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LAS VEGAS — TV stations are doing what they’ve always done: providing content that informs and entertains their local community. But how they are producing and distributing that content and the audiences they can now reach has changed dramatically, said panelists at TVNewsCheck’s Programming Everywhere conference at NAB in Las Vegas last week.
As TV stations have more technology and tools to play with, they are expanding their content purviews to reach broader audiences in more markets. While the FCC ownership rules have remained the same, not allowing a single TV station group to own more stations than reach 39% of the U.S., the internet, FAST channels, apps and diginets have allowed them to expand that footprint while remaining under the cap.
“Even with all of this proliferation of channels, the business model hasn’t really changed,” said Steve Pruett, executive chairman, Cox Media Group. “It’s still about getting something in front of a general audience and selling advertising. The thing that’s changed is technology and regulation. It’s an opportunity for us to take our market positions as broadcasters and do as we were originally licensed to do, which is to serve the community, and then build programming around our brands and transform the local media business into a much more robust multiplatform business built around that original concept.”
“There are a lot of local opportunities where we can touch the local market, whether it’s [producing] lifestyle shows or local talk shows or obviously, expanding the news product,” said Sean Compton,
