets paid more. They seem to have less and less interest in maintaining viewer relationships or talent continuity, and more in doing everything as cheaply as they can.

She was talking to ns8401.

Gray's whole strategy is to buy up the massive gorilla stations, so.

Though I've heard that Gray doesn't really build market leaders from within anymore, like they apparently used to?

The networks have seen to it that there are no more New World-esque shakeups. That Fox eventually bought New World outright - and still owns most of the outlets they inherited from them - helps with that.

8 hours ago, Weeters said:

$535 million for all of that isn't cheap, but it's definitely not what this collection of stations would have sold for 10 years ago.

 

We're seeing a lot of these sales not because the companies necessarily have "deep pockets", but because the stations value has plummeted to the point where groups like Tegna don't have to reach nearly as deep into said pockets to buy them.

What kind of price would WBNS and WTHR have gone for in 2009? Because $535 million feels like a massive sum to me, even now.

Won't TEGNA be able to fix the Justice Network? The one time I tuned in, KUSA's feed was real, real janky.

Denver would probably be the better choice - since it's not as prone to excessive heat as Phoenix, either.

Sinclair is gonna have to take on a shitload of debt in order to pull this off...

Oh thank you, I missed your stuff so much.

I've heard on here that Lakana is a nightmare to use, whereas WordPress is literally free (well, the base software is) and very very easy to use.

They also did the graphics that KMGH introduced in 1998.

Oh my god that's gorgeous.

What's stopping Hearst from just buying KLKN? Lombardo still wants out, right?

Gray must love being able to double-dip!

53 minutes ago, TVIntheDesert said:

TBD was a miscalculation by Sinclair. They thought millennials who "cut the cord" were buying antennas and watching over-the-air TV, when they're actually doing most, if not all, their viewing through streaming services. 

I'd like to see some internal ratings information on TBD. They're definitely not selling the network to advertisers based on ratings, but on the concept itself. 

As for Decades, that was an expensive gamble on both Weigel and CBS, and I'm surprised Weigel has kept it around without the CBS stations. 

A lot of millennials grew up taking cable and satellite for granted and don't even seem aware you can get OTA TV, for free, legally. Though a lot of people don't have antennas either. If diginet operators were serious they'd push the antenna aspect harder or pull a stunt like offering to install one.

Also, please. Anything but a 24-hour Kids Click. I'm sure schlockmeisters like Andy Heyward are just chomping at the bit for that.

I have no idea why Decades is still around. Kinda too bad CBS decided to dump it though.

Does anybody even watch TBD?

3 hours ago, TSSZNews said:

I'm a little shocked Turner was so willing to give up the CourtTV IP. There absolutely is a market for this kind of stuff and it's a bit puzzling Turner didn't try again with the brand through a rebrand of HLN.

Given the demos this type of programming typically attracts, it's also a bit of a surprise Katz partnered with Trib/Nexstar in the top markets, when the ABC O&Os probably would have been a more powerful fit.

AT&T is massively in debt, and Katz is a Turner alumnus. It adds up!

Didn't NBC buy KUTV entirely so that they had something extra to give CBS? An earlier version of that trade saw NBC surrendering WTVJ and WRC.

Yeah I think Gray wants to sell off WFLX. Would help with debt and such.

That isn't even how an interstate sign is shaped.

It doesn't help Tribune that they're a public company and they could be seen as breaching their fiduciary duty to refuse the highest bid...

1 hour ago, tyrannical bastard said:

Yet Scripps yanked them a few years back in favor of their own inbred syndication efforts.  Stations like WEWS have never recovered...and helped stations like WBFF rise out of the ratings basement.

I notice KDVR seems to have gotten more competitive since they scooped the pair up after KMGH had to get rid of them...

Here's hoping!