When I landed myself on the debate team proposing the motion ‘local television news is dead’, I was none too pleased. Why the hell would a roomful of trainee broadcast journalists want to argue that the medium in which many of them want to end up  is doomed?

Interestingly, ITV regions are following suit with the recent rebrand of network news, but this is surely set to be its last incarnation before it’s all change in 2012.

Suprisingly when it came down to the vote, our motion won. This can only be due to the fact that when you are realistic, the odds are stacked against local TV news as we know it.

Our main arguments were that a half hourly evening TV bulletin couldn’t dedicate enough time to the all stories in a particular ‘region’. Also as these regions were historically defined by the transmitting powers of telecommunication masts, why in the era of digital television should these boundaries still exist and be a constraint? TV news simply is not local enough (made clear when ITV merged their regions in 2008 to cut costs- as illustrated in ITN’s report below.)

We also argued that local TV news simply couldn’t keep up with the pace of 24 hour rolling news channels, the internet and ultra-local radio services. An interesting analogy comparing Radio output to TV output was introduced to us by one of our tutors the other week. Changing the course of a news programme on the radio can be extremely fast, like steering a speedboat; things can be changed last-minute, interviews can be arranged over the phone, people can get to the scene of the news and report straight away.

TV on the other hand is as nimble as trying to navigate a super tanker – with the complexity of providing pictures alongside audio, things need to be forward planned. Most of the local output you see on the news today was arranged yesterday – so is that news?

Our opponents countered the attack with the optimism that we all inherently must have or else we wouldn’t be shelling out thousands of pounds on training. People do value their local TV news service. It connects them with where they live, it lets them know what is happening, it gives them a sense of belonging. It is massively important to local democracy. At present, not everyone accesses their news online or on demand so there still is very much a need for it.

I’ve mentioned ITV’s position in 2012 when they will relinquish themselves of any public service broadcasting responsibilities, and the void that this leaves. I’ve also briefly mentioned the Independently Funded News Consortia for each region which are looking set to fill these shoes. This had promise to shake up the news service and start something new and innovative from scratch, yet I came across this interesting piece by Rob Williams on WalesHome.org.  He suggests that those bidding for the pilots may be regarding potential profit over and above a holistic overhaul to improve local news provision for the digital age.

I personally am not convinced that Newspaper groups muscling in on Radio and TV will provide a balanced news source, with the current interplay between the two being completely removed. It gives a great deal of editorial power to the news consortia at a local level, and I think this could mean a dangerous move towards more biased local broadcast news.

However, with a changing demographic and attitude with infinite choice in accessing information through the internet, local TV news as we know it is a dinosaur. Luckily for us, we’re being taught to be multi skilled and apparently cheap to employ.  Also, whether it gets transmitted on the TV or the internet, it still needs to be produced, so although local TV news may be on its way out, we shouldn’t have to be.

That’s a good job as I’ve not made it in yet.

We’ve been going through our video archives and decided to start posting some of our previous work. We plan on posting archival material during the weeks ahead, but we wanted to let you know about some of the items already at the Video Archive section.

There are three videos from a 2002 movie study, one that looks at Product Placement in Films, one that looks at Hyper-Sexual Content in Films and a third video that deals with Tobacco Use in Hollywood Films. We also have some youth produced counter-marketing ads that take on Big Tobacco.

The two videos that are highlighted here deal with the focus of much of GRIID’s work over the years. The first video is a piece we created based on a local TV story about cows that were roaming around in rural Kent County. It must have been a slow news day because all three of the GR-based TV stations covered it. The other featured video is the GRIID News Team talking about being addicted to watching local TV News.

Busy day in Utica, New York.

When I lived in the mountains of Upstate New York in the early 80’s, we didn’t get to watch much TV. Unless you lived in a lucky spot — or had a very tall rotating antenna — you got zero reception. Zero. Big C-band satellite dishes? That cost a few thousand dollars, which I didn’t have. When I did get a signal, I had one or two stations from Albany, and one from Utica.  The Utica station had three guys presenting the local news — all named Bill.

Local news departments are taking a hit in smaller markets. Take WYOU in the Wilkes-Barre/Scranton market. Broadcasting & Cable reports they’re shutting down:

The end of local news came quickly at WYOU in northeastern Pennsylvania. On the afternoon of Friday, April 3, the station announced that its news department had been dismissed, and that day’s newscasts would be the station’s last. “The viewers have spoken, letting us know that WYOU is the station they rely on for entertainment,” Dennis Thatcher, EVP/COO of station owner Mission Broadcasting, spun in a statement.

WYOU’s news ratings, or lack thereof, had spoken as well, with its household ratings consistently in the 1s. WYOU’s news, which was produced by Nexstar’s WBRE, clearly was not reaching much of an audience in Wilkes Barre-Scranton.

“It’s not like we weren’t trying,” says Thatcher, reeling off a list of attempts to invigorate local news. “I’m not so sure it came down to people not liking WYOU news. They just like WBRE’s and WNEP’s better.”

Operating in the #54 DMA, the CBS affiliate may be the highest profile station to scrap news in years, a move that saves Nexstar about $900,000 annually. But indications are it won’t be the last.

With local television going through the worst slump of most any broadcasting veteran’s career, station insiders say numerous groups are taking a hard look at underperforming news departments. While local news represents a hefty chunk of revenue, it increasingly doesn’t pay to keep a fourth-place outfit afloat.

Local TV news, like local newspapers, is something people will miss dearly if it went away.  Stations need to find a way to keep people tuned in, night after night. Or change the way you reach out to your audience. The station in Utica mentioned above is WKTV and they’ve come a long way since I watched last. You can find them  on Facebook and Twitter, too.

Change the way you present the news to your audience. Having your guests pass out on the air, however,  is not the way to go…

But... We Ruled the World... How Can It Ever End?

Clay Shirky’s recent column, “Newspapers and Thinking the Unthinkable,” has earned deserved attention among those of us pondering the question of what happens next, and whether the financial models of newspapering and making local TV news can survive the current economy.  Increasingly, it seems the answer to both questions is “no.”

It no longer seems like madness to suggest that what we’re living through isn’t the toughest times for local TV news as we know it, but rather, a revolution that will wash away the medium we grew up with, and usher in something different.  That’s scary stuff.

Shirky describes the insistence that newspapers must be saved this way:  “When someone demands to know how we are going to replace newspapers, they are really demanding to be told that we are not living through a revolution. They are demanding to be told that old systems won’t break before new systems are in place. They are demanding to be told that ancient social bargains aren’t in peril, that core institutions will be spared, that new methods of spreading information will improve previous practice rather than upending it. They are demanding to be lied to.

There are fewer and fewer people who can convincingly tell such a lie. “

Digital Guru Clay Shirky

That is meaty, heavy stuff, and it is as applicable, I believe to local TV news as it is to newspapers.  Anybody who refuses to believe that what we’ve spent our careers doing must continue to exist is at high risk of being rendered irrelevant.  And in TV, as in any business, irrelevant is noplace to be.

The save-the-papers debate, as Shirky points out, boils down to a journalistic truism:  newspapers put asses in seats at city council meetings, and get deeper into stories than local tv newsers have the luxury of doing.  They have more bodies to sift through overnight police reports and court filings.  They are essential to the survival of a healthy society.  If newspapers die, who will do that work?  Certainly not the “you’re live in the noon on the house fire” TV guy.  He’s lucky if he can grab a five-dollar footlong before he starts crashing for his 5 o’clock package.

“The newspaper people often note that newspapers benefit society as a whole. This is true, but irrelevant to the problem at hand; “You’re gonna miss us when we’re gone!” has never been much of a business model,” Shirky writes.  “So who covers all that news if some significant fraction of the currently employed newspaper people lose their jobs?  I don’t know. Nobody knows. We’re collectively living through 1500, when it’s easier to see what’s broken than what will replace it.”

Same again for TV.  It’s gut-check time.  Are you thinking about surviving the downturn?  Or figuring out what’s the new thing–and how to thrive doing it?

The Rocky Said Goodbye After 150 Years

Shirky writes:  “Society doesn’t need newspapers. What we need is journalism. For a century, the imperatives to strengthen journalism and to strengthen newspapers have been so tightly wound as to be indistinguishable. That’s been a fine accident to have, but when that accident stops, as it is stopping before our eyes, we’re going to need lots of other ways to strengthen journalism instead. “

Society doesn’t need the six o’clock local news either.  But it does need to know what’s happening.  We still have a job to do, it’s just a question of where, and who’s going to pay us.  That’s what I’m anxious to figure out, rather than answer the question of when the dry pipe in the sales department will start gushing cash again and all will be better.  That sounds more than ever like denial.

Time to Vote: the standupkid QUICK SHOW OF HANDS

What do you think, local newsers?  Is all this firing and cost-cutting just a way to keep companies afloat until the car dealers start spending again, and then we can travel, have our two-person crews and maybe even pay the photogs overtime once in a while?  Or, is it something bigger?  Is the economy merely accelerating a change that was already happening:  that the financial model that fueled local TV has changed, and local TV news will need to do what it’s doing now, and maybe a lot more, to find a new way to make profit, and stay relevant?

There’s a lot to talk about in the local tv biz these days, and most of it’s rather depressing.  In a sense, that’s what prompted by lovely fiancee to suggest, just two weeks ago, that I put up a blog to talk about what’s happening:  the scary stuff, but also the inspiring things that are right around the corner for those of us who are willing to experiment, be flexible, and believe.

5,000 Page Views Makes My Dad So Proud of Me!

Apparently, I’m not the only one.  In two weeks, this blog has had over 5,000 page views, and today, on a lowly Saturday, more people visited than on any other day:  nearly 500.  I am humbled–and excited.  I’ve heard from a lot of smart, insightful people and gotten to make connections in this business I didn’t have before.  I’ve been mentioned on sites I respect, gotten notes from well-known names who stunned me with word they’d been reading my stuff, and my baby blog even got a mention in the mighty New York Post.

I believe that if we share ideas, and stick together, we’ll not only get through this, but thrive.

So thanks for stopping by.  And please, pass the word to anyone who might want to join our conversation.

The longtime local news formula of news, weather and sports has been sliced by a third at KVVU/Las Vegas, where the weeknight sportscast has been sent to the showers. “The sportscast is not what the viewers come to us for, research has been telling us that for years,” KVVU news director Adam Bradshaw told reviewjournal.com’s Steve Bornfeld. “The economics of broadcasting dictate we put our resources in places where we’re going to get ratings.”

Bornfeld reports today KVVU will continue to cover sports, including weekend sportscasts.

The full cut comes after years of cutbacks in sports coverage, with some local news stations dialing back the daily sportscast to something in the “sports and scores in a minute” range, and putting sports photographers into the daily news shooting mix, and cutting sports reporters at many stations.

The emails poured in from local newsers at Gannett stations Wednesday as they reeled from the company’s latest effort to cut costs:  everyone’s getting a week off, without pay:   “Today Gannett is implementing a furlough program across all U.S. divisions and at corporate headquarters. This means that most of our U.S. employees – including myself and all other top executives – will be furloughed for the equivalent of one week in the first quarter. This furlough will be unpaid. Unions also will be asked to participate,” wrote Gannett CEO Craig Dubow in a memo to employees.

The upshot?  Everybody will take a week off, and they will not be paid.  The company calls it a “difficult decision.”  The cold facts came as tough reading for employees who will be asked to kick in a week’s pay to help Gannett:  “To be clear, a furlough means you will not work and will not be paid for furlough days.  Exempt, salaried employees must take one full payroll week within the payroll period.  Non-exempt, hourly employees may take five days at any pre-approved time before the last weekend in March.”

Wow.  A tough financial punch, and everyone’s taking it NOW. 

Gannett folk:  what’s the reaction inside your newsrooms?

Chicago’s air wars have gotten a lot less hardcore–with fewer birds in the air.  Phil Rosenthal’s Tower Ticker

WLS/Chicago's Chopper 7HD: Still Flying Solo

blog in the Chicago Tribune reports two Windy City stations have quietly teamed up–and grounded one of their pricey eyes in the sky.  ”Since New Year’s Day, NBC-owned WMAQ-Ch. 5 and Fox-owned WFLD-Ch. 32 have been sharing a single news helicopter and whatever video is shot from it,” Rosenthal reports.

The smaller air fleet flying over breaking news stories in Chicago comes on the heels of a growing relationship between NBC and FOX, with stations in Philadelphia experimenting with a video-sharing agreement to cut costs and avoid “duplication,” as the news suits like to call it.

But the one chopper, two station deal has its awkward side:  ”Weekday mornings from 5 to 7, Channel 5 can have a traffic reporter on board. That person can be replaced by a Channel 32 traffic reporter from 7 to 9 a.m. If news breaks during that time, the other station can run the video but not the reporting,” FOX’s Senior VP of News Operations at the FOX Television Stations Sharri Berg tells the Ticker.

Local news air warriors look at the deal as yet another scary sign of the times.  ”It just gets worse and worse,” says a veteran major market chopper vet.

One of the first comments to come my way after the debut of localtvnews was the idea that the “here’s your news, we picked the stories for you, and we’re feeding it to you at 6″ mentality just had to die.  Cable news proved that, largely spelling the end of the once mighty nightly network newscast.  Local news continues with the formula of morning, noon, evening and night as it fumbles around on the web searching for a winning formula.

David Carr may have the ultimate “a la carte” solution:  iTunes for news.  In a Monday morning post on nytimes.com, Carr devotes his The Media Equation column to the idea that beyond picking and choosing one’s own news stories, according to what you are truly interested in (perhaps it’s city hall, yes;  convenience store shootings, no–or, maybe, the other way around), the even more important solution to struggling local news operations is the business model:  you’re going to have to pay for it.  “Free is not a business model,” Carr quotes Craig Moffett of Bernstein Research.

As Steve Jobs revolutionized the world of music, perhaps someone will do the same for information–providing a platform for consumers to pick and choose exactly those stories they want to see, and are willing to pay for.  As local advertising giants like car dealers and department stores drastically scale back their spot TV spending, stations are suffering, cutting costs, and sending journalists packing.

Where’s our Steve Jobs?

Whether traditional television stations recover from the advertising setbacks that have forced layoffs for tv newsers from coast to coast, or some of those stations instead decide to eliminate their newsrooms, and send even more good people out of work, I know this much: we’re in this together.

Since I started this blog all of a week ago tonight, I’ve been jokingly called a “harbinger of doom” for noting the names of the reporters, anchors and other tv newsers who’ve been directly affected by the cost-cutting that’s having such a dramatic impact on the work we do and love. Many of my friends are among those who’ve lost jobs through no fault of their own. When it came right down to it, talent wasn’t the deciding factor. It was money.

At the same time, I remain exceptionally hopeful about our business. I believe that there will always be a market for a person who can tell a story, either with a microphone and a pad, a camera, or, yes, both. I’m curious to know what local tv news will look like in just five years. I want to talk to the smart people and share their insights right here on this blog.

And I guess I’m not the only one. In 7 days, this out-of-nowhere blog got nearly 2,000 page views, and I heard from a lot of folks, some good friends, others just people with an interest in television news, and the news in their town most of all. I hope to make this site a resource, not just to talk about “doom,” but to brainstorm about what might be, for all of us, an exciting future, telling stories in ways we never imagined.

Thanks for reading the blog, and thanks for sharing your thoughts. I can’t tell you how happy it made me to read a Facebook message from Brendan Keefe, who wrote, “I had no idea this website was new! It’s great. Suddenly I’m the most informed guy in the newsroom when it comes to what’s happening in the business.”

Doesn’t get much better than that. Thanks, everybody. (Now I’ve really gotta bolt… “24″ is on and I gotta watch me some Jack.

So, I must again state how much I LOVE Shoparooni.  I stopped in again today.  It was only my second visit.  God, it is soooooo good that they aren’t open during lunch, my wallet couldn’t take it.

They had this shirt hanging on the wall and I HAD to have it.

Is this shirt tit-rrific or what? (Maybe it's boob-tastic. Or um, nipple-nificant. No, that last one doesn't work)

I’m sure you see how I would have a deep need for this shirt. Hilarious and it makes my boobs look huge! Hooray!

So, one of the guys at work was trying to say that this shirt was an homage to 70s cop flicks because the bad guys in said movies always had a moustache.  Didn’t EVERYONE have a moustache in the 70s? (My older brother still has a bad 70s moustache.  But the best part of that is that he’s not old enough to have had a 70s ’stache in the 70s! You could smuggle Mexicans in his ’stache!  It’s awful.  I often wonder what he’s hiding under there.  You know what, I don’t want to know).  And, the guy from work is trying way too hard to explain something that just shouldn’t be explained.  The statement on the shirt is absurd and that is why it is funny.  Nothing more should be read into it.  I think I need to wear this shirt to Cinco de Moustache.

So, in addition to this shirt, I bought a plush poop.  I’m saving it for a Christmas gift for one of my friends.  It is sooooo cute.  I like giving strange gifts.  If I buy someone a really strange gift, I really like that person.  If I buy you something normal, something one can buy at a normal store (like Target), then I probably wasn’t trying too hard.  If I take the time to find something bizarre, then I care.

The last time I was at Shoparooni, I bought a plush moustache.  I was talking to my husband’s aunt who has to be in her late 60s, and she kept saying, “you know where you have to put that moustache,” and winking.  So, even though I’m over the whole let-me-find-weird-places-to-put-my-plush-moustache-and-take-a-picture thing, this is in honor of my old man’s aunt.

I also bought a pair of Hello Kitty guitar pick earrings.  I can make my own guitar pick earrings, and mine are cooler because I use Swarovski crystals and other beads (hey, I like shiny shit) but I don’t have holographic Hello Kitty guitar picks.  So, I shelled out the cash for the earrings.  I love Hello Kitty.  It is definitely an illness.  If I ever find out who infected me, well, bitch is going down!

And I couldn’t help it, they had Kid Robot shake-a-tongue toy cars.  I know that I said that I wasn’t going to start buying these things because I’d get all wrapped up in buying them, but I think I can cope.  Shake-a-tongue cars are these little funky figures that you can pull back and release and they will go forward.  I’m sure that there’s a term for this, but, screw it, I’m not looking it up.  They come in little, sealed boxes, so you don’t know which one you got until after you buy it.  It’s awesome.  It’s those little things, like having to wait to see which toy was picked, finding funky shirts that really don’t make sense, finding bizarre frivolous things, just doing fun, carefree things that keep me young, renew my sense of humor and good spirit.

Aside from Shoparooni and me, one of the best things about Cleveland is the Cleveland Scene. It’s a weekly free periodical.  Every city has at least one of these (there were about 4 in Montreal.  Ah Montreal, how I miss you.  You were the fairest city to which I have ever been.  Your downtown is magnificent, the shopping was too cool for words, and Old Montreal just blew my mind.  So much food, so many art galleries, so much alcohol, so many cool stores – Zara! – so many restaurant patios, so many flowers, so many homeless people camping out in front of the cathedrals at night.  If it weren’t for the harsh winters, I would seriously have to consider moving to Montreal.  I can’t wait to go again).  But, maybe I’m biased, I really love the Scene.  I love the goofy comics, and there are quite a few for such a small paper, the news articles are sometimes a little off-base (sometimes the articles seem to be  the aftermath of a few too many Red Bulls and late night X-files reruns – writers are looking for conspiracies where there are none), but that’s what makes it so good. Besides, most of the articles are on par with the merde that’s in our “real” paper.  Oh yes, paper, singular.  Cleveland Ohio only has ONE daily paper.  It’s despicable, discouraging.  At least I can read the New York Times online. So, I have much love for the Scene.  I’m certainly not going to watch that crap they call the evening news (or the morning news, or the late night news) to find out what’s going on in my community.  I don’t want to be scared.  I don’t want to see some moron getting all sweaty with desperation as they try to get the viewers interested in the “life-threatening” bacteria on the bottom of women’s purses.  Dear god, why does anyone care? Are there women who are preparing food on the bottom of their purses.  How is this supposed to be informational?  Oh well, as I was saying, I like the Scene.  They list the upcoming shows at the little local art galleries (this is something that Cleveland has a lot of, little, tiny art galleries/studios.  I’ve lived here my whole life, and until I payed attention to the art section – not sure that it’s called art, might be called culture or something – I never realized how rich Cleveland is in art galleries/artist studios.  I love Kokoon Art Gallery.  There are several other galleries in the same building and they get together and have open house weekends every so often.  It’s an amazing thing.  And if it weren’t for the Scene, running an article about a special art exhibit at Kokoon, I would never have found that gallery or the other galleries in the Gordon Arts District.  So, for that, I will be a loyal reader for as long as I can find copies.

I’m actually watching the news.  I NEVER watch the news.  What does it say about the target audience that the past three consecutive commercials are about bodily fluids/excrement?  WTF?!?!

I guess it’s not as bad as one Friday night when I was sitting around with a few friends watching FOX on a Friday night (see, just another example of what a party animal I am).  I hardly ever watch live TV (except when my kids are watching Spongebob or something like that), so I’m always amazed by the commercials because I generally fast forward through them.  So, I’m sitting around and I can’t even remember what show we were watching.  And the first commercial I see is this cartoon ant walking along and an elephant steps on the ant.  Then the ant lifts up the elephant foot.  During this, the voice over is giving little factoids about the strength of ants.  But the commercial is for tampons.  WTF do ants and elephants have to do with tampons? My friends, who were all guys, said that the point of the commercial was to remind women not to put ants in their vaginas.  That makes as much sense as anything.  I’ll go with that.  The next commercial, immediately following the ill-advised tampon commercial, was for toilet paper.  It was another animated commercial and it was talking about having toilet paper that couldn’t get all the poo off your bum.  Again WTF?!?! There were bears with poo-encrusted bums (the poo -bums weren’t shown, just implied through the voice over).  I wasn’t aware that bears even used toilet paper.  But if they do, and they can’t get all the poo off their bums with their normal brand of toilet paper, I hope they were watching FOX that Friday night because there’s a product for them.  Actually, I should have those bears talk to my dogs because, between the two of them, I always have at least one dog with a poo-encrusted bum.

Anyway, I can’t wait until this election is over.  I want results and I want them now.  But I can’t watch this insipid crap that the networks are showing and trying to pass off at news.  I talked to my dad today and before I said goodbye, I asked him if he voted for Obama.  And that old geezer started going on about 1) how Obama was lying when he said that he could bring change, 2) that there are very few honest politicians, but McCain was one of them, 3) Sarah Palin is soo smart (just because you want to bang her and she wears glasses DOESN’T MAKE HER SMART! She appears to be an IDIOT, and embarrasment to intelligent working moms everywhere. Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr.  When that old man is busying shitting himself, I’m not going to do a good job wiping his ass!!!!).  Old people, can’t live with them, can’t make them take their meds.

I love all the satire stuff about the election.  One of the funniest things I saw was this skit on Frank TV (Frank Caliendo’s sketch comedy show).  It starts with a bright white light and Frank, as John McCain, talking.  Then Frank/John starts slowly walking forward and you start to see the eyes and a vague outline of Frank/John.  And when you, the viewer, are finally able to see Frank/John clearly, he doesn’t have much more color to him then the white background.  He’s dressed in white and his face is whiter (but not by much) than the real McCain, but the effect is hilarious.  And the slogan is to “Keep the White House White” and Fank/John proclaims himself the whitest candidate running for president.  It’s hilarious (and would be much more funny if there weren’t people actually voting for McCain simply because he’s white).

I love the bloggers on Cracked.com.  And one of the blogs is called “Campaign 2008: The Year in Pictures“. Go check it out, it’s great.  The best three things in this blog are 1) the pictures of Obama with increasingly large birds perched on his finger, 2)  the picture of McCain with the old guys in the balcony from the Muppet Show (who are named Waldorf and Stadler, just in case you were wondering – I have a really good reason for knowing this), and 3) the blimp for Ron Paul, who, we are assured, is running for president and is completely sane.  I sent the Cracked link to a friend at work, who also picked the Ron Paul blimp as the most notable photo.  Maybe this photo stuck out for us because neither one of us is completely sane (but really, is anyone completely sane?  & I’m going to blame all the chemical fumes in the air at work if we are insane. Go ahead, prove me wrong ).

I want/need an Obama win.  I know he will win the popular vote, it’s more of a question about how far the Republican supporters will go to steal the election (again).  However, I know a few rather unpleasant people who swear they’re leaving the country if McCain wins.  If only my 401K could survive another Republican president, I would be willing to take a McCain win to get rid of the unpleasant people (but you know those people are just getting my hopes up.  They said the same thing during the Bush/Kerry election, but those lying f^&*ers are still here).

I’m still watching the election results.  If I see one more sensationalistic commercial for my local news, I’m going to scream.  I swear these are true.  One says that turning your heat on this winter could turn your home into a bomb.  It’s apparently warning about natural gas line corrosion causing gas leaks.  But WTF?!? That’s not journalism, that’s just lazy merde.  This is why I don’t watch the news.  The other commercial that’s pissing me off has the same type of tough talking voice over, but, again I swear this is true, it’s about whether or not the aqua globe (yes, that stupid thing that you fill with water and stick in your house plants) are effective.  The voice over says something like ‘they say the aqua globe will water your plants but are they worth the money’ with the same intensity as the exploding house story.  Come on.  Grrrrrrrrr.  My local tv news is just as amateurish as my print news (check out the local paper’s great ad slogan.  Cheers to the dorks who came up with that).

It sure seems like NBC is beginning to recognize that local broadcast’s days are numbered, as indicated by the planned November launch of a 24-hour local cable news channel by their NY affiliate. NBC local media President John Wallace attributed this move to local broadcast’s “slow-growth,” “eroding and aging” audiences, and the “perception” that it might not be a “sustainable business long term.” Translation: he thinks local broadcast is dead — when all media converge onto the Internet, the networks will no longer need to run their profitable prime time programming through local broadcast stations, leaving affiliates’ self-originated local news as their most obvious business to cling to.

Unfortunately, NBC has not factored in how the New Media are changing news audiences’ habits. Also dying with local broadcasting will be the importance of metro area-wide news. It had never been a consumer choice, but a limitation of broadcast technology. Now with the Internet, viewers will begin to consume more news that directly affects their lives – news of family and friends, their neighborhoods and communities, local shopping, kids’ schools, local roads, vocations, and avocations. So, just at a time when consumers will be losing interest in metro area-wide news, NBC will be offering a lot more of it – 24 hours worth. In football terms, NBC is going wide when they should be going deep (H/T: Lost Remote).

I grew up wanting a Jeep.  To have a rag top that could drive up the side of a mountain seemed to me to be the ultimate freedom.  I remember when I was 23, I was looking at a used Laredo…  The price was right and I was ready to sign on the dotted line till I called the insurance company for a quote and they wanted something like three grand a year to insure it.    I remember asking the nice lady on the phone why the cost was so high and her asking me in response “Why do you need a Jeep in the city ?  Are you going to drive over curbs ?”.   My first lesson in what it’s like to be held down by the man!

So…  I waited and eventually was “Old” enough to afford my Jeep Wrangler Sahara and in the three years I owned it, I got to take it out on the dry lake bed near Zzyxz, California  and only drove over one curb in West L.A.

Then the policies of the current administration began to bear fruits (to the Oil Companies anyway) and gas hit around $2.25 per gallon my 70 mile per day at 18 miles per gallon commute got pricey.  So I sold the Jeep and traded up to a Mini Cooper Convertable.  A really fun car to drive and at nearly 30 Miles Per Gallon cut my commute costs in half.  And it was good… for awhile…

As I drove home tonight, Gas at the local Unocal 76 station was topping out at $ 4.11 per gallon.  I can’t imagine what the poor truck drivers are going through, with Diesel at $ 4.49 at the same station.  It is spinning out of control faster than a helicopter without a tail rotor and the government of the people, by the people and for the people has us all on hold while they take the call from the executives of the oil companies.  (But I’m sure if we leave a message at the beep, someone will get back to us eventually…)

While I would really like to see someone in government service actually serve the broader good and consider acting in the public interest with the elimination of corporate welfare during the all time greatest profit season the oil companies have ever seen, I’m realistic enough to know that there is absolutely no hope for change (if there ever will be) till after whatever the hell it is that is going to happen in November happens…  (After all, King George is either so out of touch or so comfortable lying to our faces that he played dumb when asked about gas prices approaching $ 4.00 at a press briefing!)

So for today, I am going to direct my abundant outrage on those who have historically expected to speak truth to power on our behalf.  That’s right…  The fourth estate…  The free press.

For a democracy to remain healthy, it needs a free and impartial press to question those in power.  After all, you and I won’t get the chance to ask The President what the fuck he is thinking when he does stupid shit like a little irish jig for the cameras while waiting for John McCain to show up.   After all, the press is sitting in the room with him and it is their job to remind him that he works for us and he should stop being such an idiot in public!

So I am most frustrated when I find myself watching the “Reporter” for the local news (and I work at a local TV station, so trust me I watch A LOT!) standing at the corner gas station, sticking a microphone in the face of some poor schmuck who is pumping $ 75 into his S.U.V. and asking him how he feels about rising gas prices…   This question is obvious, stupid and it does nothing to inform us.

I want that reporter to walk into the station and ask the Manager when he got his last fuel delivery, when he is due to get his next fuel delivery and assuming the answers to the former isn’t just a few minutes ago… then why the fuck did the price at the pump go up five cents since we started this conversation ?

When the price of crude oil goes up a buck a barrel on the market today, it doesn’t magicially become gasoline in the pump in real time.  It has to be shipped and refined and delivered and… Well you get it.  The cost of the gas already in the tank at the station hasn’t changerd any more that the cost of the gas in your car tank doesn’t change while you are driving (although I’m sure that given the chance, a little man from the oil company would come to your window at the next red light and shake you down for five more bucks every few blocks if he thought he could get away with it.

There is a serious scam going on here and we are getting dick’d around by it.  So what do you say we start to hold all of them accountable!  

If enough of us make sure that the politicians know that you will hold them personally accountable when Exxon produces their next world record breaking quarterly profit while government gives them tax credits, they might have to listen.  It is an election year after all and it is really easy to get the message to them because they each have the same damn web site hosted on the same damn server with the same damn pull down menus with the pre-configured topics for communicating with their constituency.

And Please make sure that the Local TV news know that you aren’t going to consume their useless products if they don’t start providing something of substance.  The airwaves are a public trust and the May sweeps rating period is about to begin!

Listen…  If it costs me half a “C-Note” to fill my little Cooper each week, it has to be killing you folks driving the GM Tahoes and Hummers.  

It’s time to get off the couch and get pissed off people!  A little revolution every so often is not such a bad thing!

So what do you think ?   What is your point of no return when it comes to fuel costs ?  And what are you going to do when you hit that wall ?

Once upon a time, local TV stations offered the only way we could see video of news events outside our metropolitan areas. But then came cable TV. Then the Internet. And now, even the affiliates’ own networks are beginning to bypass them, allowing viewers to watch news videos on the web. Worse yet, weather reports — a staple of local news — are being supplanted by the Internet’s superior, in-depth, on-demand forecasts.

This has left these stations with an impossible task — finding local news that is of interest to just about everyone in a metropolitan area. But, for the most part, this news simply does not exist. Metro area audiences live in different municipalities, school districts, and communities, and they work for multitudes of employers. Almost nothing that can be reported on a metropolitan level directly impacts the lives of most in their audiences.

So, local TV news has little choice but to become local TV entertainment, with stories that appeal to those sometimes unfortunate common denominators that unite the masses. Sports news is entertainment. Panda bears born in our local zoos, as parodied by Will Ferrell as Ron Burgundy in the movie Anchorman, is entertainment. And then there is entertainment for our prurient interests. If it bleeds it leads, because morbid curiosity is a sick part of our human nature. The kidnapping of pretty blonds is titillating. Gossip about the rich, famous, and successful makes us feel better about our mediocre lives. As Skeptic.com notes, a story that shocks us because it is so unrepresentative of the world as it is becomes even more likely to be reported than a story that accurately depicts the world, as news purports to do. All in all, it is becoming as difficult for local TV news to “stay classy” as it was for anchorman Ron Burgundy to say it. (H/T: Dan Wismar)

A report from the New York Post ought to send a chill down the spine of every local TV affiliate. This fall, their networks are pushing aggressively to place more of their fresh programming on the web. Downloadable. On-demand. Free. Embedded with advertising. And, across as many platforms as possible, such as YouTube, iTunes, Yahoo!, AOL, MSN, Comcast, MySpace, Joost, Bebo, Sling Media, and their own sites. For affiliates, every viewing of such material will be an audience member lost and ad revenues denied. Networks are completely running around the network-to-affiliate-to-household broadcasting system that has supported local TV affiliates for decades.

Local affiliates once had a profitable lock on that “last 50 miles” that networks could not bridge between their long-range transmissions to metro areas and the short-range broadcasts into households. But now that networks can stream their content directly into households over the Internet, what is keeping them from completely eliminating the affiliates as middlemen? Two things. First, most households do not yet have sufficient bandwidth and systems to handle large video files, particularly those in high definition. Second, it is less pleasant to view web-based entertainment that relies on “lean forward,” PC technologies (small screen, keyboard/mouse) than “lean back,” TV technologies (large screen, relaxing in a living room environment, remote control in hand).

No doubt the bandwidth problem will be solved sooner rather than later through some combination of increased throughput and buffering technologies that finesse download times. And technologies that bridge that “last 50 feet” between PC’s and TV’s are almost at hand. What will be left will be superior on-demand TV from networks vs. inferior, old-fashioned appointment viewing (in-person or TiVo) from local affiliates. So, the only foreseeable solution is for local affiliates to transform themselves into masters of their own fate as full-time creators of original content, which for most means local and hyperlocal news. The networks are encroaching. The clock is ticking.

Our hearts go out to the families of the four who died Friday when two Phoenix TV news helicopters collided while covering a high-speed police chase. They lost their lives engaged in an activity that represents the best of what local TV stations have been doing for many years – striving to give TV viewers exactly what they want, as best as it can be provided, in a spirited competition with other local channels. Unlike many newspapers, local TV stations have always acknowledged that giving their audiences exactly what they want is a noble pursuit, even if it leads them toward the sensational. Also unlike most newspapers, local TV stations have, out of necessity, embraced competition, and have labored to make their news products more and more uniquely appealing to their audiences. This culture of customer-orientation, competition, and continuous improvement will give local TV affiliates an edge over local newspapers when all media have converged onto the Internet, and each is just one mouse click away.

As much as I love WGRZ’s weatherman, Kevin O’Connell he needs to keep his mouth shut a little more often.

After last night’s 11pm airing of the emotional story of a woman with cerebral palsy who found purpose in her life after hearing the Goo Goo Dolls’ “Better Days” they move on to weather and O’Connell goes into some tangent about how on rainy days like today he likes to listen to this one song by the Carpenters.

He does this way to often. You’re very lovable, Mr. O’Connell but just stick to the weather. Kthxbye.

Please note that the title of this post is in jest regarding Murray Light’s commentary in Sunday’s (Jan. 15th) edition of The Buffalo News.

If you haven’t read his piece yet, do that. You should be able to access it at www.buffnews.com or take a look at the paper itself. It’s on Page H-3.

Anyways, Light seems to be implying that elected officials in Erie County made some mistakes last year during their well-documented fiscal crisis because of “the pressures of Channel 2.”

Whatever. While I didn’t always agree with their presentation and approach to the investigation of the county’s fiscal woes, Channel 2 did something that virtually every other local news media outlet – including The Buffalo News – failed to do in years past: they did their homework, actually read the budget, asked the “tough questions” and paid attention to the business at hand for the Erie County Legislature.

Light also says in his editorial that County Executive Joel Giambra, who he correctly points out was a prime target of Channel 2 with their constant coverage of Giambra’s ”friends and family plan,” recommended restoration of some budget cuts that never should have been made.

In my mind, Light is missing the point – this isn’t about Channel 2 and their “red jacket reporters.”  The cuts that were debated and the employees laid off happened because JOEL GIAMBRA, JOE PASSAFUIME, NANCY NAPLES, THE ENTIRE ERIE COUNTY LEGISLATURE AND OTHER COUNTY OFFICIALS TOO NUMEROUS TO MENTION DID NOT DO THEIR JOBS !

And what is he getting at – that Channel 2 was a bunch of meanies and gruff thugs who forced our elected leaders to make decisions? What does that mean, that Scott Levin, Maryalice Demler, Scott Brown and the rest of the on-air folks at Channel 2 threatened them in some way? Why did it have to take an aggressive news department to wake everyone up?

And why would Channel 2 and the other local media entities - including the other local TV news stations, the news department and talk show hosts on WBEN-930AM, The Buffalo News, The Beast, Artvoice, blogs such as www.buffalopundit.com, and the various WNY weekly newspapers - have to cause our elected officials to make rush judgements and quick decisions? Aren’t they supposed to be constantly working on long range planning and computing county finances so we know where we stand fiscally for years to come? Just because Channel 2 did some hard-hitting stories during sweeps week that bruised some egos and revealed some facts, that helped the problem fester? I’m not buying that.

It’s just frustrating that we now have the former editor of the only daily newspaper in town siding with Giambra, George Holt, Ray Dusza and the like in saying that the media is to blame.

It’s a bunch of crap. They are to blame – they messed up big time and Channel 2 is only reporting on the mess and failed clean up.

 Thanks to Shaggy for getting me going on this – I’m sure he and others will post their thoughts, some which may or may not agree with me.

Don’t blame Channel 2 – blame the elected officials who did a bad job in office. And them blame US – the taxpayers of Erie County – for electing, and in many cases, repeatedly re-electing them into office.

I give credit to Satish Mohan, the supervisor of the Town of Amherst, for bringing up some key issues that will likely be discussed before a large crowd Tuesday night at the next meeting of the Amherst Town Board.

Instead of just accepting how things are currently done because “that’s the way we always have done them,” Mohan has opened up some new avenues in discussing how a local government is run on a day-to-day basis and essentially governs the township.

Is everything that Mohan has thrown out on the table – including term limits for town officials, cuts in overtime and downsizing the total number of employees who work for the town – going to fly or is even legal? Probably not, but that doesn’t mean you can’t talk about this things. Having an open mind and “thinking outside the box” is needed everywhere, not just in Amherst.

If every newly elected school board, town board, village board and city council members asked “why do we do it this way?” the way Mohan is maybe we could really do what needs to be done in this community - “right-size” all governments, from the county level all the way down to our local towns and villages and school districts.

I don’t want to hear people say “Mohan is nuts” or “doesn’t he realize we can’t do that?” because he is acting courageously and thinking about and looking out for his constituents.

Tuesday night should be very interesting. Look for all four of the local TV news stations as well as WBEN-930AM and WNED-970AM to have reporters at that session and the meeting room should be packed to the gills with curious residents, union officials and town employees.

Let’s both encourage and applaud this type of thinking from ALL of our elected officials.

Kevin Hardwick, the Canisius College political science professor who hosts a one-hour talk show each Sunday morning on WBEN-930AM, named Random Thoughts 101 as his “web site of the week.”

I’m truly honored, shocked, happy and flattered to receive the recognition. Having listened to Kevin’s show since it debuted last year and hearing what he’s had to say when speaking as a ”political expert” on Channels 2, 4, 7 and 49 and WBEN, I think we have the same mindset on certain issues when it comes to local happenings, current events, politics, Buffalo-based sports teams, etc.

Of course Kevin is much more intelligent than I am.

And he makes a lot more money than I do.

And he probably would be designated as being better looking than I (I’ve never appeared on all four local TV news stations over a 24-hour time period.)

The guy knows his stuff. And he knows a decent blog when he sees one  

Seriously, thanks to Kevin for showing me some ”love” and thanks most importantly to the readers and contributors of the blog.

 Bigger and better things are in store, especially involving working and interacting with the good folks over at www.wnymedia.net

Thanks also to Alan over at www.buffalopundit.com and some of the other Buffalo area bloggers for noting on their blogs about Kevin recognizing Random Thoughts 101.

Keep providing feedback – positive or negative – I really appreciate that.  

I just checked two minutes ago and Channel 4 is carrying the game show “Price Is Right.” What the hell is going on over there?

Channel 2 and Channel 7 are carrying the Bills press conference live – good call. Channel 4 is dropping the ball big time.