The graphic is a bit of an overstatement. WISH-TV in Indianapolis does not air news 24 hours a day. But it’s moving in that direction. Starting in January, the station will air 9 1/2 hours of local news every weekday, adding four hours to its current schedule. The extra hours are spread across all day parts: morning, noon, evening and late.
The station has a good reason for ramping up local news: it’s losing its CBS affiliation. News is one of the cheapest ways it can plug the gap created by the disappearance of network programming. And it’s hardly the only local station to move in this direction, as we’ve previously noted.
What made me sit up and take notice of this particular news expansion is the fact that it’s happening in Indianapolis, which already has one of the country’s top producers of local TV news. Fox affiliate WXIN airs 10 1/2 hours of news on weekdays, so even with the added hours, WISH will still air less than its cross-town rival. And here’s the kicker: both stations trail the market leader by a substantial margin in time slots where they go head to head. NBC affiliate WTHR boasts both the top-rated morning and evening newscasts.
So you have to wonder: at what point does more news become too much news? Do viewers in Indianapolis really want or need to be able to watch local news practically around the clock? Comments on the WISH website suggest the answer may be no. “Fox59 already offers too many news casts. This is not something we need,” one writer says. “Really! What more can you report? How many times can you tell the same stories?” asks another.
Good questions, I’d say. But the answer may be irrelevant. As long as stations can make more money running local news than other, more expensive programming, they’ll do it. And for the time being, some of them are making plenty thanks to a flood of political advertising. “Local TV stations are being force-fed Super PAC cash,” Bloomberg reports. The general manager of WHO in Des Moines says that’s why his station added another hour of news at 4 p.m.; he knew he could sell it.
Will it live on past November? Possibly. In Iowa, after all, the 2016 presidential campaign will already be underway and the cash flow is likely to continue.