michael hagerty said:
ding12 said:
michael hagerty said:
Wow.
This completely misses the point of the Tribune/Local TV deal, which is scale. They want to be the biggest group that isn't a network owned stations group. Part of this is to psychologically blow Gannett into the weeds. What you suggest would put Gannett ahead of Trib. Maybe FOX, too. Not what they're after.
The stations are, by and large, cash cows. Trib will make much more money in not just the long run but even mid-term by operating them than they would selling them at today's prices.
You're putting way too much emphasis on affiliations. It's not that big a deal. Trib wants to be doing business with everyone. If (big if) CW folds, Trib knows how to run indies. And, depending on how far down the road that happens (if it does), Tribune has what it needs to start its own network, including its own content creation.
If that was truly the case, why didn't they go after Young Broadcasting and KRON for San Francisco, or one of the other indys out of there in the Bay Area? Instead they went after Local TV which is predominately CBS and FOX affiliates outside the top 10 markets, and will achieve duopolies in Denver and St. Louis.
What good is starting a network like you suggested and having a network affiliate in Davenport over San Francisco?
If running indies is so desirable or running a network they can own, why pay CW for affiliation in the first place?
Young wouldn't have given them the scale they get from the Local TV deal.
The Local TV stations are by and large big cash generators. KRON isn't.
Again, you're way more fixated on affiliations than Trib is. They want to be a major force. You do that in part by doing business with everybody.
And when it comes to indies or a Tribune-owned network, note that I said "if" and "big if" the CW goes away.
Crackedscreen is right about re-trans.
And if you start a network, but don't own a station in a given market, that's a revenue source as your affiliate pays you reverse compensation.
The thing is, you're making it sound like Tribune wants to be a less evil version of Sinclair. For any other station owner, that'd be easy enough to understand. But so long as Tribune owns WPIX, KTLA, and WGN, it will always be a weird hybrid that does not compute with the
order-obsessed people on this board, a relic of the days when independence was so viable that WGN and KWGN, VHFs when that still mattered, could say no to Fox with a straight face.
If you look at the big four, they only own stations aligned with their own respective networks, plus MyNet for Fox; CBS is the odd one out with its CW, independent, and MyNet duopolies and its standalone CW station in Seattle. Depending on how serious it was about starting its own network, Tribune wouldn't be that unless it split in two, which it easily could. That doesn't justify going after Young (which is basically KRON and a bunch of small-market junk), but it does make suggesting it a little more understandable, compared to a purchase of a purely conventional affiliate owner.
Regardless of anything else, even without any prospects whatsoever of a true fifth network, the spectacle of KWGN, channel 2, being the junior duopoly partner to a legacy UHF (and while VHF/UHF might not matter anymore, to the extent OTA channels in general still matter if three of the big four are in the 2-13 range, you don't want the fourth to be way out in the 50s or 60s, and I know this doesn't apply to KDVR), is so bizarre I can't help but wonder whether Tribune or Fox might consider swapping affiliations between KWGN and KDVR.
