-
Posts
4007 -
Joined
-
Last visited
-
Days Won
183
Content Type
Profiles
Forums
Articles
Posts posted by Rusty Muck
-
-
Unsurprisingly, Hank Price decided to humiliate himself in this op-ed claiming it will be a "body blow" to the megachains and depress salaries for talent, and openly pled for "an appropriate court" (translation: a right-wing court dominated by Republican appointees) to overturn it.
It's easily the most depraved, tone-deaf and out-of-step reaction by a man who runs a website—TVNewsCheck—now wholly subsidized by rich old white males Perry Sook, Hilton Howell, Adam Symson and David Smith.
-
1
-
1
-
-
It does feel like there are three options for WADL since Mission is so badly handcuffed here:
- Sell it to another group owner—hell, even Gray!—who can run it as a CW affiliate
- Sell it to a Godcaster and sell the existing program inventory to Scripps/WMYD
- Convert it to a diginet tree and sell the existing program inventory to Scripps/WMYD
There's no way in the world that Mission is going to want to run MyNet dreck with a terrible syndicated program inventory (although not as horrendous as WMYD's lineup by comparison!) on a station that has no facilities, doesn't own the transmitter tower, has an inferior signal and can't use Nexstar at all to extort cable companies for extra retrans revenue.
-
1 hour ago, Recovering Producer said:
FCC order is here (it boggles the mind that some websites paywall documents that can be found in two minutes)
It feels like the FCC is doing a case of malicious compliance by allowing the sale under these conditions.
And I love it.
From paragraph 54:
QuoteAccordingly, we impose the following condition: No more than 15% of the programming time aired on WADL may consist of programming provided by, procured from, or owned by Nexstar, its affiliates, or its VIEs. Accordingly, Mission may not lease time to, procure from, outsource to, or otherwise air programming owned, provided, produced, or procured by Nexstar, its affiliates, or its VIEs for more than 15% of WADL's programming time, including, but not limited to, by affiliation with The CW Network, NewsNation, or any other programming source majority-owned or controlled by Nexstar or its affiliates. For purposes of clarity, if WADL airs more than one channel of programming, this limitation shall apply to each channel or multicast stream of programming offered by the station, such that no more than 15% of the programming time on any one channel or multicast stream may consist of programming provided by, procured from, or owned by Nexstar, its affiliates, or its variable interest entities.
15% of 168 hours means Nexstar cannot supply more than 25 hours and 20 minutes of programming per week. The CW primetime takes up 15 hours total per week, meaning they cannot program any more than 10 hours of sports per week or any NewsNation simulcasts.
Mission got a greenlight to purchase a boat anchor for $75 million.
-
2
-
-
Surprise! The FCC approved the $75 million sale of WADL to Mission Broadcasting earlier today. But there's a catch: Nexstar is legally prohibited from directly being involved in Mission's operations of the station.
I'd argue this is much worse for Nexstar than the WPIX decision, because Mission is incapable of operating a television station by themselves. Moreover, the $75M price tag does not include WADL's current facilities, all of which were retained by Kevin Adell.
Quote“Any financing utilized by Mission in connection with either the acquisition of WADL or Mission’s operation of the Station, including with regard to day-to-day operations, capital improvements, programming acquisition, or technical upgrades to the Station, may not involve Nexstar, its affiliates,…or any related person or entity in any manner, including through the provision of such financing directly or indirectly, the guarantee of any loan or debt instrument sought or held by Mission, or the provision of collateral to secure a loan or debt instrument sought or held by Mission.”
Additionally, the FCC said the sale is allowed to move forward if Mission is allowed to claim 70 percent of WADL’s ad inventory revenue for itself, limit Nexstar’s annual performance bonuses to $155,500 and restructure certain purchase options involving Nexstar should Mission enter into a shared services agreement with the broadcaster to operate WADL when the sale closes. It also prohibits Mission from extending Nexstar an option to purchase the station at some point if both sides enter into a shared service agreement.
-
3
-
-
On 4/1/2024 at 11:45 AM, mrschimpf said:
Henry Jessel has editorialized about WPIX; the short of it is 'how dare the FCC actually enforce its market cap rules instead of brushing them aside like they did under 45 and GWB and they should be PAYING Nexstar to run the market's lowest-rated news operation, which cannot survive any other way. Also Jessica Rosenworcel should be giving a medal to Perry Sook for trying to save wireline TV with NewsNation and saving the CW, rather than fining him', which is certainly...a view.
So now we know Perry was that one superdonor that saved TVNewsCheck from oblivion. Sure helps to have influential people in your back pocket, doesn't it, Harry?
-
1
-
1
-
-
1 hour ago, Breaking News said:
Spoken like an executive out of touch with the audience. You'll be surprised at what the audience actually knows about the stations ins and outs.
Excuse me? You really think Joe Sixpack of Anytown, USA, really gives a damn about the set design of Channel 2 News or the graphics or the music or if the station has the network logo in your preferred use? Come on.
The TV fandom is a fringe community of people who have a massively oversized feeling of self-importance they don't deserve and posts like these are ironclad proof of this.
And for the record, I am not an executive. But at least I have a job and a life.
1 hour ago, Breaking News said:If WABC or KABC ever dropped Eyewitness News-wonder what would be the take on this board, but the audience would definitely have something to say a well too!
With all due respect, this is just ridiculous. The local news audience—what little of it still exists altogether—would not care. At all.
-
1
-
-
3 hours ago, GraphicsMan said:
It called tradition, we need to keep them. Just like how WPVI the mother of the Action News brand would never do something like this and drop it. Or even worse drop Move Closer to your world. Jim Gardner retired from channel 6, in 10 years should we drop the “Action News” branding and MCTYW? No. Because it’s tradition. WXYZ in Detriot caved to modernism by rebranding.
Modernism is what will keep the industry from becoming a museum piece that only people 65 and older give a crap about. What you're advocating for is a one-way ticket to obsolescence.
-
1 hour ago, Breaking News said:
People always notice that funny part thinking they will forget. People will always remember. People were upset when WXIA dumped 11Alive moniker in the 90s.
Contrary to the majority opinion in the fandom, I really don't think anyone but news nerds care about superficial things like that. They care if the news is treated like a joke or slathered with 3D graphics, dated music and trapped in amber since 1995.
-
1 minute ago, ns8401 said:
They always had the same style as KABC or KGO… they never really followed the Action News format… it always looked like Eyewitness news with a little more relaxed freewheeling style.
Wasn't that because WJBK at the time used the EWN name? Of course with an anchor like Bill Bonds at the helm, it wouldn't have been a proper use of the EWN format anyway. Same with Irv at WKBW not exactly implementing the Action News format with the EWN name.
-
9 hours ago, MichiganNewsGraphicsJunkie said:
I've lost all respect for Scripps at this point.. They just really want to screw everyone: employees, viewers, etc...
Why? Because they are dropping a name that hasn't really meant anything since Bill Bonds got fired 30 years ago?
Good lord, this fandom is so unbelievably out of touch with reality.
-
4
-
2
-
-
The CityPulse format effectively died in 2005, right before Moses sold it. Or it died with Mark Dailey in 2011. It's not really good to pretend to be something you are not and have not been for a long time.
And given the absolutely sorry state of Canadian television, chairs for CityNews anchors is far, far down on the level of importance.
-
1
-
1
-
-
And to think, all of this could have been prevented back in 2019 had Nexstar sold as many stations as possible to keep WPIX and retained KASW and WSFL. They have no one to blame but themselves for this level of short-sightedness, poor planning, and outright greed.
-
1 hour ago, AmericanErrorist said:
Does this mean that Detroit is going back to WADL, after everything that happened?
Unless they agree to subchannel affiliations with WDIV and WPLG, the CW is likely shut out from Detroit and Miami entirely.
-
1
-
-
It's a sore loser lawsuit.
It's been repeatedly stated by company officials that Nexstar wants to own more stations and a second television network, as if their 68% national reach and multiple sidecars—let alone their largest station being one they don't really own—isn't enough.
The heavily conservative judicial makeup of the 5th circuit already makes it known the fix is in. Only question is how much does that court kneecap the FCC from enacting any policy, or does the FCC simply defy the ruling and make their policies more punitive?
-
2
-
-
Y'all are going to be very disappointed when Scrippscasts become the industry norm, not the exception. If there's one thing local television enjoys, it's xeroxing the heck out of each other.
-
6
-
1
-
1
-
-
10 hours ago, Geoffrey said:
Although maybe the channel banner is proof that the person making graphics for their YouTube page is just throwing things together and not really clear on the correct graphics to use.
Same energy:
-
15
-
-
4 hours ago, tyrannical bastard said:
If anything, the stations have to give up inventory (either paid or promotional) to show NewsNation ads. For a station that is not clearly number #1, giving up this prime inventory may be something that could possibly make a difference for the positive.
Isn't Nexstar paying for that ad inventory?
-
32 minutes ago, ABC 7 Denver said:
Ratings drive ad revenue and that drives profits.
Fox News is the most profitable cable network not because of ratings or ad revenue (or lack thereof on the latter) but because it is the most expensive network a cable provider can carry. Those carriage contracts are extremely lucrative and make any advertising boycott levied by MMFA, et. al, completely useless.
NewsNation runs with a fraction of the budget of Fox, and is able to get some blue-chip advertising as opposed to none with Fox. And even then, the carriage contracts for NewsNation is still what makes the most money.
32 minutes ago, ABC 7 Denver said:They are taking revenue from their local stations, none of which are #1 in any market, and using it to fund NewsNation.
Do you have actual proof this is the case? Show me facts and figures, or this is nothing more than a "dude, trust me" claim.
-
3
-
-
On 1/25/2024 at 5:14 PM, ABC 7 Denver said:
So you're just taking the spin at face value. Remind me to never put you in an investigative role.
Calling it a failure with nothing to back up those claims besides ratings—which anyone would say is an outdated form of measurement and a rather arcane form of guesstimating—is particularly dishonest.
Any cable network can turn a profit if they run lean and mean, and in the case of the entire Paramount Global cable portfolio, run reruns of only one show for days on end. Why? Because it's all money that's taken directly from cable bills. We pay for these networks to be in the black and they collectively do nothing to justify it.
I don't really care for cable news or whatever NewsNation actually does at this point. At least they're doing SOMETHING, which is something I can't say about much of the vast wasteland of zombie cable channels that SHOULD be dead and are helping to kill off the medium altogether.
On 1/29/2024 at 7:32 PM, newsman123 said:Has Adrienne Bankert left NN? Or is she in the process? She hasnt posted on social since December. Not a good look. Usually means they are in separation talks, which is to be expected since she lost her show.
She was reassigned to host special projects and documentaries.
-
4
-
-
5 minutes ago, NowBergen said:
Does anyone actually watch? Any update on ratings?
Ratings don't matter when you're profitable. Look at the entire suite of cable networks owned by Paramount Global; they all still exist because they command profits with no budgets and no effort given into programming.
Which is just as well. Nielsen clamped down on the scraping of data that Mediaite used to do to get cable TV ratings, thus you don't hear much about ratings in general nowadays.
-
1
-
1
-
-
5 hours ago, ABC 7 Denver said:
What was to be gained by blowing up WGNAmerica?
WGN America had a near-national reach but was run as a low-rent ION with expensive, lengthy syndicated contracts of mostly copuganda shows and a second-tier Tim Allen sitcom (as their inability to rid themselves of Blue Bloods clearly shows). It was incompatible with the rest of the Nexstar portfolio and needed to be blown up.
NewsNation is also turning a pretty good profit.
-
2 hours ago, ABC 7 Denver said:
Have we known Nexstar to make smart decisions: i.e. NewsNation? No.
Except there is zero to be gained by blowing up their lone radio station. Simple as that.
-
On 1/22/2024 at 10:03 PM, ABC 7 Denver said:
Let me guess, WGN 720 will be rebranded and called something like WANN for We Are [News Nation] or something equally useless.
A call sign change (which won't happen to begin with) won't change the fact they're stuck with a standalone AM they can't sell, with demos older than dirt.
-
4
-
-
Absolutely no sane person, no person with a shred of mental competence, would willingly allow themselves to be made a target like David Smith has. This is worse than your typical delusions of grandeur that the likes of Elon Musk have.
This has a good chance of not just killing the Sun outright, but coupled with the $500M in legal fees from Diamond's bankruptcy case, could damn well be the death penalty for hundreds of television newsrooms across the country, if not a financial death penalty for David Smith and Sinclair as a whole.
I'm going to say it. Something is very, very wrong with David Smith and his mental state.
-
5
-
6
-
Sinclair Broadcast Group - General Discussion
in Corporate Chat
Posted
Because Disney only treats WPVI as a budget line item that generates a boatload of money in revenue without any effort. Disney is only focused on Disney+ and the soulless meat packing plant that is the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That's it.