Sad Day for Broadcasting

I found out last night that the news department that I was a part of for the better part of my early career is being “outsourced” to Davenport, IA.

First, and most importantly, I hope that all of the staffers are able to find employment elsewhere.  Hopefully, in stations that genuinely care about broadcast journalism.  My fear, however, is that those stations are becoming more scarce.   Television stations have – and always will be – run by business people.  Ratings matter.  No ratings = no paychecks.  I get that.  The problem is is that more and more stations are being run by business people that have absolutely no experience in the broadcast business.  In the eyes of the public and, more importantly, advertisers…a news presence adds legitimacy to your station.  I still feel that, if you have a legitimate newscast that people trust, the public will follow and trust you.  If your newscast is being produced 300 miles away, well…I don’t know what to tell you .  How do you go into a local business and say, “yes, we’re very excited about our newscast…they devote 2 minutes to the weather and they rip and read the ‘top headlines’ from the area.  Oh, one thing…it’s produced in another state.”?

Centralized News is a scary trend.  Is it the death knell for local news?  Time will tell.  The public still wants to know what is going on in their town.  They want to know what it’s going to be like tomorrow.  And they want to know what is going on with their favorite local sports team.   I think stations are slowly rethinking how they tell stories and how they reach their audience, but I still believe that people still make time to watch “their” newscast.  Maybe I’m too old school.  I hope I’m wrong and that I’m overreacting.

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