Howard Beale

How many people total are watching? Having 46% of the audience sounds impressive, but if the total audience size is -- for example -- 10,000 people, then big whoop. Ratings no longer matter as they once did. Broadcasters typically earn more-than half of their annual revenue from retransmission fees versus core advertising. Who needs to fight for viewers when you're getting the same check every month from the cable companies?

Let’s talk about something that’s a little more substantial… Scripps recently released its latest financial report after a nearly one-month delay, and we finally know why. The company needed the time to basically shore up its debt and kick the can a bit further down the road. Even the delay itself didn’t buy Scripps enough time to have a financial report worth praising. Here’s the total numbers for 2024 (with 2023 in parentheses for comparison) for Scripps Local Media: Core advertising: $552.2 million ($598.8 million) Political ad revenue: $342.8 million ($32.9 million) Retransmission/distribution revenue: $764 million ($752.3 million) Political ad revenue clearly saved the Scripps budget, because core advertising took yet another hit. Retransmission revenue grew from the previous year, but not by much. Scripps doesn’t have too much leverage against cable and satellite companies as some of the bigger competitors do. But it’s also possible that the cable and satellite companies have little juice left to squeeze out. In short, Scripps is somehow still afloat, but the boat is definitely leaking. Former KSTP news director Kirk Varner questions whether the bad news at Scripps could be a sign that some TV stations may eliminate local news altogether in 2025.

According to a post on Reddit, the layoffs affect every station in the Scripps group. Some worse than others. No details on exact layoffs just yet. This sounds like Scripps is desperately trying to make its upcoming quarterly report look good or at least not entirely terrible. The fact the company delayed its earnings report alone is a sign of trouble.

Further verification: https://thedesk.net/2025/02/tegna-lays-off-national-verify-fact-check-team/

This is definitely the newest trend in news consolidation. Allen already did it to its Wisconsin stations, Morris won't be the last either.

https://old.reddit.com/r/Broadcasting/comments/1i7nzaf/allen_reversal/ It's only a rumor at this point, but the Broadcasting subreddit has been pretty spot on about things like this. Perhaps even Byron Allen realized this was an incredibly dumb move.

Today is the last day for TEGNA's creative services and marketing departments. All are being laid off in favor of centralized creative services. I saw an example of the new TEGNA creative services AI-driven TV ads...and wow, it's not good. I'm sure it's cheap, and that's what matters to the bottom line, but wow it's bad.

Here's a new thread specifically for the Imagicomm pending sale.

Imagicomm Communications is getting out of the TV news business. Paywalled articles at News Blues and the Radio & Television Business Report say the company plans to sell the TV stations it purchased from Apollo (dba Cox Media Group), including: KYMA (Yuma, AZ) KIEM / KVIQ (Eureka, CA) KPVI (Pocatello, ID) KLAX (Alexandria, LA) WABG / WNBD / WXVT (Greenville, MS) WICZ (Binghamton, NY) WSYT (Syracuse, NY) KOKI / KMYT (Tulsa, OK) KMVU / KFBI (Medford, OR) WHBQ (Memphis, TN) KAYU (Spokane, WA) KFFX / KCYU (Yakima, WA) With President-elect Trump due to become President Trump in less-than one week, it seems clear that the broadcasting industry truly believes a Trump administration will be pro-merger. Many of these are small-market stations that probably turn very little of a profit, if any, so anyone’s guess is good at this point about what happens next.

You "guess it is still too scandalized?" My goodness, that's an understatement. Matt Lauer is persona non grata at NBC. He will never be allowed back on "Today" in person, even if it's a one-off appearance to wish a former co-worker well. NBC would sooner bring back J. Fred Muggs (kids, ask your grandparents) than Lauer. As for where Matt Lauer is now? Probably still laying low in the NYC area.

It is a win, small as it is, but the wins will not last. Broadcast's monopoly as THE place for live sports is no more. It's still the number-one reason why people watch broadcast TV, but the major sports leagues have already put some games on streaming services. I get it, Gray's just trying to grab any fruit off the tree, and I don't blame them for it. But this is not a hurrah for broadcast TV. It's a metaphorical fleeting jab from a boxer who's two or three more blows away from a knockout.

Technically, it is. But, despite what the Gray hype would have you believe, it's not that much more than nothing.

Big whoop. That amounts to one in ten games being shown on WPCH and elsewhere in the Gray universe. But, judging by how Gray promoted this, you'd think all 194 games (32 pre-season and 162 regular season) were coming to WPCH.

Guess I didn't watch far enough.

WANF (Atlanta) appears to be the next Gray station to have a sponsored 7 pm show. The station has a website with a countdown clock to January 6, 2024, when it will debut the revamped one-commercial-only newscast. I don’t know who’s sponsoring the show, but if it’s anything like KVVU in Las Vegas did, it’ll probably be a personal injury attorney. EDIT: A financial services company called Hoffman Financial Group is sponsoring the newscast.