Monthly Archive for August, 2008

And So It Ends….

Published
by
Alex
on 8/31/2008
in Local Media and departures
. 4 Comments

The CW news at 10 ended tonight at 10:30PM. I’m working on getting video, but it was rather funny seeing how “upset” everyone was over it. The CW news at 10 was always more of a chore then anything. The ratings and graphics suck, but still beat the “My 33 News @ 10.”  There was really no mention of the CW news ending, until that last segment.

My favorite, Joel Connable ended it by saying:

“Before we go tonight, we have some news that has to do with us. This is the last newscast that you’ll see us anchoring and producing on the CW news at 10 o’clock. Thank you for welcoming us into your home for the past several years, and remember though for all your news and information you need, we’re just a few channels away on NBC6, we of course, will see you there.”

Makes me a tad upset to think that he may be saying that exact same line in about a year if the Post Newsweek deal goes through. But anyways, during the whole “goodbye” speech Joe Rose kept making witty comments about “how upset he is and never saw this coming”, and just wants to do “a couple more shows just for the practice.”  Joel also poked fun about how he had to announce 20 times in a row that Rihanna’s song, “Umbrella” was number one.

So Joel, John, and Joe, this is for you:

See you on NBC6!

NBC Makes You Feel Important

Published
by
Alex
on 8/31/2008
in Local Media and Site News and Comments
. 3 Comments

 

Congratulations! NBC has selected you… yes YOU to be a NBC Universal Panel Member! Before you tell me to “stfu” and to “get out of town”, you might be interested in knowing that everyone can be on this prestige panel.  So, Panel Member (insert your name here), what are your new responsibilities? Answer about 20 questions about your TV viewing habits and Internet usage, give them your e-mail address, and bam, that’s it! Now you may bask in your new title as panel member, and brag to all of your friends. Make sure to let the police officer know when you get pulled over that, “I don’t know if this will get me out of anything but i am, after all, an NBC panel member.” Have fun!

-Panel member Alex

In all seriousness, this is a local media poll NBC O&O stations put up on their sites. NBC has national polls as well for news and other shows. Here’s another one to help you with that poll “street cred”

This is gonna get bad…

Published
by
Alex
on 8/30/2008
in Local Media, Media Headlines and Site News and Comments
. 5 Comments

I don’t often say this, but this looks bad. Hurricane Gustav stares down the Gulf Coast looking to be a category five and make landfall as a category four.  I’m not going to go all religious on you, but just keep all of the residents and families in your thoughts. This feels different then Katrina. We know how strong this is and the general direction it’s going. We 100% know it’s going to be bad.  Again, keep them in your thoughts.

 

On to what forecasters are calling “Gustav’s little sister”, Tropical Storm Hanna. Who the heck knows where this thing is going. Basically every forecast model shows it going in a different direction. I guess we’ll worry about that when our local weather guessers can tell us where it’s going.

Here we go again…

Obama Speech Beats Idol Ratings

Published
by
admin
on 8/29/2008
in Local Media
. 12 Comments

TV Decoder says Obama’s convetion speech got 38.3 million viewers beating the American Idol finale, Olympics opening ceremony and the Oscars.

Nielsen included all the broadcast networks, msnbc, cnn, fox news, bet, TV One but does not include PBS or C-SPAN. PBS averaged 3.5 million viewers between 8 and 11pm. Which would put the ratings at 41.8 million viewers.

Awesome, perfect reason to kill American Idol now.

Alex Trebek Uncensored

Published
by
admin
on 8/29/2008
in Bloopers and Videos
. 1 Comment

Just don’t watch this at the office on speakers. You’ve been warned

WPTV Got the Renderon Touch

Published
by
admin
on 8/27/2008
in Local Media and graphics
. 6 Comments

Some wondered who did WPTV’s new graphics package. It was Renderon.

WPTV’s new boss Steve Wasserman, who headed WDIV in Detroit, also commissioned Renderon for that station’s WDIV’s graphics which are backed by music from WSVN’s Chris Crane.

Some frameshots below courtesy of Dan from Renderon

CW News at 10

Published
by
Alex
on 8/27/2008
in Local Media and departures
. 6 Comments

Say goodbye to the CWSFL News at 10. CW didn’t want NBC6 to continue doing their 10pm news, so August 31st will be the last newscast. Ratings sucked anyway but it still beat the “My33 News at 10.” The weekday producer of the CW newscast is a former intern with no other news experience. He is now the 6pm producer for NBC.  The 6pm producer has been moved to the 11am slot. It is still unknown if other people will be moved or laid off since many people work under CW employment deals.

 

Update: So i looked at my DirectTV guide today. I hope you love Raymond! “Everybody Loves Raymond” is now in the 10PM slot, weeknights on WSFL.

Update: So tonight is the last night.  Catch Joel and the gang, tonight at 10 for the last time on the CW.

Bloggers, and Bloggers, and Bloggers, Oh My!

Published
by
Alex
on 8/26/2008
in Site News and Comments
. 0 Comments

500 of them at the Democratic convention.

“The 8,000-square-foot “tent” is two stories of reinforced canvas packed with tables, chairs, plugs, screens, wiring, bad lighting, and a critical mass of overstuffed, worn-through comfy couches and pillows. Just beyond the white curtain, you can pick up a smoothie or a 10-minute massage at no charge, courtesy of Google, a Big Tent sponsor. Others sponsors include Digg, EcoDrivingUSA, InterfaceFLOR, Meru Networks, Floorz, Moveon.Org, DemWire, Daily Kos, Progress Now, Alliance for a Sustainable Future, Service Employees International Union, Human Rights Campaign, PickensPlan.com, the Sunlight Foundation, and Alliance for a Sustainable Colorado, to name a few. The restaurant chain Chipotle, another sponsor, is helping to provide 600 free lunches and dinners.

Of the 3,000 bloggers who requested credentials for the Big Tent, 500 were granted. Most are liberal or progressive blogs, but Big Tent organizers said they tried for diversity: The conservative Heritage Foundation in Washington was offered two credentials for bloggers, for instance, but took only one.”

 

I’d like 10-minute massages courtesy of Google! All we get from them is adds to put up. :-(

Read more here.

/image courtesy of the above link/

Danielle Knox on Lifetime Program

Published
by
admin
on 8/26/2008
in Local Media
. 4 Comments

Many have asked whatever happened with Danielle Knox who left WFOR amidst the changes that were taking place well here’s a bit of info.

According to this press release Danielle will be on Lifetime’s The Balancing Act this morning at 7am to interview the creators of a shapewear product called Slimpressions.

The PR also notes that Danielle now has her own company, Play Pretty Beauty, “a natural-based organic bath and body care company.”

No Bogert For You!

Published
by
Alex
on 8/25/2008
in Local Media
. 34 Comments

If you’re a Republican, you are now officially allowed to speculate about NBC6’s political coverage.  As many of you know, WTVJ is only sending political reporter Nick Bogert to the Democratic convention.  NBC6 will just use the network reporters at the Republican convention.

 The NBC6 news director, who is a well known supporter of Barack Obama said “the real show is in Denver.” Is it right for NBC6 to not equally cover each parties?.. or is this just simple budgeting and NBC not wanting to spend the money to fly Bogert around? You decide.

Formal Petition Against WTVJ Sale Filed

Published
by
admin
on 8/24/2008
in Local Media and WTVJ Sale
. 4 Comments

This from the Save WTVJ Blog

Miami attorney JB Harris announced today that he would file a formal petition with the FCC to stop the proposed sale of Miami television station WTVJ (NBC6) by owner NBC Universal to rival Post-Newsweek Stations, which owns and operates Miami’s WPLG (Channel 10).

The petition is being filed on behalf of a Coalition of Concerned Citizens for Competition and Fairness in Broadcast Journalism, headed by William McCormick, former President of the Fort Lauderdale NAACP.

The petition is 14 pages long!

I guess when someone said there was a grassroots effort to stop the merger they were not kidding.

We wish them success.

Press release for petition filing

WPTV’s Big Olympic Numbers

Published
by
admin
on 8/24/2008
in Local Media and ratings
. 0 Comments

The Palm Beach Post notes that WPTV ranked No.1 station in the country for the Beijing Olympics with an 8.0 rating 0.2 ratings points ahead of KFOR-Oklahoma City and KSL-Salt Lake City which tied for number 2.

Then from 11 to 11:15pm on Saturday when Michael Phelps competed for his 8th gold medal WPTV had 50 share! As in 50% of Palm Beach and Ft. Pierce counties were tuned to Channel 5.

Unfortunately there may not be much fire in the “money demo”. The article quoted WPTV’s programming director Bernadette O’Grady who attributed the big ratings to large number of “elderly retirees”, “kids at home” and people home from work due to Tropical Storm Fay.

At any rate though No. 1 in the nation and half of your viewing area paying attention to you is not bad. No station would turn that down regardless of demo numbers, if only for bragging rights. Besides, those “elderly retirees” got all the cash stash anyway

NBC6 11pm Exec Producer Leaves

Published
by
admin
on 8/23/2008
in Site News and Comments
. 1 Comment

Chris Pena executive producer of WTVJ’s 11pm newscast is leaving for Chicago’s NBC-owned station WMAQ to become assitant news director.

Before heading the 11pm news newscast on WTVJ, Chris was WSCV Telemundo 51’s news director. /via MediaMoves/

New WPTV Graphics Package

Published
by
admin
on 8/22/2008
in Local Media and graphics
. 5 Comments

WPTV has new graphics. I believe they debuted it before hurricane coverage?

The logo got a minor update, now it’s white color even on the site. And there’s a a peacock logo on the bottom right side.

The open is flashy, the teasers also have a lot of swooshing graphics elements. In all the new look has picked up speed it seems.

I wonder if the change is the idea of the new chief, Steve Wasserman, who took over the helm of WPTV in early May. He headed KPRC-Houston and WDIV-Detroit. WDIV got a similarly faster paced more flashier make-over not long ago when he stepped in as a general manager.

I think the new look is pretty nice. It’s not too annoying although the logo transitions in the teasers are a bit overdone. And the lower 3rds are just huge!

Overall much nicer look than what debuted when WPTV went HD with the blue/white which looked very cold and sterile.

New Open:

New Teaser:

Previous Open (high quality):

Hi from Seattle

Published
by
admin
on 8/20/2008
in Site News and Comments
. 8 Comments

I has arrived!
Sheesh, finally made it.

Sunday evening actually but Mariott apparently doesn’t give much love to their Courtyard digs so I had to leach WiFi from somebody with an open connection and didn’t want to type passwords that someone could be sniffing.

Continue reading ‘Hi from Seattle’

Tropical Storm Fay Ratings

Published
by
Alex
on 8/19/2008
in Local Media and ratings
. 15 Comments

Tropical Storm Fay ratings - Monday

                            NBC     WFOR   WPLG   WSVN

5am - 5:30am     2.0         1.7        1.0        3.5
5:30 - 6am          2.7         1.4        1.4       4.0
6 - 7am               5.5         1.1         3.3       9.4

Specials
4pm                  4.2          4.7         7.0      12.8
5pm                 5.2           5.8        7.0        10.5
6pm                  7.3          5.8         7.0        7.5
7pm                 6.1           4.8         8.0        8.5  
11pm             Not on       4.7        7.0       6.6
12am           11.6 down from a 17.3 during Olympics

Thank you to my e-mail tipster, and commenter “Please”