Nexstar, Mission Purchase Newport Stations

[nathannah]

The web presence is insignificant in terms of the revenue it generates. That's part of why companies like Nexstar have such crappy sites in the first place! Of course, whether it makes sense for us doesn't matter much either. What matters is whether the deal makes business sense. If you wanted to argue it doesn't, you might still have a point. I seem to remember Nexstar fighting to keeps its transition digital TV channels at low power because it was 2/3 of a billion dollars in debt. Also, wasn't this the company that told everyone it was putting everything on the block after Four Points announced they were getting rid of their properties?

I don't think it does. They're beginning to be the Clear Channel of television, with too many properties spread across the country and their strong operations few and far between, and staff is suffering (in my WFRV example they've cut alot, their marquee sports anchor is now at the weak NBC affiliate across town because of their strong sister station in Milwaukee, they optimized their on-screen look to 16:9 without putting in the AFD flag to show 16:9 on 4:3 screens, suggesting a weak master control, and now their weekend anchors work both the morning and evening shifts). They're also going to cut pretty much all the subchannels from these stations because of their 'no subs' policies; thankfully Newport's affiliations are limited to TheCoolTV and The Country Network, so no one will lose Me-TV or Antenna TV beyond the Memphis duopoly, which has their Me-TV protected by the MyNet subchannel.

I thought WOAI and KABB had the #3 and #5 newsrooms with KWEX in-between them. Sinclair is going to say it's legal for them to own both WOAI and KABB because KWEX is in the top-4.

Thanks for the actual number; I knew KWEX was somewhere high there (and can get #3 easily on many nights). And indeed it is legal, as the gambit of Post-Newsweek trying to buy WTVJ in Miami from NBC proved; they used the argument that WTVJ was #6 in the market because the Spanish newsrooms topped them, and would have got it through if not for FCC inaction and universal opposition in South Florida against the WTVJ-WPLG duopoly.

 

[TomParks]

Cox is now also selling some other TV stations...

http://www.coxmediagroup.com/news/c...oup-purchases-new-tv-stations-jacksonv/nPy7J/

I hope the new buyer of WJAC likes subchannels so we keep MeTV. Nexstar is screwing us already by refusing to add any on WTAJ. They run a second class news service. :

 

[Mr. X]

The web presence is insignificant in terms of the revenue it generates. That's part of why companies like Nexstar have such crappy sites in the first place! Of course, whether it makes sense for us doesn't matter much either. What matters is whether the deal makes business sense. If you wanted to argue it doesn't, you might still have a point. I seem to remember Nexstar fighting to keeps its transition digital TV channels at low power because it was 2/3 of a billion dollars in debt. Also, wasn't this the company that told everyone it was putting everything on the block after Four Points announced they were getting rid of their properties?

I don't think it does. They're beginning to be the Clear Channel of television, with too many properties spread across the country and their strong operations few and far between, and staff is suffering (in my WFRV example they've cut alot, their marquee sports anchor is now at the weak NBC affiliate across town because of their strong sister station in Milwaukee, they optimized their on-screen look to 16:9 without putting in the AFD flag to show 16:9 on 4:3 screens, suggesting a weak master control, and now their weekend anchors work both the morning and evening shifts). They're also going to cut pretty much all the subchannels from these stations because of their 'no subs' policies; thankfully Newport's affiliations are limited to TheCoolTV and The Country Network, so no one will lose Me-TV or Antenna TV beyond the Memphis duopoly, which has their Me-TV protected by the MyNet subchannel.

I thought WOAI and KABB had the #3 and #5 newsrooms with KWEX in-between them. Sinclair is going to say it's legal for them to own both WOAI and KABB because KWEX is in the top-4.

Thanks for the actual number; I knew KWEX was somewhere high there (and can get #3 easily on many nights). And indeed it is legal, as the gambit of Post-Newsweek trying to buy WTVJ in Miami from NBC proved; they used the argument that WTVJ was #6 in the market because the Spanish newsrooms topped them, and would have got it through if not for FCC inaction and universal opposition in South Florida against the WTVJ-WPLG duopoly.

Clear Channel was the Clear Channel of television, until it sold it's stations to Newport.

 

[jdb820]

Clear Channel was the Clear Channel of television, until it sold it's stations to Newport.

I think that Sinclair fit that bill a lot more especially during the News Central era. Nexstar seemingly seems to get a pass because their base is in medium-to-small markets but still...

What keeps other companies back from pulling the stuff that these two companies have done?

 

[nathannah]

Clear Channel was the Clear Channel of television, until it sold it's stations to Newport.

I would disagree that they had the influence on television they have in radio; at their peak the best they could do was monopolize news through their stations in Upstate New York, but a rather poor effort that failed as most of the stations except their Syracuse operation were longtime third-placers with no impact on the big two in town (and they had help in Syracuse with Granite's botching of their duopoly).

Speaking of which, there should be more concerns with Syracuse. With Granite's news product barely being tolerated and WSYR about to go to Nexstar, it's a two-station news market that may see quality of reporting go down.

 

[Kent]

What keeps other companies back from pulling the stuff that these two companies have done?

Money! Simply put, outside of smaller markets the major players don't want to be in, partnering with another party to buy one of the big four affiliates is cost prohibitive.

Nexstar is basically the carcass of ABRY that Sinclair didn't want. Yeah, I know it's a little more complicated than that, but Nexstar essentially got markets no one else really wanted and built its strategy around squeezing higher revenue out of those markets.

 

[fybush]

Clear Channel was the Clear Channel of television, until it sold it's stations to Newport.

I would disagree that they had the influence on television they have in radio; at their peak the best they could do was monopolize news through their stations in Upstate New York, but a rather poor effort that failed as most of the stations except their Syracuse operation were longtime third-placers with no impact on the big two in town (and they had help in Syracuse with Granite's botching of their duopoly).

Rochester's WOKR/WHAM-TV was number one in the market before Clear Channel, during Clear Channel and after Clear Channel. Ditto for Elmira's WETM. The only "longtime third-placers" were Binghamton, Utica and Watertown, and the latter two were really distant second in two-station news markets.

Speaking of which, there should be more concerns with Syracuse. With Granite's news product barely being tolerated and WSYR about to go to Nexstar, it's a two-station news market that may see quality of reporting go down.

Granite has no news product of its own in Syracuse. Granite's WTVH is operated by Barrington's WSTM.