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TheRob

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9 minutes ago, TheRob said:

What do you mean "somehow"?

 

Also can't help but laugh at the comment on the article

Quote

NOW THE BRADLEYS WILL OWN ALL LOCAL STATIONS THEY WILL HAVE A MONOPOLY. THIS IS ABOUT BRADLEY'S GREED AND IT IS THE END OF COMPETITION IN NEWS IN ST. JOSEPH.

 

Whoever the Bradleys are. But come on man, it's St. Joseph lol, not Kansas City.

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It's legal primarily on the basis that FCC duopoly rules have tended to treat LPTVs differently than full-power stations. The top-four and former "eight-voices test" restrictions applied only to full-power outlets, while groups have been allowed to own multiple low-power stations in the same market, hence why NPG owns an effective triopoly in St. Joseph now and how Weigel is allowed to own a virtual LPTV triopoly in South Bend (which, ironically, was the reason why Schurz was effectively rebuffed by the FCC from acquiring WBND, WCWW and WMYS in 2009 as it would have created a broadcasting oligopoly in South Bend with WSBT).

 

The question is, is it really legal on its face? It would be a monopoly since NPG also owns the city's lone daily newspaper (St. Joseph News-Press), in addition to the three LPTV outlets (KNPN, KNPG and KCJO) as well as a 24-hour news channel that was integrated into KNPN (News-Press NOW). That would suggest there are some antitrust issues involved here, given the market's size and the fact that the FCC's crossownership rules weren't intended to allow local media ownership to be concentrated in such a narrow manner. Also, the DOJ had problems with Sinclair trying to acquire Tribune because of the ownership conflicts Sinclair didn't really bother to try to address that got the group sued by Tribune when the deal fell apart. It's possible the DOJ would find problems here, too, given the consolidating of print and broadcast media outlets.

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Just now, T.L. Hughes said:

It's legal primarily on the basis that FCC duopoly rules have tended to treat LPTVs differently than full-power stations. The top-four and former "eight-voices test" restrictions applied only to full-power outlets, while groups have been allowed to own multiple low-power stations in the same market, hence why NPG owns an effective triopoly in St. Joseph now and how Weigel is allowed to own a virtual LPTV triopoly in South Bend (which, ironically, was the reason why Schurz was effectively rebuffed by the FCC from acquiring WBND, WCWW and WMYS in 2009 as it would have created a broadcasting oligopoly in South Bend with WSBT).

 

The question is, is it really legal on its face. It would be a monopoly since NPG also owns the city's lone daily newspaper (St. Joseph News-Press), in addition to the three LPTV outlets (KNPN, KNPG and KCJO) as well as a 24-hour news channel that was integrated into KNPN (News-Press NOW). That would suggest there are some antitrust issues involved here, given the market's size.

 

I think you hit the nail on the head. The question isn't at the FCC, it's Justice.

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5 minutes ago, Ramona said:

 

I think you hit the nail on the head. The question isn't at the FCC, it's Justice.

 

Does NPG own any radio stations in the market too? Are there any other places where both the newspaper and the only TV news operation are owned by the same company?

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1 minute ago, GoldenShine9 said:

 

Does NPG own any radio stations in the market too? Are there any other places where both the newspaper and the only TV news operation are owned by the same company?

 

No, NPG is not in the radio business. Eagle Communications owns the St. Joseph radio market, essentially.

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16 minutes ago, TheRob said:

 

No, NPG is not in the radio business. Eagle Communications owns the St. Joseph radio market, essentially.

To a point. Of the twelve radio stations in St. Joseph, Eagle owns four and all but one of the others are owned by religious entities. As for GoldenShine's question about a company owning a newspaper and the lone television news operation in one market, the answer is no. The remaining markets that have newspaper and television properties owned by the same company are in markets where there is at least one other independently owned network station with a news department.

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That’s the NPG playbook — buy one station, cut costs, buy all the other stations in town, and cut costs again to the point where there’s barely anything left of a news operation. Garbage company that’s refined and neglected a lot of once great stations.

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9 hours ago, T.L. Hughes said:

It's legal primarily on the basis that FCC duopoly rules have tended to treat LPTVs differently than full-power stations. The top-four and former "eight-voices test" restrictions applied only to full-power outlets, while groups have been allowed to own multiple low-power stations in the same market, hence why NPG owns an effective triopoly in St. Joseph now and how Weigel is allowed to own a virtual LPTV triopoly in South Bend (which, ironically, was the reason why Schurz was effectively rebuffed by the FCC from acquiring WBND, WCWW and WMYS in 2009 as it would have created a broadcasting oligopoly in South Bend with WSBT).

 

Let me remind you that along with Channel 22, Schurz also owned the South Bend Tribune & a cluster of radio stations. Free Press complained about the deal when it was first proposed. FCC only approved the WBND app, but they sat on the other two. 

 

9 hours ago, GoldenShine9 said:

It's definitely legal. However, Justice may not like this too much.

 

Normally, the DOJ wouldn't touch these kinds of deals, since the value are relatively small,.DOJ was never involved in Block acquiring the three LPs (ABC, CBS & Fox) in Lima, OH while they already owned NBC outlet WLIO. The difference today is while the FCC is pro-deregulation, the current regime of the DOJ's Antittrust Unit is following a playbook that's a complete opposite,

 

On the paperwork posted tonight, NPG is paying Heartland $13.65M. And the cut off date is September 30th of this year. They better hope the DOJ doesn't get involved.

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6 hours ago, C Block said:

That’s the NPG playbook — buy one station, cut costs, buy all the other stations in town, and cut costs again to the point where there’s barely anything left of a news operation. Garbage company that’s refined and neglected a lot of once great stations.

 

KNPN, KNPG, and KCJO bumped KCTV, KSHB, and WDAF off cable and satellite due to the protectionist policies of NBC, CBS, and FOX about stations with significantly viewed status although KMBC and KQTV co-exist. The DMA is close and small enough that the KC stations can be picked up with a good antenna. What is ABC's policy about stations with significantly viewed status or do the cable and dish companies not want to pay retrans fees for those stations even though they might be better ratings than the low budget monopolistic LPTV stations. Same policies have kept many Packers games off in parts of Wisconsin in Minnesota DMAs. Parts of far northwest MO might be out of OTA range of the KC stations although that's in the KC DMA instead of the St Joseph DMA

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19 hours ago, C Block said:

That’s the NPG playbook — buy one station, cut costs, buy all the other stations in town, and cut costs again to the point where there’s barely anything left of a news operation. Garbage company that’s refined and neglected a lot of once great stations.

Seeing that there are clearly a lot of thoughts and opinions about NPG, I've gone ahead and made a thread for it in corporate chat. We can move these discussions there. Here's the link to it: 

 

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  • 1 month later...

A follow up.

 

To no surprise, the cable advocacy groups of the ATVA & the NCTA have written informal objections (not a petition of deny) over this deal. They fear that NPG having control of the major affiliated stations (despite the incumbent three are LP'd) might use the new station as leverage in retrans negotiations.

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On 5/13/2019 at 6:26 PM, CircleSeven said:

A follow up.

 

To no surprise, the cable advocacy groups of the ATVA & the NCTA have written informal objections (not a petition of deny) over this deal. They fear that NPG having control of the major affiliated stations (despite the incumbent three are LP'd) might use the new station as leverage in retrans negotiations.

Of course, they are. Those groups clearly hate the idea of mergers & acquisitions and are for rules that in some cases hasn't existed in 10-20 years if not, longer than that

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  • 4 months later...
1 hour ago, Samantha said:

The FCC dismissed the assignment of license application for KQTV today but I cannot find a reasoning.

 

Perhaps Justice said no and NPG walked away?

 

That means that either it joins most of the other Heartland Media stations heading for Allen (they would likely have to pony up a bit more money), or it becomes orphaned like WKTV and becomes essentially a free agent station (and would probably fit Gray better than anyone else).

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5 hours ago, Samantha said:

The FCC dismissed the assignment of license application for KQTV today but I cannot find a reasoning.

 

4 hours ago, GoldenShine9 said:

Perhaps Justice said no and NPG walked away?

 

That means that either it joins most of the other Heartland Media stations heading for Allen (they would likely have to pony up a bit more money), or it becomes orphaned like WKTV and becomes essentially a free agent station (and would probably fit Gray better than anyone else).

 

September 30 was the outside date for this deal (six months). But I didn't get the feeling the applicants would call off the sale. Even after the Third Circuit ruling, and FCC granted the KDLT deal a day later.

 

Not sure if DOJ stuck their head in this deal or not. But if they didn't, I could've seen the FCC granting this deal, the same way they granted KDLT. I say this because the NCTA & ATVA wrote informal objections over this deal (the same as the KDLT, but the FCC greenlighted that), Maybe the appeals process regarding Pai's 2017-dereg rule might've been too long for applicants of this deal if they would've waited (and that's if Pai will follow through with an appeal)?

 

I would look at Cox/Apollo now since that deal includes transferring newspapers (and broadcast assets) from one entity to the next, even if that new entity is holding 77% interest.

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On 10/16/2019 at 12:10 PM, Samantha said:

The FCC dismissed the assignment of license application for KQTV today but I cannot find a reasoning.

 

Here's the letter from the applicant's lawyer requesting dismissal of the application.

 

Again we don't know if DOJ had a hand in this deal. But I wouldn't be surprised if it did.

 

 

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kqtv2011.jpg

10.18.2019

This week the FCC posted a dismissal of the application of News Press and Gazette to buy ABC affiliate KQTV in St. Joseph, without any reason listed. NPG already owns a series of low-power network affiliates and the newspaper. However, a federal appeals court recently vacated the FCC's intent to re-write or eliminate several media ownership rules, including the newspaper cross-ownership rule. KQTV's current owner is, by proxy, Heartland Media. Heartland recently announced it is selling most of its other stations to Allen Media. It's unclear what will happen to KQTV.
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