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KING and KONG expand daily newscasts

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discjockeyjohn64

Was scrolling through my satellite TV guide yesterday to see what new programming the locals will have in early September. I looked on September 9, and KING 5 will launch a new 7 pm newscast, and Evening Magazine will slide to 7:30. On KONG, they will launch KING 5 News at 9 pm, as well as continue their 10 pm hour long newscast. Two hours of prime time news on KONG. I wonder who will be anchoring these additional newscasts?

KONG moves Dr. Phil to 6 pm, Katie to 7 pm, Access Hollywood to 8 pm, and Inside Edition moves from KING to KONG and airs at 8:30 pm. Then the two hours of prime time news.
 
Here's an idea - why don't they just change KONG to all-news?
 
Here's another idea - why don't these TV threads move to a NON-RADIO board? Oh, I know...
 
Because there is NO such thing as a "Seattle TV" board. If so, all of these comments about 4, 5, 7, 16, etc. would be moved there. Hopefully the 7PM newscast gets good ratings, because Evening Magazine has been in that slot for about 20 years now. (Since KING moved Entertainment Tonight to KIRO, c. 1993 or 94) KONG wants to compete with KZJO, I see.

I wonder if, by 2015, we'll see a "KSNV" on KING 5. Nothin' but newscasts all day except for NBC primetime. That would be a killer to KING, IMO.

-crainbebo
 
I always thought that's what DTV sub-channels were for......
 
Don't worry about news saturation! KING 5 News at 7 will be gone within 6 months. This has been tried before on KIRO in the 80's and on KONG a few years ago. I predict that the ratings will be anemic as usual. And, honestly, how long is KING 5 News at 9pm on KONG going to last??? Probably a very similar six months.

As for who is anchoring? Well, I suppose that Jean could stay another 30 minutes to anchor at 7pm. At 9pm, I suppose that it will be Lori and Dennis, but they need another strong male presence -- now that Schauffler is gone. Perhaps Rob Piercy could slide to weekday evenings and anchor with Jean at 7pm and Lori at 9pm or something like that.
 
Well KZJO's 9pm newscast has lasted a couple of years now. It's nice to have a newscast that is early in the evening and good for the extra-early risers the next morning.

-crainbebo
 
KZJO's newscast had anemic ratings at last check. But KZJO has generally anemic ratings anyway. Q13 has made a significant investments in news over the past year or two (at 4, 5, and 9pm). That said, I live in Phoenix now and love watching news at 9pm and I'm not a super-early riser.
 
I dont understand why KONG isn't used to its full potential... Its mainly just a spill-over channel for KING to air shows they already have aired, along with infomercials and sometimes a movie. It could be a neat station if they made it more appealing to watch.
 
KONG used to be full of classic TV shows and even SERIALS, back when they first started. All in the Family, Baretta, Hawaii Five-O, My Three Sons, etc all aired on KONG in the beginning. Perry Mason was even on KONG IIRC. Wasn't uncommon to see some old movie serials in the early morning as well.

-crainbebo
 
I must have not been old enough to remember that, or care at the time. I think it would make so much more sense to show stuff like that on KONG again. For what they use the station for now, they could easily just make a third "subchannel" (since this is unfortunately the age of useless DTV).
 
formeraa said:
Don't worry about news saturation! KING 5 News at 7 will be gone within 6 months. This has been tried before on KIRO in the 80's and on KONG a few years ago. I predict that the ratings will be anemic as usual. And, honestly, how long is KING 5 News at 9pm on KONG going to last??? Probably a very similar six months.

As for who is anchoring? Well, I suppose that Jean could stay another 30 minutes to anchor at 7pm. At 9pm, I suppose that it will be Lori and Dennis, but they need another strong male presence -- now that Schauffler is gone. Perhaps Rob Piercy could slide to weekday evenings and anchor with Jean at 7pm and Lori at 9pm or something like that.
Click to expand...

It will be interesting to see what they do for anchors for these two new newscasts. Dennis Bounds is already on for a ton of hours; Jean doesn't work a full time schedule (and by that, I mean she takes a TON of time off) leaving a lot of her shifts for Lori to cover. I think they're going to need to bring someone on to cover some of these newscasts...
 
Rob Piercy announced on his twitter he is off weekends and a new weekend anchor is coming. I think he is the new anchor. The other weekend anchor I think might take over for his 7pm NWCN show too.

Anyways what's up with NWCN it seems like its going down hill more and more.
 
Drewgu111 said:
Anyways what's up with NWCN it seems like its going down hill more and more.
Click to expand...

NWCN is a shell of its former self. They do not have any dedicated bureau reporters (remember when they had their own in Portland and Spokane), all the anchors also have regular shifts on KING (except Cam Johnson) and their weather department is also basically, the KING talent. Also, NWCN is not available in HD ... I forget about it as I am rarely in the non-HD section of my comcast box. I wonder what the future holds for it?
 
NWCN is just KING 5 News, but 24/7. I agree, used to see more KREM 2 and KGW 8 reports on there years ago. Then Don Carson retired from the weather department and basically, Keisha Burns and Lisa Van Cise are working 2nd shifts.

-crainbebo
 
crainbebo said:
NWCN is just KING 5 News, but 24/7. I agree, used to see more KREM 2 and KGW 8 reports on there years ago. Then Don Carson retired from the weather department and basically, Keisha Burns and Lisa Van Cise are working 2nd shifts.

-crainbebo
Click to expand...

I watched this weekend and there seemed to be a fair amount of news from Portland with a few stories from Boise and Spokane. Seattle is obviously where NWCN is based and is the biggest market in the Pacific Northwest. In Arizona, the Belo affiliate simply repeats their latest newscast all day long on their news channel. At least NWCN hasn't devolved to that level.

Back to the original topic, congrats to Rob Piercy!!

By the way, rumor has it that KING 5 News @ 4pm is next, starting sometime within the next 6 to 9 months.
 
Last edited:
fordranger797 said:
I must have not been old enough to remember that, or care at the time. I think it would make so much more sense to show stuff like that on KONG again. For what they use the station for now, they could easily just make a third "subchannel" (since this is unfortunately the age of useless DTV).
Click to expand...

I do recall that KONG had classic TV shows like the ones mentioned already in another post; as for KONG today, MeTV has most of the shows that the station used to run in its first couple of years, so one would think it would make for a perfect MeTV affiliate, if not for the presence of KVOS in the market.

Actually come to think of it, is there any way there can be another MeTV affiliate in the Seattle area? Don't get me wrong, I like KVOS and all, but their availability on various TV providers in the area leaves something to be desired; for example, they just got on DirecTV last year, but in HD only, which you have to pay extra for in terms of equipment and HD programming packages.

Also, Click Cable TV down in Tacoma does not have the channel yet, and unless i'm mistaken Verizon Fios TV subscribers in Seattle cannot get the channel yet as well; maybe MeTV can do some kind of shared agreement with Belo or whoever owns KONG in the future and put some MeTV programming in the evening hours or whatever.

Or try and get on KFFV(which right now is Azteca America spanish programming I believe); at least that way MeTV can be on a channel with better distribution in the area.
 
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