Catching up on my DLTV and this popped up while Patrick Norton was showing off photos from NAB 2007.
This is the new Sky10, WPLG’s chopper, that should already be flying. It’s a Bell 407 with top speed of 170mph, recent upgrade to bring it in line with what the other stations have. Not sure if they were showing off something specific (HD gyrocam would be nice) or just having it there for people to fondle.
Monthly Archive for April, 2007
WPLG’s managing editor Alyssa Merlot quit abruptly yesterday (Tuesday 4/24) and is now at WFOR. According to tipsters she had a big argument with WPLG’s news director and just left - 2 days before May sweeps and with no advance notice. Alyssa Merlot was an assignment editor at WFOR before going to WPLG in 1999 so she’s got lots of experiences in the market.
Her first day with WFOR is April 30th.
One tipster pointed out that managing editors are the brains behind the news and lead the assignment desk, remains to be seen if it impacts WPLG, but it’s sort of a nice coup for WFOR to get someone local and experienced who knows the market.
Please join me in welcoming our new Managing Editor, Alissa Merlo.
Many of you know Alissa. She was an assignments editor here for four
years before going to WPLG.
There she’s been the Managing Editor since 1999.
Alissa brings experience, strong market knowledge and sources, and a
passion for excellence in journalism. She has a passion for winning.She graduated from Barry University in 1992. She lives in Coral Gables
with her two sons.Alissa is extremely excited about joining our team.
She told us, “I look forward to working with such a wonderful group of
people. I have worked with some of you in the past, and I look forward to
seeing, working, and meeting all of you. Together we will make a great team.”She starts Monday, April 30th
Local10 has began airing LATV on their 10.2 subchannel. LATV bills itself as a ‘Los Angeles-Based Bilingual Music and Entertainment’. Previously Channel 10 simulcasted their standart definition feed on 10.2
Hat tip Joe
Previously: WPLG To Air LATV
For those who have noticed Vivian Gonzalez has been doing the weather in the morning on weekends on WSVN. She’s one of the weather producers at 7 and *recently started to* fill in for Jonathan Novak whenever he has to work weekend evenings in place of Brent Cameron.
Apartment Therapy has a few snaps of the soon to be home for The New York Times. The new digs are not only modern but also green making maximum use of natural light as opposed to relying on electric lighting by having open glass design, automatic louvers to limit or increase natural light, dimming Lutron flourescents, air conditioning coming from the floor as opposed to the ceiling and managing the bottom 6′ where people actually need it.
And what looks like miles of Cat5e cabling
Apartment Therapy - The New NYTimes Building - NY Times building gallery
I missed this in all the spam but Sharon Melton is leaving WSVN heading back to Texas. Her last day at WSVN is this Sunday April 22nd
She’s originally from San Antonio, TX
Hat tip John
Update: Brandon in comments: Sharron is moving to KTRK the Houston ABC affiliate.
Miami Herald says she’ll anchor the weekday morning newscasts from 5-7am.
Nice promotion!
MiamiHerald Notables /bottom of page/
CNN’s Miles O’Brien hosted a live RTNDA opening session and had his 14 year old son join in via web cam. During live Q&A the boy was asked if he watched local news his reply? He doesn’t like local news - “all they talk about is murders and rapes and killings.â€Â
O’Brien’s daughter also made an appearance via webcam and she too was asked if she watched local news. “No,†she said. “It scares me.â€Â
In 5 years when these two, along with their peers, become the target demo we’ll be seeing news heads wondering again where have all the demo viewers gone.
Lost Remote - RTNDA opening session - interesting read
You have probably seen the ad with a shot of cash piled on a table while a voice tells you how the evil cable companies don’t want you to have choice and don’t want millions of Floridians to save millions of dollars on their cable bills. The commercial ends with “Paid for by TV4US” and a url www.wewantchoice.com
TV4US is an astroturf - a front group paid for by AT&T that makes advertising that looks like it’s made by consumer groups. AT&T is building a VDSL based video distribution service called Uverse to compete with Comcast and instead of negotiating franchise contracts with every town they, as Comcast had to, they are lobbying Florida and other states to let them have video franchise contracts directly from the state, skipping towns, and deploying their service faster.
This would be all fine and dandy, the ad makes you think that more choice equals lower fees, except that AT&T has stated their Uverse service won’t be competing with cable companies on price. Thus the money argument is rendered useless. AT&T wants elimination of city franchise commissions in favor of state ones and Comcast doesn’t want the competition and doesn’t like AT&T getting off easy.
By the way Comcast also has a front group running ads on local tv here in South Florida and other places, I forget what their name is but the ad usually runs first then followed by commercial for a Comcast service.
“The notion of competing just on price doesn’t make sense to us,†said Jeff Weber, AT&T’s vice president of product and strategy, who added that the company will not lead on price.
CommonCause.org - Telecom Front Groups and Astroturfing
CommonCause.org - TV4US - ‘corporate money not citizen power’
BroadbandReports - AT&T Won’t Compete on Price
XChangeMag - Evolving the U-verse ecosystem
Well WSVN have fixed whatever issues they had with the hardware and flipped the switch ON for stretch-o-vision dubbed such by HDTV enthusiasts. Also known as panoramic stretching, and non-linear stretching, it takes the corners of a 4:3 broadcast and stretches it to fit 16:9 format leaving the center intact but making for some funny looking anchors.
WPLG’s use of panoramic stretching has been hated by the local HDTV fanboys ever since the station began using it. Some of them outright blocking WPLG from their receivers while others going a step further and mentiong the b-word, as in boycott because according to them WPLG management isn’t listening to the presumed flood of complaints. Some emailed Laurie Jennings and Dwight Lauderdale telling them they look fat in panoramic mode and hoping for intervention but so far WPLG management is sticking to its decision.
The problem with panoramic stretching is that even if one uses their set top box or TV’s ability to scale video back to 4:3 the distortion is still happening unlike with anamorphic stretching which simply pulls a 4:3 picture to fit 16:9 format and is easily scaled back.
AVS Forum Miami HDTV discussion
Ay!
CBS announced today they are spreading their content on most video streaming services out there but even more cool is that Joost and CNET TV are on that list! All content will be free full length and ad support, each site will share 10% of ad revenue. CBS even has a fancy shmanzy name for it - CBS Interactive Audience Network. International audience will get clips instead of full length shows.
This can’t be happy news for local stations
The day SciFi and Discovery networks do this is when this house will be dropping Comcastic and taking our $2500 yearly bill on vacation to anywhere.
ARS Technica - Joost scores first deal with major broadcaster, CBS
PaidContent - It’s Official: CBS Launches Own Distribution Network; Includes Domestic And International
Shit! Bill O’s gum and glue isn’t holding well these days.
Joel Cheatwood, the guy who became known after saving WSVN in the 1980s from going extinct after the station lost its NBC affiliation is now the Vice President of development for Fox News and Fox Business Channel.
I guess they’re hoping he’s got some of that magic still in him but most in the industry will probably disagree given his track record after the two 7s
TV Week - CNN’s Cheatwood Jumps To Fox News
More on this Cheatwood guy after the jump
Some crazed idiot went after a woman, probably his wife, shooting her dead at the CNN Center in Atlanta. It happened on the lobby floor of the CNN building in Atlanta. CNN.com is based on the lobby floor and it’s employees were temporarily evacuated.
Jumped the gun on this one.
Brian Andrews is NOT leaving WFOR as I posted yesterday.
The “no one has seen him in two weeks” is because he was on vacation and on assignment at sea with the Navy.
Plus he’s got time left on his contract.
So apologies to Brian for “firing” him.
WNYW is letting visitors to their site sign up for email alerts when the station’s news chopper is flying and get a link to a live video stream from the helicopter! Cool
MyFoxNy - SkyFoxHD Alerts
I wrote a post I never published about this a few weeks ago when that police chase was going on down in Broward. I watched it on CNN Pipeline - they had a feed with audio from WSVN’s chopper. You could watch everything unfold live and uninterrupted, just Ralph Rayburn talking back to the control room from time to time. And I actually hurried up and turned the TV on to learn more. I though how it would be nice if the stations themselves offered live video from choppers on their websites it can be both interesting and informative if what’s happening is not during a time when a newscast is on. And it sure beats having to wait every 30 or 60 minutes for a 30second update!
I think at one time 7 had video with no audio from Skyforce mixed with traffic cameras when they weren’t streaming their live broadcasts.
15-minute Comment Bug
If you tried to post more than one comment in 15 minutes chances are you got the comment bug that sometimes wouldn’t go away. Apparently it wasn’t a bug in Wordpress but a feature (ha!) from K2.
I just got bit by it even though I was signed-in as admin and have commenting rights and what not.
So I removed this “feature” and you won’t be bothered by it, ’till I upgrade the script again at which time it may return.
So get your commenting on.