FCC to possibly crack down on dual affiliations

[dave73]

I wonder how that would work out in the Grand Rapids/Kalamazoo market, where there are 2 separate ABC affiliates. LIN owns NBC affiliate WOOD-TV, while owning ABC affiliate WOTV. I believe the FCC has allowed this duopoly to happen, since WOTV only covers the southern portion of the market, while Gannett owned WZZM owns the other ABC affiliate, who only covers the northern portion of the market. LIN also has many Class A digital stations carrying MNT.

As for the Tribune stations in the Indianapolis market; if they had to divest any station, I believe they'd divest WTTV/WTTK, unless the value of the stations go up, now that it'll affiliate with CBS. Both of those stations are licensed to communities too far from Indianapolis to be any real value, unless with WTTK transmitting from Indianapolis makes it worth more. WXIN being licensed to Indianapolis might be worth more, & I think Tribune might keep it. WTTV being licensed to Bloomington, & could only move as far north as Trafalgar, in order to put a Grade A signal over Bloomington, while WTTK now transmitting from Indianapolis still allows them to put a Grade A signal over Kokomo.

Also for Granite Broadcasting& Malara in Fort Wayne, IN with WISE-TV (NBC on .1 & MNT on the .2) & WPTA (ABC on .1 & CW on the .2) having their own duopoly (for a brief period of time, they also had Fox on WISE-TV's .2, until a lawsuit forced Fox to go back to WFFT).

 

[thomwim]

Exactly if those 2 things don't happen, then who's going to buy WOAI? Graham can't buy them (they own KSAT) Gannett can't buy them either (they own KENS) I think it's either Hearst or Scripps that buys WOAI, however Hearst owns The San Antonio Express-News but if Hearst can apply and get a permanent waiver to keep both The San Antonio Express-News and WOAI, that wouldn't be too much of a problem, Scripps, I'm not sure if they're even interested in that station, maybe Meredith, if that law where to be in effect right now, you don't have Sinclair repealing it, and congress doesn't rescind it, who will buy WOAI? Hearst, Scripps, or Meredith? Or even Tribune? I forgot about them too.

It can't be Tribune, because they already have 39% coverage. Scripps owned KENS (channel 5) for a short time in 1997, before selling it to Belo. Hearst owned a radio station in San Antonio (KTSA, AM 550) in the 1930s. Meredith has never owned any TV stations in Texas.

 

[ftballfan]

I wonder how that would work out in the Grand Rapids/Kalamazoo market, where there are 2 separate ABC affiliates. LIN owns NBC affiliate WOOD-TV, while owning ABC affiliate WOTV. I believe the FCC has allowed this duopoly to happen, since WOTV only covers the southern portion of the market, while Gannett owned WZZM owns the other ABC affiliate, who only covers the northern portion of the market. LIN also has many Class A digital stations carrying MNT.

As for the Tribune stations in the Indianapolis market; if they had to divest any station, I believe they'd divest WTTV/WTTK, unless the value of the stations go up, now that it'll affiliate with CBS. Both of those stations are licensed to communities too far from Indianapolis to be any real value, unless with WTTK transmitting from Indianapolis makes it worth more. WXIN being licensed to Indianapolis might be worth more, & I think Tribune might keep it. WTTV being licensed to Bloomington, & could only move as far north as Trafalgar, in order to put a Grade A signal over Bloomington, while WTTK now transmitting from Indianapolis still allows them to put a Grade A signal over Kokomo.

Also for Granite Broadcasting& Malara in Fort Wayne, IN with WISE-TV (NBC on .1 & MNT on the .2) & WPTA (ABC on .1 & CW on the .2) having their own duopoly (for a brief period of time, they also had Fox on WISE-TV's .2, until a lawsuit forced Fox to go back to WFFT).

In Grand Rapids, I could see WOTV going to MNTV since both WOTV and WZZM get mostly full-market cable carriage, with the only exceptions I can think of being WOW! Hastings [middle of the market] (no WOTV, despite WOTV's tower being near Hastings!), Charter in Sturgis and Coldwater [in the far southern part of the market] (no WZZM), and Charter in Grant [northern part of the market] (no WOTV).

 

[JeeperOne]

IF this new law were applied RETROACTIVELY as opposed to going forward, it would have HUGE ramnifications here in Denver

First, there's the KWGN 2/KDVR 31 pair. If Tribune had to get rid of one of them, it would likely be KDVR 31. Who would buy it ?? That one is a no-brainer. Fox itself would (Why not? They owned it before & currently don't own any stations in Denver)

Next we have the KUSA 9/KTVD 20 pair. This one's more complicated. Couple that with the fact that KTVD 20 is affiliated with a network that runs itself more like a syndication service than a conventional network makes it tough to sell KTVD as a standalone. If Gannett were to get gutsy & decide to part with KUSA 9 instead, I would think the most likely buyer would be Hearst since Scripps already owns KMGH 7 & Comcast/NBC couldn't even buy the building KUSA/KTVD is housed in (Let alone anything else) without irking the ire of the FCC (Even though NBC once owned KCNC 4 many moons ago)

In addition, KTVD would also lose Broncos preseason rights (And probably the MNF & ThNF rights as well) since those are owned by Gannett & KUSA. As for the news, I doubt KTVD would lose that because KUSA can simply enter an agreement to produce the news for them to get around that problem. Simple solution there

Finally there's the KTFD 14/KCEC 50 Univision owned pair. Good luck trying to figure this one out. I know NOTHING about the number of Latin broadcasters outside of the networks

Turning to a MUCH LARGER scale - Fox would have to sell off (If not completely dissolve as a network) MyNetwork TV. That would make WWOR 9 New York, KCOP 13 Los Angeles, KDFI 27 Dallas/Fort Worth, KUTP 45 Phoneiix & a host of others all Independents again (Assuming MNTV is dissolved as a network) Which they would have to spin off in order to comply with the law. Fox might also have to sell off some O&O's of its Latin network in areas where they already own a Fox station too

CBS would have to sell off its CW & MNTV stations (Though it might be able to keep its stake in the CW network itself)

Did I miss anything ??

Cheers & 73

Pat

 

[newsmark]

JepperOne,

I don't think any of the cases you mentioned would apply, since they're talking about "big 4" network pairings. Tribune in Denver is Fox/The CW. The other pairings you mentioned wouldn't count, either.

They're specifically talking about one station owning affiliates of two of the "Big 4" networks: ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC. The CW and MyNetwork don't count. Nor do Univision, Unimas, Telemundo and Mundo Fox.

I'd think existing deals, such as Indy, might be grandfathered, but there's no guarantee of that.

 

[TheBigA]

Congress weighed in on the issue today, and said a pretty quick: "Hold your horses!" According to RBR:

The lead players when it comes to broadcast issues in the House of Representatives said that a thorough process is absolutely necessary before any changes to broadcast market definitions are incorporated into any new FCC ownership rules. They said the possible effects are “unclear.”

Read more at http://rbr.com/house-leaders-slam-the-brakes-on-local-tv-rule-changes/#ksFBhktXkKCysKPr.99