Sometimes, in the wake of all the dynamic change in the television and media industries, I'm really disheartened. This morning Broadcasting & Cable published an article online about a CBS affiliated TV station abandoning its local news programing. http://www.broadcastingcable.com/article/195997-WYOU_s_Disbanded_News_Operation_May_Be_The_First_of_Many.php
The story quotes a "broadcast veteran" who said “The bottom line is: Do all markets need three or four newscasts in the same time period?"
WTF??!! I almost don't know where to start. There are already more than "three or four" newscasts in the time period. If a viewer in Wilkes Barre is watching Fox News, it's local. The news that viewer is consuming doesn't have to occur in their town for it to be relevant. News is entertainment. 11P newscasts don't compete only against other 11P newscasts. Audience fragmentation both to other television programming and to other media is an old story. Dayparts don't matter anymore.
Station executives who look at today's industry challenges from a (very) outdated perspective are on a one-way path to extinction. This morning's B&C story actually reads like it's from the 1980s.
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