nathannah

I imagine in that market most of the viewers (if they are) mainly hate-watch for certain political reasons and posting said hate-watching on the station's socials, so neither news org needs to put their best foot forward in the first place and the out-of-state staff is doing their 2-3 and fleeing.

Without the Sony game shows (there by default because Nexstar and Sinclair aren't throwing money into a perceived 'dead market' like Syracuse) WSYT would probably be a Coastal station like WYDC nearby. It really feels like an complete afterthought since Sinclair spun it off with WNYS.

Today GMA3 started out without the goofy 8:30am theme or 'This is the third hour of GMA' from the announcer, but plenty of mentions of 'what you need to know' in a couple of feature stories, so it looks like they're experimenting week-to-week.

Speaking of CBS and syndication, the 50/50 Weigel/CBS network StartTV has quietly begun to air that day's Drew, ET, and Inside Edition in late night, just as ABC/DIsney and NBC air their big syndicated shows in late night on their own stations (with Bravo also airing Kelly Clarkson the same way). Probably a big way to address how ET is now considered very pre-emptable by many stations without much consequence if they don't have the late night re-air.

Name a Paramount Global channel whose name doesn't start with Nick or CBS Sports; MTV, CMT and VH1 could easily merge their schedules into one at this point and their digital cable era spin-offs are just as useless.

WRAL's streaming strategy is a big firehose with multiple services rather than just limiting it to certain websites and services (and times... *cough* Perry Sook ), including an open stream of their WRAL+/WNGT-CD service on YouTube, so this isn't a surprise; just another means to get their news out there. I wouldn't worry about any takeovers; this is just a broadcasting company that remembers the 'broad' part of the name and Fox letting them do so through that affiliation agreement, the same way they carry WAGA's audio on an HD2 radio subchannel through Audacy, and I'd expect this will be the first of many FoxLocal streaming deals (or perhaps a part of the upcoming cord-cutting app in planning).

I completely believe this because what used to be a good tool for managing accounts in TweetDeck is probably now a bodged together online-only mess because the guy who took over the site destroyed the downloadable app that let you do this all offline THEN send the muted words onto their lists. I don't know the TweetDeck experience right now, but adding every variation of the r-slur because that place refuses to moderate anything just as an individual user now was a nightmare and a half.

Which would be suicidal and I'm sure the local folks will try to talk New York out of it, but we're talking about a company that utterly refuses to kill a cable channel even as nobody is watching them and subscribers plead with providers to force them to die to get even $4 of relief on their bills. Les Moonves is a jerk and his personal life sucked, but he literally only seemed to be the only adult in the room that could get through to the Redstones and the Viacom board and deal with every CBS division with an iron fist. I would expect next go-around if this sticks, Sony seals a deal with ABC-Disney for distribution and streaming and that if not Netflix, Hulu already has a head start to start streaming the shows just based on Sony/ABC's overall relationships regarding the show alone. Every single negative thing Les feared about a re-merger has come true.

The "not a difficult decision" in her statement was very telling and candid because they did a few things and hires that you could say are 'more palatable' to certain suburbanites, including getting a new hire outside the station for the nightside rather than promoting deserving talent already there. (It's still much less than what 4 has gone through since the Scripps sale though) A day one hire from WTMJ, and a well-deserved wind-down for Mike (and Sunday Morning is a good example of what stations should do on the weekend mornings); one of the last of the 'steady and solid' guys from that era of Milwaukee news.

WBAY is at Gray...Half right now. They have the ticker and the bug good to go, but the older-gen weather, main graphics and L3 system is still in use (I assume the plan is to have it all done by draft night on the 24th for sure). It actually still works together despite the two different design languages.

They used to air a third hour of GMA online...just do that on ABC News Live at 9am so viewers can choose instead of this goofy GMA3+4 silliness and make the noon hour across the country a floating news hour or just give it to the affiliates. There's barely enough GMA segments to justify a 20 minute brand extension, much less an hour, and it's pre-empted half the time anyways when something happens in Washington.

This is a losing strategy for sure, and in the smaller markets where there's already no other choice but Nexstar (aka the first ones to be sold off to vultures like Standard and AMG so they can get pointless pipe dreams like a WGN/WCIU duopoly) this will not go well for them. Less competition has been nothing but bad for them, and the 'competition' they've provided in SouthernBorderNation (does NewsNation report on anything else) has not been close to worthy at all.

There was probably a vacate date of March 31 so it was something they literally could not wait for, and Disney wants to showcase their new building and spaces in a unique way. No harm, no foul here.

So are they just hiring the Weatherology Voicebot 4000 to do Allen station weather hits? It feels like they should be adding staff rather than subtracting from it, and hiring cheaper and younger inexperienced talent (God forbid the worst of young WeatherTwitter) just puts them in the same boat.

I'm guessing since the same staff does GMA First Look they justify a two-hour shift (outside sudden breaking events where the GMA cast isn't on-site yet) and keep running it in that manner for cost efficiency purposes.

It makes you feel like they're going to have red LEDs all over the studio even when its 85º and sunny as they Future Alert you that thunderstorms may happen in the month of April. Baffling brand; it feels like it belongs solely as a forecast model brand rather than one for the entire department.

Nothing new to say about the Bally/FanDuel scoreboard this year; everything remains unchanged. Rangers network board is nice, and unusually with the Twins now MLB-P&D'ed, instead of an RSN bug, the Progressive logo remains on the top right of the screen at all times in addition to being the presenting sponsor. Not unusual for radio now, but a first for TV coverage in this age.

It's the Paramount way to create an MVP; a 'minimally viable product'. They've already cut MTV and Nickelodeon and their other channels down to a bare existence of certain shows, and are now just doing the same with CBS. No more Grammys, Blue Bloods minus the weight of Tom Selleck's contract, international imports from Ten and Five, soaps from Atlanta, and now CBS Mornings in the equivalent of an average Nexstar studio space with network and stations using the same themes and design language. We are seeing in real time how much they can cut from CBS before they get comparisons to CW/Fox.

This is really the year CBS is being starved; we're getting yet another Yellowstone spin-off too and they already cut 2/3rds of the FBI's to allow another one to start up. But this is on Paramount for instead of contracting with someone you know will stay in Hollywood for several seasons, hiring a comedian at the height of her career who makes much more in touring host the show. I can't blame her for walking away when it seems like the format and limitations of broadcast TV just never worked for a show that started on cable, a very hands-on management trying to file every edge of their network down to satisfy the FCC to get the Skydance merger closed, and a certain heiress that needs to have her nose in everything who just needs to be given FU money and told to go away already. I already sense that Taylor and the writing team was getting network-noted to death to not comment about current political events (which they sadly won't do for Colbert, who I've just stopped watching because it's NOTHING but that) and just had no further appetite for the show. As for the timeslot and local stations, it'll either be sitcoms, tabloid news shows, CBS's cheapo syndicated game shows, or infomercials. Nothing new or creative is going there.

Not a moment too soon, because I think they ran out of breaking news in the 8am hour this morning.

Whenever Fox starts their streaming service (and since WITI is Fox-owned, they basically carry everything non-network outside the TMZ shows and Fox First Run filler on FoxLocal...and said filler is on Tubi anyways) and Disney decides to offer an ABC feed to Hulu subscribers without a Live TV add-on, it feels like we're marching towards that inevitability. And unless you're a Harvey-era Feud superfan who must watch all 12 episodes offered daily, why does the CW need stations in the first place outside of propping Perry's ego? I can get NBC through Peacock and CBS through Paramount+ and if Spectrum gets tired of paying Scripps more money for "YouTube playlist" news and advertorials, I'd be fine if those stations go away. TV stations really just need to get into a 50s radio mindset and begin to adjust to a world where scripted programming is in the past and the networks will only offer reality, news and sports content from hereon out. That seems to be WPLG's mindset now, where there's little upside when ABC seems to be spending less on affiliates and more on being a barker channel for Disney+ and Hulu.

I just don't see WSVN and Fox parting ways, especially now that the Dolphins get many more games on 7 with cross-flexing and the snowbird crowd happy with their college sports coverage, along with the rare Marlins game (and don't forget the World Baseball Classic, whose de facto championship home site is Marlins Park). There's no benefit for Fox to go to the Scripps pair on 35 or 39 at all, WSVN provides them enough resources in the market, and you know very well that promotions department is beyond psyched to put a new spin on a "Power of Two" marketing campaign, especially in football season. And simply I don't see WSVN interested in individual team rights for the other sports like WSFL is. And I disagree about Fox's lack of scripted programming, they're just more judicious and selective now about what shows they roll out (Doc and The Cleaning Lady are both pretty good and perfectly tuned for a Miami Fox station). They know they don't need to compete with Netflix and that's how their primetime feels like; we're still far from a subpar lineup comparable to UPN or MyNetworkTV.

Speaking of stations that are strong as independents, we'll see what will happen in Miami now because the bombshell just dropped; WPLG is done with ABC as of August 4th. Meanwhile right after that, we already also have an idea where the network is headed; it's getting subbed to WSVN's second sub; Mods, I think this needs to be broken out to its own thread.

And it makes sense considering their overall competition is a Scripps disasterpiece in WRTV and post-Dispatch WTHR stuck in Tegnaization. Both stations have to deal with whatever corporate foists upon them, while WTTV is just bonus ratings and revenue and WXIN is pretty much left alone by Nexstar and has a solid news operation and coverage across the day. It's pretty much a "Luigi does nothing and wins" market as the others flail around. Same with Miami; outside WPLG and the Spanish stations, WTVJ and WFOR are subject to the whims of whoever's in New York. I will say though I'm impressed by WDAF's new presentation; the older one was fine but just never felt real cohesive, while the new package just feels big-market and more defined with a full theme. ETA - Forgot to account in WISH-TV which is fine, but being associated with Allen stations outstate trickles down to them and as an independent, they can only do so much to stay competitive. But at least they are compared to WRTV.

Meanwhile its sister show True Crime News is one and done as part of a secret experiment to see how generic a TV show title, drafting off a better show's reporting, and how little promotion you can get away with to try to get a second just as anonymous season.