DirtyHarry

snip

More like, "Give us a successful media property and we'll figure out how to destroy it."

Re: Your new Avatar. I always liked that logo.

You're right, I forgot about that. They should do that with cable boxes. Incidentally, the power company changed my meter to a new electronic one. They gave me this Gizmo that allows me to monitor energy usage on my phone. I was playing around with it and I didn't realize how much juice those cable boxes use. Mine is pulling 500 watts (w/o a DVR) while the 58" plasma TV only pulls about a hundred. More incentive to hook up an antenna to the TV.

$100 million is basically like losing one network affiliate station in a place like Charleston, WV maybe?

At least you don't have to pay that local broadcast fee that way. Easy solution to all this: Cable boxes should have a place to plug in an antenna. Have the OTA signals listed in the cable guide right along with the rest of the channels--hit the channel number just like all the rest of the cable channels and it tunes to an OTA channel without having to hit an A/B switch or without picking up programming from the cable company.

https://abc6onyourside.com/station/people Somehow I ended up on the WSYX talent page. I count 35 people. I know at least one of them is a Sinclair reporter, but is their news department really this large?

How about TEGHA since WTHR and WBNS are going to be related to GateHouse? (GH for GateHouse instead of GN for Gannett.)

Looks cramped in there. Do they have the same problem with studio space that their former sister station WCMH had?

Those squiggly lines on the backdrop are reminiscent of a Media General set. But I thought their set was done in-house. Was it ever upgraded after that? Or is this a new Sinclair set?

Yes, many use hair straightener/relaxer depending on the hairstyle. Rob needs gallons and gallons of it and a good tutor. I'm too old and too sick and tired of the PC police to change my vocabulary anymore. For me it's black, but I changed it to "black colleagues" because it reads better.

I can't say I've watched them all that much, but here is my take on things from somebody who used to be in Cincinnati fairly frequently. Dierking is dry, but she's got the MILF thing going on. You have to be impressed with somebody who is almost 60 and keeps themselves in shape like that. As much charisma as Rob Braun's dad used to have, I'm surprised he is so dry. Bob Braun was a genuinely funny, funny guy. Rob may be a riot in person, but on TV he is pretty boring. Plus there is that hair. One of his black colleagues at the station need to teach him how to use some hair straightener. I say that as a person with curly hair myself, but it just doesn't look right on the guy! Okay, enough for the superficiality. Spare me the sanctimony about the Sinclair spot. It was just a locally tailored promotion. Every chain store does that and TV stations are no different than chain stores these days in my opinion. A Sears in Cincinnati has Bengals jerseys they advertise. A Sears in Detroit has Lions jerseys and they probably use the same ad, too. Same difference if Cincinnati anchors and Columbus anchors and Dayton anchors are all cutting a promo reading the same script.

Rob Braun is okay, but he's no Nick Clooney. If he were that level of talent, he might have been able to get a gig in one of the cities where The Bob Braun Show used to air. That would create some buzz. He could have been Columbus' next Doug Adair. But like I said, he's no Nick Clooney (or Doug Adair). Does he end up at one of the other stations in town or is he too old for another gig?

Now this is a situation where collusion might actually be illegal. Companies can't collude together to force business terms down AT&T throats. They better watch it.

They could call it "columbus4.com" (since CMH is the Columbus airport code for those who don't know), but you'd be surprised how many people will botch the spelling of Columbus. NBC4i is easy and if you have an easy domain name, you keep it.

I thought it started out as a subscription based service. Or were they just trying to get you to pay for CBS All Access?

No offense, but what I've seen from OAN looks kind of cheesy. I can't imagine this is any better. Now that you don't have to pay a subscription for CBSN, I don't see why they don't just turn that into a diginet.

According to Wikipedia, Tegna made $698.4 million in operating profit. According to one of the Articles yesterday, the purchase price for WTHR and WBNS was 7.9 times earnings. Doing some quick math, that backs out to about $68 million dollars in profit. Can two mid-market stations really account for 10% of the profit of a 50 station chain? Will Tegna management be able to keep these stations as profitable as they are?

If you can find it, dig up the Doug Adair tribute from Virgil Dominic. He said the most amazing thing about Doug Adair was that back in the day when they didn't have teleprompters, news people would memorize their scripts. Doug wouldn't do that, he ad-libbed everything. Although this was before my time, that's what they said Chet Long used to do. I've also found that public speakers who ad-lib tend to give more interesting presentations than people who read a speech. (Kasich is a good example of this and, dare I say Trump?) This was back in the 1970's (?) when I was still in high school. Mona Scott (in her WLWC days), Vicki Grant, Angela Pace, among others, all caught my attention and I don't typically have crushes on black chicks. Maybe it was those teenage hormones, but she was very good looking when she first started.

Never liked Kaylor ... all I remember him was those goofy glasses he always wore and that undercover story where he dressed up as a hobo to report on what it's like to be homeless. He was mocked mercilessly for that. I had a crush on Angela Pace when she first started at Channel 4, but I liked her less and less as she got older.

Never liked many of the local guys. I strictly look at "performance" skills: Great voice, interesting manner of presentation, ability to make a witty crack every now and then. Doug Adair was my ideal, but those guys don't come up that often. I think Finnerty was also at WJW or WEWS.

Depends how you judge. I judge by presentation skills and all the people I listed were pretty good, with Doug Adair being the best by far. I thought Jim Finnerty was pretty good, but his hair looked weird. He never caught on. I thought Doug Adair was put out to pasture and that's how he ended up in Columbus. Anyway, I thought all those people had good presentation skills. Never was a fan of Colleen. Good looking lady, but annoying voice.

Doug Adair, Mona Scott, Tracy Townsend, Bob Kendrick, that new black lady at Channel 4, Tom Lawence, Jim Finnerty (didn't last long, but he was good) and Kirsten Hartman, to name a few. I think Bob Hetherington was from a larger market and he was good too. Scott Light's from Atlanta, he's okay. Also: Tyler Bacome, Mike Bowersock and Ted Hart. Not anchors, but rejects from larger markets.

A while back, I guesstimated that they were worth $400 mm based on a multiple of revenues. Revenues have gone down, but it seems like they must have improved their profit margins. Also remember, it wasn't just John Wolfe and family who owned the stations. A lot of the other cousins also have ownership. I think there was an FCC filing somewhere which gives the percentages. She doesn't do anything for me. I like her well enough. For the most part, the best Columbus anchors have always been rejects from bigger markets.

They should have known that it was only a matter of time. A two-station company can't compete in the current environment. It would be different if they were an independent station, but as a network affiliate they have too much to lose.