What would you do in your market if you had the clout?

[secondchoice]

Why stop with a local market, I will take a shot at the big 4 networks and a lot of the cable networks. When a network "buys" a weekly sitcom, assuming it lasts more than 3 or four weeks, please buy at least 26 episodes! I understand the economics of summer reruns but twice is enough. If someone can't watch the show when it is aired, there is always Hulu.

 

[desertv]

In Phoenix...

Break up the Gannett news monopoly...either sell off the paper to local interests or sell KPNX to another media company.

Combine Belo and Scripps local operations...put ABC back on 3TV, move the CW to 15, put antenna-tv on 61?

And move Fox 10 out of the termite terrace on Adams, maybe out to Westgate near the stadium.

 

[KeithE4]

In Phoenix...

Break up the Gannett news monopoly BS generator...

Fixed. ;D

...either sell off the paper to local interests or sell KPNX to another media company.

The Repugnant probably can't be saved in the long-term; it's the worst big-city paper in the country. I haven't bought it in almost 5 years. I used to use it to line the cat-box until the cats complained. ;D

NBC might have been interested in Channel 12 years ago, but I can't see them buying another station now (they already own KTAZ/39 here). The only way I can see Comcast still wanting it is if they shut the OTA NBC network down and would want to move Telemundo there.

Combine Belo and Scripps local operations...put ABC back on 3TV, move the CW to 15, put antenna-tv on 61?

What difference does it make where ABC is? Both stations are UHF now, so reception isn't an issue anymore. Besides, are Belo and Scripps interested in merging? Didn't think so.

What I think would be a good idea is for KAET to return to RF 29, KSAZ to 31, and Belo sell KASW's transmitter to Gannett and then put KPNX on 49. KASW's programming could then be moved to 3.3. Get off of VHF completely!

 

[bpatrick]

Greensboro/Winston-Salem/High Point:

Although my biggest wish is for WGHP to become an ABC
affiliate again (and I think Fox has been too much of a cash
cow for the station for that to happen), my changes are directed
at WFMY:


1. Dump the 7-8 AM hour of "The Good Morning Show,"
run "CBS This Morning" from 7-9, then start a 9 AM
newscast to compete with WGHP's.

2. Move "Let's Make A Deal" to 10 AM.

3. WBTW Florence, SC has a three-hour block of "The Talk" at 2,
Anderson at 3, and Ellen at 4. Let WFMY do something like that
in the afternoon.

 

[ding12]

I also wouldn't mind seeing CBS make an offer for either WBTV Charlotte or WRAL
Raleigh. A few months back the rumor mill was stirring with suggestions that CBS
was going to buy WAGA and it would once again be Atlanta's CBS station, but that
obviously isn't going to happen.

Why can't CBS just make WUPA the CBS affiliate for Atlanta? CBS has held it so long that it's as if it's always as an option.

CBS could start it off without a newscast and run it like the Detroit CBS station WWJ, but then start one up by paying talent from other stations to move there. In Philly, KYW got Larry Mendte (from WCAU) and Alicia Layne who was hot from Miami and paired the two together. The two didn't last because of a scandal, but the point is neither were KYW vets. It'd probably be cheaper to just build a newsteam rather than buy a station that has one, but not sure. Also, here in Philly, Univision built up a newscast on WUVP, which was once a HSN station.

The benefit for such a large market is CBS would keep the retrans and advertising profits. Meredith would get screwed in the process, but it's business.

That brings another point. With the auto industry rebounding in Detroit, Detroit still relatively healthy and stable and the VHF UHF thing being a less relevant issue in digital, could CBS put investment in their Detroit station and launch a newscasts there? It seems like newscasts on these major stations are still a profitable business, and with CBS #1 in primetime, it'd seem to make sense to make a go for it.

 

[trapper12]

Put Me-TV and Antenna TV in the Knoxville Tn market.

 

[Mario500]

In the designated market area of Mobile, Alabama-Pensacola, Florida...

I would have WFGX-TV broadcast all programming from ThisTV on their main channel and sell the rights to some of their syndicated programs (including "The Jerry Springer Show", "The Maury Povich Show", and "The Jeremy Kyle Show") to other stations.

I would cancel all plans for WALA-TV and WEAR-TV to produce 4:00 PM newscasts Monday through Friday and have them broadcast syndicated programs at those times instead (WALA-TV would broadcast "Jeopardy!" at 4:00 PM and "Wheel of Fortune" at 4:30 PM. WEAR-TV would broadcast "Inside Edition" at 4:00 PM and "The Insider" at 4:30 PM.

I would purchase the local rights to "Dark Shadows" and "Mama's Family" for WKRG-TV ("Mama's Family" was very popular locally after having been broadcast by WKRG-TV and WALA-TV at 10:30 PM for years after production of the program ended). "Dark Shadows" would be broadcast at 9:00 AM and 9:30 AM Monday through Friday instead of paid programs and "Mama's Family" would be broadcast at 6:30 PM Monday through Friday and broadcast at 10:35 PM on Sunday.

I would establish rules (at any station) requiring all newscast presenters and reporters not to express their personal feelings about news, weather, or sports during local newscasts.

I would have WEAR-TV broadcast "Nightline" at 10:30 PM instead of 11:00 PM and "Jimmy Kimmel Live" at 11:00 PM instead of 11:30 PM Monday through Friday. These programs would no longer be delayed by "Prep Football Final" every Friday during the high school football season, because "Prep Football Final" would be rescheduled for 6:30 PM on Saturday (WEAR-TV usually produces local news programming between 6:00 PM and 7:00 PM on Saturday).

I would have WALA-TV end 5:00 PM and 9:00 PM newscasts by 5:30 PM and 9:30 PM respectively Monday through Friday. I would create new local programs for the station to broadcast at 5:30 PM and 9:30 PM Monday through Friday.

I would make programming from Antenna TV and the Funimation Channel available on digital sub-channels through WALA-TV, WPMI-TV, or WJTC-TV.

I would have Comcast Cablevision of Mobile provide programming from the Retro Television Network (RTV) by retransmitting the programming broadcast on one of WKFK-TV's digital sub-channels.

 

[Mr. X]

In Jackson, TN:

On WBBJ I'd drop 7.2, which is usually nothiing but a repeat of 7.1 (ABC) with occasional secondary audio, but usually there's no real difference. Then I'd adjust the bitrate to make Me-TV a full time subchannel instead of just filler for the CBS subchannel on 7.3.

Fire some of the four or five weatherpeople(there's one who only does the Saturday morning news) they have and use that money to get some good reporters.

On WJKT (Fox) I'd replace Cool TV with Antenna TV on 16.2.

Start a WJKT newscast and drop the WLMT/WPTY news.

ON WLJT (PBS) I'd bring back The Red Green Show and also add Monty Python, Fawlty Towers, and Mr. Bean.

Air more shows about West Tennessee history.

 

[mgsports]

KMBC- Exstrella TV,Own Weather Channel and Moretv back
KCWE- Tuffy TV,AMGTV,Midday and 4PM Newscast and 9pm to an hour
KCTV5- TNN,The Country Network,Weathernation TV,PBJ,Weekend and 4pm Co-Anchors
KSMOTV Saturday's 9PM, Weekday Morning Newscast back,Pursuit,9pm Co-Anchor,The Cool TV,Povich at 4pm if coming back
FOX4KC- My Family Net,Outside,4pm Newscast,Accuweather
KSHB- RTV,Untamed Sports TV,Ethnic Channel,Weekend Mornings Co-Anchor
KMCI- Shopping Channel,Youtoo,other Digital Sub Channels,more local programming and also Game Shows like Family Fued
Orlando Stations do nothing but add local Sports and more Newscast/Digital Sub Channels.
For Springfield and Columbia/Jefferson City,MO more Newscast and Digital Sub Channels.

 

[sthompson98]

I would like to see all the Nexstar duopolies here in West Texas (Lubbock, Amarillo, Abilene, Wichita Falls, San Angelo) split up. That way we'd have more options for local news. I live in Lubbock and the newscasts on KLBK and KAMC are pretty much the same other than different anchor talent.

 

[RadioDaze]

Raleigh-Durham (RDU) is an international airport, while Fayetteville (FAY) is a regional one. It's not unique to Fayetteville for air travelers to opt out of their local airports' limited offerings in favor of RDU. Cities such as Danville, Burlington, or Greenville--all three of which are in adjacent TV markets--could be included as well.

Despite the difference in airports (and being joined in a hyphenated TV market, the two areas are separate and distinct:

• Two separate radio markets
  
• Different economic engines (education/medicine/research-Research Triangle Park) vs. military/industrial/agriculture-Fort Bragg/Pope Army Air Field)
  
• Over an hour away from each other via interstate (and that's not a direct connection--you have to take I-40 East to I-95 South)
  
• Fairly self-contained as far as retail and entertainment
  
• Different weather patterns and conditions

Fayetteville is culturally and economically more tied to Lumberton (in the Myrtle Beach-Florence market) than RDU. Really the only time you see Raleigh, Durham, and Fayetteville together is on top of the hour IDs and on the local newscasts when they stretch to cover the two different areas, be it the two useless token Fayetteville Traffic Cams in the morning, an extra long list of election returns/school closings, or interrupting a Spring Lake (near Fayetteville) viewer's favorite show about a thunderstorn in Oxford (near Raleigh). Often, even TV promotions where, say, Wheel of Fortune is "coming to your town" will require two separate events for Raleigh and Fayetteville. One of Fayetteville's two TV stations, WFPX, channel 62, literally doesn't even register in the Raleigh-Durham part of the market (not even a faint picture in analog days and with digital it actually shares UHF channel 36 with Roanoke Rapids public TV station WUNP-TV in the far northeastern corner of the market).

Again, market rank (now #24) and lots of money are at stake, and both take precedence over viewer convenience or the separate areas argument, so Fayetteville always has and always will be joined to Raleigh-Durham as far as local TV is concerned.

3. Separate Raleigh-Durham from Fayetteville with either separate affiliates or via digital subchannels. I realize this would negatively affect our market ranking, but Fayetteville doesn't have many cultural ties to Raleigh and Durham besides sharing TV stations.

That would hurt Raleigh-Durham as you pointed. While cultural may not be strong, I think it does have valid economic ties even if not commutership.

I've been to Fayetteville and it's a lot cheaper and not so incovenient to fly through RDU than FAY to reach there. RDU also had 16,000 avg. daily seats on departures to domestic airports while FAY had less than 1,000. No doubt Research Triangle Parks helps alot of that, but it could be the main carriers (including low cost carriers) prefer serving RDU at FAY's expense (given the paltry service there) and making RDU a gateway to a greater area than just the MSA.

I think it is a greater association than Philadelphia and Allentown. ABE is economically and culturally just as tied to New York as it is to Philadelphia now, and independent on its own merit as well - with people not commuting to either region. There is state commonality between ABE and Philadelphia, and the broadcast stations being able to reach there, but IMO it's weak.

 

[dhett]

Those are your examples of Conservatives on PBS? Two are dead and the third one is pretty much retired.

...producing and hosting two weekly half-hour shows (The McLaughlin Group and McLaughlin One On One) hardly qualifies as anything near "retirement"...

So a conservative gets one out of 168 hours in the broadcast week.

Thanks for making Freddy's original point.

 

[spencerkarter85]

For New Orleans, LA:

WWL 4 should dropped their local morning newscasts at 7-9am and clear CBS This Morning. WVUE should go back to ABC, WGNO should be FOX.

For Salt Lake City, UT:

I would get KSL 5 to force to relinquish the NBC affiliation and give the Peacock affiliaton to KXTV 4 and clear the entire NBC line-up (despite NBC has more tolerence on local pre-emptions) including SNL, and ABC goes to KCSG 44 and KSL would be an indie!

For Jacksonville, FL

I would like to see WJXT 4 be affiliated with MyNetworkTV instead being on subchannel of it's FOX station in the market.

For Boston, MA (just like my friend Shane Spencer said):

WCVB 5 should switch from ABC to NBC and bought by NBC Universal (and trade NBC Connecticut to Hearst TV), WHDH 7 switch from NBC to ABC and bought by Disney, and regain Wheel and Jeopardy!, and I would say Live! With Kelly. WSBK 38 should be CW instead of MyNetworkTV, and WLVI 56 should be bought by FOX and become My56.

San Francisco, CA: I would like to see KTVU 2 bought by FOX making all four network O&Os in Bay Area!

Dallas, TX: I would like to see WFAA 8 being bought by ABC, so they could have all four network O&Os.

 

[benwolf]

For New Orleans, LA:

WWL 4 should dropped their local morning newscasts at 7-9am and clear CBS This Morning. WVUE should go back to ABC, WGNO should be FOX.

For Salt Lake City, UT:

I would get KSL 5 to force to relinquish the NBC affiliation and give the Peacock affiliaton to KXTV 4 and clear the entire NBC line-up (despite NBC has more tolerence on local pre-emptions) including SNL, and ABC goes to KCSG 44 and KSL would be an indie!

For Jacksonville, FL

I would like to see WJXT 4 be affiliated with MyNetworkTV instead being on subchannel of it's FOX station in the market.

For Boston, MA (just like my friend Shane Spencer said):

WCVB 5 should switch from ABC to NBC and bought by NBC Universal (and trade NBC Connecticut to Hearst TV), WHDH 7 switch from NBC to ABC and bought by Disney, and regain Wheel and Jeopardy!, and I would say Live! With Kelly. WSBK 38 should be CW instead of MyNetworkTV, and WLVI 56 should be bought by FOX and become My56.

San Francisco, CA: I would like to see KTVU 2 bought by FOX making all four network O&Os in Bay Area!

Dallas, TX: I would like to see WFAA 8 being bought by ABC, so they could have all four network O&Os.

I disagree about KSL. You really thInk everything on that network is worth clearing? They spared their viewers crap like "The Playboy Club" That station seems to have more smarts than the network, and that's why they're number 1 (or 2) in Salt Lake City. And SNL isn't worthwhile either.

 

[wild949austin]

In Austin:

I would switch Fox and CBS back to their original channels, so KTBC Fox 7 would be CBS 7, and KEYE 42 would go back to Fox 42.

In San Antonio:

Fox would buy WOAI 4 and become an O&O, and become Fox 4 San Antonio. KABB would become NBC 29 Action News.

In Dallas:

I would trade ownership of KTVT and KDFW. Therefore KTVT would become Fox 11 and KDFW would once again be CBS 4.

 

[Mario500]

In addition to the changes I suggested previously for the designated market area of Mobile, Alabama-Pensacola, Florida, I would switch network affiliations for WALA-TV (FOX) and WPMI-TV (NBC). Since WALA-TV was affiliated with NBC from 1953 to 1995 and they lost that affiliation as a result of a change in ownership in which the FOX Television Stations group and Savoy Pictures Entertainment were involved (their venture was called Savoy-Fox, or SF Broadcasting), I believe it is best to restore their affiliation with NBC. Even though they may have fewer hours for syndicated programming, the limits may help them gain more viewers and listeners and better programming.

 

[bpatrick]

I also wouldn't mind seeing CBS make an offer for either WBTV Charlotte or WRAL
Raleigh. A few months back the rumor mill was stirring with suggestions that CBS
was going to buy WAGA and it would once again be Atlanta's CBS station, but that
obviously isn't going to happen.

Why can't CBS just make WUPA the CBS affiliate for Atlanta? CBS has held it so long that it's as if it's always as an option.

CBS could start it off without a newscast and run it like the Detroit CBS station WWJ, but then start one up by paying talent from other stations to move there. In Philly, KYW got Larry Mendte (from WCAU) and Alicia Layne who was hot from Miami and paired the two together. The two didn't last because of a scandal, but the point is neither were KYW vets. It'd probably be cheaper to just build a newsteam rather than buy a station that has one, but not sure. Also, here in Philly, Univision built up a newscast on WUVP, which was once a HSN station.

The benefit for such a large market is CBS would keep the retrans and advertising profits. Meredith would get screwed in the process, but it's business.

That brings another point. With the auto industry rebounding in Detroit, Detroit still relatively healthy and stable and the VHF UHF thing being a less relevant issue in digital, could CBS put investment in their Detroit station and launch a newscasts there? It seems like newscasts on these major stations are still a profitable business, and with CBS #1 in primetime, it'd seem to make sense to make a go for it.

We tend to get into the technicalities of digital (WXIA is Ch. 10, WGCL is Ch. 19, WAGA is Ch. 27, WSB is Ch. 39, etc.), but the general public still thinks of them as 11, 46, 5, and 2, respectively. As I recall, when CBS moved from 2 to 62 in Detroit, before the digital conversion, WTOL/11 Toledo became, in effect, the CBS affiliate for Detroit, if you go by the numbers of people watching. Atlanta viewers would probably say, WUPA, oh, that's Channel 69, and CBS has another WWJ on its hands.

Besides, some of you are saying Chs. 4 and 11 in DFW ought to switch so that KDFW/4 is once again CBS, and that 10 and 15 in Mobile ought to switch so that WALA/10 is once again NBC. So what's wrong with WAGA going back to CBS, except that Fox will never sell the station?

I would like to see WFAA become an ABC o&o, being the largest Big Four station that is not one currently. But, just as I don't think Cox would sell its flagship, WSB, to ABC, neither do I think Belo would sell its flagship. The two stations I'd most like to see as ABC o&os are WFTV Orlando (just because of the Disney connection there) and WJLA Washington, since NBC and Fox have o&os in Washington and CBS has one in Baltimore (scratch WMAR--Scripps-Howard already owns it and I don't know why ABC would want to own it; even being on Ch. 2 it's rarely been a factor in the Baltimore market, except for Orioles games).

Somebody pointed out that WVUE will not go back to ABC; the station owner also owns the Saints, and as long as Fox has the NFC contract, WVUE is going to stay put to carry the team.

Finally, KSL is a special case; it is owned by the Mormon church, which considers programs such as "Saturday Night Live" and "The Playboy Club" inappropriate. When it was a CBS affiliate it frequently pre-empted made-for-TV movies it considered offensive to its primary audience. Bill Paley never said a discouraging word; he once said that KSL was one of CBS's weakest affiliates but it had a reason and was thus willing to make allowances for its tendency to pre-empt. Besides, "SNL" is on--what?--Ch. 13, so you can still see it.

 

[TheRob]

If I had the clout, I would quintuple my salary.

 

[Wright County Guy]

First, I'd quintuple TheRob's salary. You're welcome.

Twin Cities:

TPT (PBS) has two stations and only 4 streams -- PBS, "Life", "Minnesota Channel" and Weather. Add PBS WOrld and a traffic channel with 88.5FM audio (This used to be done OTA on Channel 45)

WCCO (CBS O & O) The husband and wife primary anchor team is getting tough to watch. Break 'em up.

KSTP/KSTC (ABC/Ind.) Blow up the news department. Throw reruns of "McHale's Navy" during the news time. Start over in 2013.

KMSP (Fox O & O) Do something with your sub-channels. Antenna TV perhaps?

KARE (NBC) Hire a primary news anchor. Add (yes, ADD) a Sunday morning local news presence.

WUCW (CW) No opinion.

WTFC (MyNet, Fox O & O) See KMSP.

KPXM (Ion) Move to the Shoreview Telefarm with the other full power stations.

 

[w9wi]

KPXM (Ion) Move to the Shoreview Telefarm with the other full power stations.

Your wish is their command: KPXM recently received a CP to do just that.