TV/Cable News

The FCC in March released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking that seeks to streamline the TV satellite station reauthorization process when they are assigned or transferred in combination with their previously approved parent station. Filing comments and reply comments for this NPRM have now been set in stone by the Commission.

In a new note from prolific Wall Street wordsmith Brian Wieser, Senior Analyst at Pivotal Research Group, an analysis of Nielsen's Digital Content Ratings is put to the test with YouTube. Daily viewing data from August 2016 through March 2018 was put under Wieser's microscope. He's discovered an interesting trend: "YouTube growth has decelerated over the past few months, although it remains at high absolute and relative levels."

An AI-driven tech company "transforming TV advertising for the connected world" has partnered up with a top ATSC 3.0 Next Gen TV platform company to develop the standard for interactive advertising formats to be delivered over the ATSC (Advanced Television Systems Committee) 3.0 standard.

In the South Texas city of Corpus Christi, viewers who wish to tune to ABC network programming go to KIII-3, a station currently owned by TEGNA. The company formerly known as Gannett took ownership of KIII in July 2014. Now, the company that sold KIII to TEGNA appears to be in a bit of a bind. And, it is the prior owner before that who is alleging a default on the payment of a promissory note valued at $7 million.

TIP Initiative (Television Interface Practices), a consortium of local television broadcasters including Nexstar Media Group, Sinclair Broadcast Group, TEGNA, Tribune Media and Hearst Television, on Monday confirmed the release of an updated framework for standards-based transaction interfaces, highlighting the progress the work group has made toward its goal of accelerating electronic advertising transactions for local TV broadcasters and their media agency partners.

The first next-generation TV signal in the Phoenix Model Market is “en el aire," thanks to Univision Communications and Pearl TV. “Today’s announcement is just the first Phoenix station to transition to ATSC 3.0, with additional partner stations to be added soon," Pearl TV Managing Director Anne Schelle said on Monday at the 2018 NAB Show.

In November 2013, the future of two TV stations in North Dakota suddenly became fuzzy. Full-power facilities in Bismarck and Minot, respectively, were to be sold to Excalibur Media, with the company entering into a LMA agreement with Gray Television. That deal was aborted, after Prime Cities in March 2014 asked the FCC to nix the deal. This resulted in Gray acquiring the intellectual property of the two stations, while it needed to sell the facilities to a woman-owned or multicultural business. As a result, Legacy Broadcasting became the owner of the North Dakota duo. Legacy is now selling the stations to a partner it has had a relationship with since 2015.

Hive, an advanced tech company that uses AI to identify and capture metadata related to TV content through its Hive Media platform, has partnered on a joint offering with advanced data and analytics company 605, which focuses its efforts on the media and entertainment industries. The joint offering is designed to provide deeper insights into both paid and earned media on television, the companies note.

In a significant convergence of wireless and broadcast technologies, DISH Network on Sunday revealed that it has successfully completed the trial of transmission and reception of the new broadcast ATSC 3.0 standard as part of the Spectrum Consortium's "Next Gen" deployment project in Dallas. Using its 700 MHz E Block spectrum (former broadcast TV channel 56), DISH deployed on Spectrum Co.'s Garland, Tex., Single Frequency Network (SFN) site as part of the country's first major market conversion to the Next Gen broadcast standard.

A SmithGeiger survey of media leaders from across the broadcasting, entertainment, finance and tech sectors, unveiled Sunday at the inaugural NAB Show Senior Leadership Summit, finds a majority remain optimistic overall about the future of linear television in the face of pressing challenges.

A veteran news anchor at an ABC affiliate owned by Nexstar Media Group is attracting national attention — but not for her on-air efforts. Rather, she's getting notice for a sexual discrimination complaint filed with the Pennsylvania Human Relations Commission for a reassignment by WHTM she contends is a demotion. The situation boiled over late Friday when Nexstar issued a statement refuting the anchor's claims.

Two full-power TV stations in California have each received letters from the FCC with important information regarding their respective post-spectrum auction transitions. The transition phase assignment for these stations has been modified, allowing the operators — ION and Nexstar, respectively — a little extra time to plan for their moves.

Eight weeks ago, a bruising battle between the owner of a host of small- and medium-sized TV stations and one of the nation's largest MVPDs erupted. Charter Communications yanked 11 stations in areas such as Syracuse; Spokane; and Yuma, Ariz., where CBS affiliate KSWT-13; Estrella TV, on KSWT-13.2; and NBC affiliate KYMA-11 are impacted. The stations are owned by Northwest Broadcasting, led by President/CEO Brian Brady. As of Friday, the battle is not only waging on but involves a fresh lawsuit filed by Charter. The defendant is the City of El Centro, Calif.

On Thursday RBR+TVBR exclusively reported on the acquisition of three LPTVs in the San Francisco DMA by HC2 Holdings. It is now known that the seller of these low-power facilities is not leaving the area: It has just acquired a full-power facility, in Mendocino County, in order to continue broadcasts to the market.

"TV now means much more than producing stories for the 5 o’clock news," say two Knight Foundation executives who have teamed to share some key findings from the organizations new study, “Local TV News and the New Media Landscape." In short, television is a key source of news. But, audiences are slowly shrinking. What can your stations do to prevent an audience drain from your newscasts?