Local television news can be so easy to mock. Happy-talk anchors, meaningless live shots and enough on-screen grammar goofs to send an English teacher into orbit. The good news is that it's not all terrible. But a lot of it is and, sadly, there's not …
If you just look at the bottom line, local TV stations appear to be thriving. Revenue was up substantially last year, thanks largely to a flood of political advertising. But viewership was down in every key time slot in every sweeps period in 2012, according …
The TV business runs on numbers. So it's really no surprise that networks from ABC to Fox are ramping up their efforts to offer news aimed at Hispanic viewers. The real wonder is that it took so long. For years, Latinos were mostly ignored by the …
It was a sorry spectacle. For more than a week, NBC let Ann Curry twist slowly in the wind after word leaked that she was on her way out as co-host of the "Today" show barely a year after getting what she described as her …
This won't come as a huge surprise to anyone working in local TV news, but there's more of it than ever and more people are watching. "To quote Mark Twain, ‘Reports of our death are greatly exaggerated,’” says Hearst Television’s vice president for news, Brian Bracco, …
A New York station's decision to dump one of its veteran anchors has people up in arms--and not just the anchor's fans. Sue Simmons is an institution at WNBC, having anchored the news there for 32 years. But at age 68, she's been informed that …
Are the days of dominant No.1 news stations over and done? Not quite. But the headlines from this year's February sweeps period do make you wonder. When former powerhouses struggle and former rivals are neck-and-neck, have we entered a new era of local news? Let's start …
Forgive the apocalyptic headline, but when two columns cross my desk the same day warning broadcast executives to wake up or face extinction, I pay attention. Technology-driven threats to the broadcast business model aren't new, but these columns suggest a bazillion-channel future is closer than …
A new mobile app aims to give YouTube a run for its money in the "citizen journalist" assignment game. Rawporter is the latest competitor to YouTube Direct, giving newsrooms the ability to request and rebroadcast video from anyone who happens to be at or near …
There's more news on local TV than ever--more than five hours every day, on average--but is it any good? It depends on where you look and whom you ask. On some stations, serious reporting is hard to find, squeezed out by crime and fluff. And …
After a couple of bumpy years, the local TV news business is growing again, according to new research from Hofstra's Bob Papper and RTDNA. The average network affiliate now airs more than five and a half hours of local news a day, and there's every …
After two grim years, the state of local television news is much improved, thank you. That's the bottom line of the chapter I wrote for this year's State of the News Media report from the Project for Excellence in Journalism, released today. The good news is …
