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Rusty Muck

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Everything posted by Rusty Muck

  1. Rusty Muck
    The cold truth is that news is a public service, but broadcasting is a moneymaking profession. That’s why both have been at odds with each other since Edward R. Murrow interviewed celebrities on See It Now and chimpanzee J. Fred Muggs was a sidekick on Today. Look, maybe the program could improve. But there is no excuse in the world why that debut newscast should have made it to air in the first place. It set back whatever goals Austin wanted to meet, and needlessly so. Fresno is too big a market to have such a fiasco happen. Hell, Glendive and Alpena MI are too big a market.
  2. Rusty Muck
    It might be in everyone’s best interests for the program to be put on hiatus indefinitely and retooled outright. If it got canceled or ended by Austin’s volition, well, I again fault the station for not doing a darn thing to help the product at launch. They failed him.
  3. Rusty Muck
    This really makes Ed Agre's work at KXGN all the more impressive. He was a literal one-man band with no computers and barely any internet access and yet he put out a damn good product, good enough to get that Real Sports shout-out. It's also easy to mock WSVI over their No Budget News but in those videos I linked above, it's also evident that Jerome Agean and Wes Small made an effort. I can absolutely respect them for that. This debut newscast should never have gone over the air. It should have been one of many audition tapes so technical issues could be ironed out prior to the debut. In this case I absolutely fault the station over Austin.
  4. Rusty Muck
    With all due respect to the phrase, “don’t judge a book by its cover,” here’s two more salient phrases that more appropriately apply here, and they run hand-in-hand: 1. You will never get a second chance to make a great first impression. 2. Perception is reality. If you live in Fresno, and you stumbled upon that debut newscast and saw it looked no-budget with stories lifted from other stations, a Podcaster doing sports, and a setup that sure as hell lent credence to Scott Jones’s slam (which, considering Scott’s irrationally absurd hatred of Dave Lougee, sure doesn’t mean much), you’re likely not going to tune back to that newscast ever again. If the perception is that it’s an cheap newscast with no effort or care put into it whatsoever, then good luck changing that. Other options exist in the Fresno market, including a freaking O&O. Watch them instead. The fact this debut newscast already went viral is a testament to both sayings. Few will watch that second newscast in comparison to the debut. It’s how things work.
  5. Rusty Muck
    Royalty-free production music CDs and digital downloads exist. Many of them are actually very good. There is no reason why this had to happen.
  6. Rusty Muck
    Compare to WSVI in their Jerome Agean/Wes Small era and their newscasts become infinitely more watchable: It’s not that Austin Reed made an attempt. The technical effort is simply nonexistent, it plays like a no-budget parody of a WatchMojo countdown video that somehow got played on OTA TV.
  7. Rusty Muck
    WOIO/WUAB has two substantial translators to compensate for their lousy V signal, and WTCL does the same. Plus WTCL is the only Spanish-language media outlet within the city proper (unless you count WQHS, which is run out of a broom closet).
  8. Rusty Muck
    Sure doesn't sound like someone who would be thinking about getting licenses for newscast themes.
  9. Rusty Muck
    Wouldn't be surprised it's "Source: Dude, Trust Me, Bro"
  10. Rusty Muck
    KMSG did the impossible. They made WSVI look like WSVN. I can understand a budget of nothing and a staff of just Austin and a producer, but Ed Agre was a news department of one and KXGN put out a far more competent product on-air.
  11. Rusty Muck
    "The Spirit of Akron! On W - N - I - R" is without a doubt the closest thing to an anthem here in Northeast Ohio. Change my mind. And oh god, is that WGN ripoff of "Nothing But Class" painful to listen to.
  12. Rusty Muck
    Easiest move to make is using 19.2 as a full-power SD simulcast of WTCL 6.1.
  13. Rusty Muck
    Sinclair was absurdly blatant trying to “offload” WPIX to Cunningham and WGN-TV to a freaking car dealership not named Big Bill Hells. That’s the equivalent of trying to rob a bank holding a bowling ball with a glued-on string “fuse”. It was so outrageous that Ajit Pai couldn’t even defend it.
  14. Rusty Muck
    Correct, low-power stations don’t count. KRDK is another “voice” in the market even though it is nothing more than a glorified diginet tree.
  15. Rusty Muck
    I’ve mentioned it on the Discord server but with the “5,500 journalists” and hundreds of TV stations behind them, you’d think that NewsNation would have an inventory of documentaries to run as filler on the weekends instead of a marathon of Last Man Standing reruns.
  16. Rusty Muck
    I was also mocking the press release billing the lineup changes as the greatest thing since sliced bread. I actually like the moves but they are totally overselling it. (For those not on the server, NewsNation is referred to meme-wise as “Matlock” because 1) Matlock doesn’t actually air on the channel, 2) the channel’s highest rated programming is the rerun block of JAG and Blue Bloods and 3) the alternative is either crying or continually being very frustrated at something that never lived up to expectations.)
  17. Rusty Muck
    Looks like the press release was updated and... hmm...
  18. Rusty Muck
    WFXT is the sixth-place station in a five-station town and where WHDH kicks their butts in all the time slots that matter. This isn't about retrans, it's a practical joke Apollo is making to Soo Kim.
  19. Rusty Muck
    Soo Kim couldn't afford Tegna on his own so he had to sell two of their prime Texas stations just to cover the balance, and they give him a turd in WFXT. Tell me how that's a good deal.
  20. Rusty Muck
    Some stuff could not be more obvious, like the fact Soo Kim couldn’t afford Tegna in his own right so he needed another private equity vulture who already owns a significant station group just to pay the balance, plus the obvious footsy action with WFAA, KHOU and WFXT. I’m capable of making inferences and can already say this deal is putrid with no benefit to anyone but Soo Kim’s lavish bank account and should be rejected. I don’t even need to see the filing.
  21. Rusty Muck
    That Harry Jessell can see how bad of a deal this is and Scott Jones lets his personal hatred for Dave Youngee cloud his inner judgment is stunning. Jessell is pro-consolidation but he at least cares about the industry and its future. Meanwhile, Scott is stuck in a tunnel vision that newscasts from the early 2000s still work and that you shouldn’t even bother trying to reach younger audiences. News flash for Scott: it’s not 2002. It’s 2022. Harry Jessell won my respect today, and I never thought I’d ever say those words.
  22. Rusty Muck
    pictures always tell a thousand words...
  23. Rusty Muck
    Assuming this deal actually goes through, and I have a sneaking suspicion it won't ... just saying ... Soo will break up the company piecemeal in 1-3 years. And really, the only buyers left are the networks. Hearst, Graham and Hubbard are most likely to cash out, Scripps is tapped out, Griffin, Bahakel and Capitol are committed to their stations and nothing else, and Weigel is more interested in stations for their diginets. That leaves ONLY the networks as buyers.
  24. Rusty Muck
    Well I certainly didn't expect Harry Jessell to effectively reject this deal like he just did. If Jessell, one of the most business-friendly writers/analysts in the industry, is saying this, then it may be more doomed than you might think.
  25. Rusty Muck
    Not much of a factor, but it's that WHDH cleans WFXT's clock in all the time slots that matter most... especially in morning and 10pm.
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