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Nexstar to acquire Tribune


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2 hours ago, TVNewsLover said:

So it seems that it’s in their best interest to keep WISH/WNDY together and WTTV/WXIN together. Perhaps this can be accomplished with an affiliation switch. See below.

 

I dont believe WTTV was in the top 4 back then, but WISH was, so it was legal back then.

 

 

If affiliation switches are needed to make this happen the more likely scenario I see happening is:

WTTV: CBS

WISH: FOX

WNDY: MNTV

WXIN: CW

It may be in the best interest to keep the status quo by acquiring the Tribune big four duo and selling their own duo but the million dollar question that can only be answered by the folks at both the Justice Department and the FCC is this:

 

Do they see the current Big Four duopoly of WXIN and WTTV in THEIR own opinion as being in the public interest?

 

We'll find out over the next few weeks

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On 4/26/2019 at 9:28 PM, atlnewsfan03 said:

It's possible the FCC and DOJ could force Nexstar to divest WTTV or WXIN, as overlapping isn't allowed (top 4 in terms of audience share).  If one of them has to be divested, Nexstar would have to choose which station it intends to keep, and which station it intends to sell.

 

On 4/27/2019 at 10:07 PM, Megatron81 said:

I believe that The FCC should keep it as is if they had the problem with Tribune owning 2 Top 4 stations Tom Wheelers FCC should have told Tribune that you can't have CBS on WTTV back in 2014 when they made a deal with CBS just my opinion. I wonder if The FCC denies Nexstar request to keep both WTTV & WXIN if Nexstar will just keep The Wish TV/WNDY combo? But WTTV can't do it as a stand-alone TV station just my opinion.

 

10 hours ago, oknewsguy said:

It may be in the best interest to keep the status quo by acquiring the Tribune big four duo and selling their own duo but the million dollar question that can only be answered by the folks at both the Justice Department and the FCC is this:

 

Do they see the current Big Four duopoly of WXIN and WTTV in THEIR own opinion as being in the public interest?

 

We'll find out over the next few weeks

 

As of now, Nexstar is requesting to keep the two (WXIN/WTTV) together, as they're taking advantage of Pai's change of allowing certain top-4 combos on a case-by-case basis. Pai's FCC has already approved a top-4 duo in Hawaii from Gray-Raycom at the end of last year. And since it's an already-formed duopoly (just like the Hawaii duo), I don't think there would be an issue on the FCC side to get the greenlight.

 

It's getting through Makan Delrahim and the DOJ's Antitrust Unit that's going to be the one to watch. Shockingly enough, during Sinclair-Tribune, Indianapolis was NOT one of the ten TV markets it had to divest by the DOJ. Again, since WXIN/WTTV & WISH/WNDY are already-formed (and it's proposed to stay that way post-transaction), I don't see anything Makan would do outside of ordering Nexstar to divest one of the duopolies. It isn't like Nexstar is proposing to keep both of the duopolies. So far I haven't see Makan order a group to break an already-formed top-4 duo. Otherwise, he would've told Gray to break it up in Hawaii (and he didn't even touch that market).

 

Anyway, expect the advocacy groups to complain over the spin-offs (despite it being completely clean deals with no attached JSA/SSAs). And I wouldn't be surprise if those parties complain over Nexstar's buyback option of WPIX.

______________________

 

Anywho, here's the full write-up from the FCC regarding the spin-offs. And along with that comes a new comment period.

  • For those who want to file a petition of deny, you'll have until May 27 to file.
  • For oppositions of the deny petitions, you'll have until June 11 to file.
  • And for replies, those are due June 18.
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8 hours ago, CircleSeven said:

Shockingly enough, during Sinclair-Tribune, Indianapolis was NOT one of the ten TV markets it had to divest by the DOJ.

That’s because Sinclair didn’t own any stations in Indianapolis around that time.

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  • 2 weeks later...

Someone mentioned on the Court TV thread that This TV (one of Tribune's diginets) will be booted from Tribune stations in favor of Court TV in November, which to me suggests that This is on its way out. I've never watched that channel myself, and it seemed to be stagnant anyway. Besides, Nexstar doesn't exactly strike me as being interested in the diginet business, unlike Sinclair or Tegna. Might as well prepare for the funeral, if you'd even consider one worth it.

 

It does raise the question on what'll happen with Antenna TV, though. Personally, I wouldn't be surprised if Tegna wanted to make a play for it, considering their recent buyouts of Justice and Quest, not to mention both Tribune diginets are already on a number of Tegna stations. Still, this would be going into Speculatron territory,

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6 minutes ago, channel2 said:

Perry Sook is on record stating that Nexstar has no interest in national platforms. WGN America might well hit the block once Nexstar takes over, if not before then.

 

They could probably fetch a good return on that, maybe over $1 billion.

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If Nexstar does sell WGN America I see a rebrand I don't see the new owner wanting to pay a fee to keep WGN America's name which has lost what it was when it was a Superstation that was WGN's best years as a network when it aired Cubs, White Sox & Bulls. I don't watch WGN America none of the shows interest me.

 

Yeah, never have really watched This TV time to get rid of that channel as it's a waste saw that come Nov that This TV which is Fox17 .3 is going to be Court TV. Don't know if This TV will be .4 or is going bye bye bye for good.

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On 5/11/2019 at 11:03 PM, Megatron81 said:

If Nexstar does sell WGN America I see a rebrand I don't see the new owner wanting to pay a fee to keep WGN America's name which has lost what it was when it was a Superstation that was WGN's best years as a network when it aired Cubs, White Sox & Bulls. I don't watch WGN America none of the shows interest me.

 

I'm sure Nexstar would be selling it sans content to someone who will flip it to something they'll already have content for.

 

In other words, it's all about the slot on cable systems. Think Current turning into Al Jazeera America.

 

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1 hour ago, mre29 said:

 

In other words, it's all about the slot on cable systems. Think Current turning into Al Jazeera America.

 

Or my personal favorite example: TechTV being purchased by Comcast, merging it with G4 to become G4techTV, cancelling most of TechTV's existing programs, turning the network back into G4, and eventually becoming home of Cheaters and Cops marathons until the network finally folded.

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7 hours ago, hfiles said:

Or my personal favorite example: TechTV being purchased by Comcast, merging it with G4 to become G4techTV, cancelling most of TechTV's existing programs, turning the network back into G4, and eventually becoming home of Cheaters and Cops marathons until the network finally folded.

 

I can't believe I finally found one person who remembers TechTV. The network that destroyed society with it's "personalities" and "toxicity", you and the people who worship the network make me sick.

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20 hours ago, hfiles said:

Or my personal favorite example: TechTV being purchased by Comcast, merging it with G4 to become G4techTV, cancelling most of TechTV's existing programs, turning the network back into G4, and eventually becoming home of Cheaters and Cops marathons until the network finally folded.

 

TechTV was ahead of its time. In a way, it lives on in the form of podcasts and Internet-based shows.

 

13 hours ago, TVLurker said:

I can't believe I finally found one person who remembers TechTV. The network that destroyed society with it's "personalities" and "toxicity", you and the people who worship the network make me sick.

 

Wait, what?

 

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3 hours ago, mre29 said:

 

Wait, what?

 

 

Didn't you hear. One of the personalities toxified the internet back in 2008 with his viewpoints on politics, religion and sexism, thus leading to the world we live in today.

 

And the other personalities didn't even fare so well... I don't hear any of their names when it comes to today's times.

 

And it wasn't ahead of it's time, it was just a bunch of people pretending to know about computers and giving away misinformation.

 

Enough off-topic stuff, I made my points known.

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19 minutes ago, TVLurker said:

 

Didn't you hear. One of the personalities toxified the internet back in 2008 with his viewpoints on politics, religion and sexism, thus leading to the world we live in today.

 

I'm just trying to figure out which personality you're talking about at this point. I have two names in mind.

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  • 2 weeks later...

I have noticed something the past 3 days, during prime time on KWGN. Almost all of the ad's they have aired with the exception of a few DQ & Samsung Phone spots have been local news promos.  I would say 90% of the ads i have seen have been for upcoming newscasts.   Are the ratings that bad on The CW that affiliates cant sell national ads?   Or is this a Denver issue?   

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46 minutes ago, DENDude said:

I have noticed something the past 3 days, during prime time on KWGN. Almost all of the ad's they have aired with the exception of a few DQ & Samsung Phone spots have been local news promos.  I would say 90% of the ads i have seen have been for upcoming newscasts.   Are the ratings that bad on The CW that affiliates cant sell national ads?   Or is this a Denver issue?   

 

I most always never watch KWGN , I don't see anything on the CW or their daytime lineup worth watching so like you say, the ratings must be that bad.  Hard to say if it's a Denver issue though, CBS owned KCNC, a station with more viewership, has a lot of dealership ads along with promo spots with all their reporters during their newscasts, it might be that they just want to reinforce what they have to offer even if you watch their news because they don't trust that you won't watch anyone else.  Of course, news ratings in Denver had declined a lot the last time I read a Westword or Denver Post article on them, which was May of last year.  I don't know if things have changed since because I haven't seen anything in either publication about local news ratings since then, not even for this month's sweeps.

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1 hour ago, DENDude said:

I have noticed something the past 3 days, during prime time on KWGN. Almost all of the ad's they have aired with the exception of a few DQ & Samsung Phone spots have been local news promos.  I would say 90% of the ads i have seen have been for upcoming newscasts.   Are the ratings that bad on The CW that affiliates cant sell national ads?   Or is this a Denver issue?   

TV season ended Wednesday; nobody watches on Saturdays without network programming, so that's pretty much a standard operating procedure for that night. Plus it's Memorial Day weekend, so it seems like advertisers don't want to burn money on a message that won't go out to many people.

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  • 5 weeks later...
10 minutes ago, mre29 said:

That would give Nexstar a bit of breathing room with regards to the cap, wouldn't it?

 

The question is, given that they hold an option to buy back WPIX from Scripps, would a sale of KCPQ (with or without KZJO), WJW and KDVR (with or without KWGN) clear enough space to allow Nexstar to exercise that option once it reaches the period in which they can do that?

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13 minutes ago, tyrannical bastard said:

Between Seattle, Denver and Cleveland, that's about 3.5 percent adjusted reach (since Denver is UHF and the others are both VHF).   New York is 6.6 percent.

 

If WPIX goes UHF for some reason, that puts it in reach.

 

That seems to be the goal. If they can get WPIX down to 3.3%, getting rid of Seattle, Denver and Cleveland would allow them to take back WPIX cleanly with the option. 

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