[written by UVa LaGrape]
A Cvillain recently confused Channel 29 and the “Newsplex” (?), which I guess is the name of the conglomerate of new TV stations that came to town since I left for undergrad. This sparked me thinking about TV a lot (never read Cvillain before bed).
As someone who grew up here with only 2 channels (because we couldn’t always afford cable), it’s oddly thrilling to me that we have 4 more local stations. Even though now I have satellite and almost never watch them. Part of that avoidance of the local stations is a rebellion against long childhood periods of nothing but NBC and PBS. But when I’m not bent on rebellion, I watch the news for a larf.
First off, there are 4 new stations, but they advertise for each other on all the stations, so I get confused on whether I’m watching ABC or CBS. To add to confusion, I finally caught on that they play one newscast on multiple stations, so I find myself watching the CBS news on Fox. I can’t tell if this is very professional or very unprofessional…cross-marketing or cheapness. Can someone more knowledgeable than me tell us?
Second, everyone seems young, in their 20s. Whatever happened to wise old dudes and middle-aged moms anchoring the news? All the national news anchors are people who look like my mom and dad. I don’t want to run into my local evening news anchor screaming drunkenly at Zocalo. Are young newspeople the new thing?
Third, our newspeople are weird-looking. I don’t know if it’s too much makeup or not enough, but there’s a pattern of oddness.
Fourth, I never run across local public affairs programming. I feel like I get more local news watching cable access than 29 or the Newsplex. If local radio has multiple shows dedicated to our area, why can’t the TV stations?
And fifth, reception for the 4 new stations is not as good as 29.
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i always find it odd when i’m watching the news on WAHU that the field reporters are holding mikes with “CBS 19″ on them. of course, it wasn’t until a couple of weeks ago that i saw the same field reporter on all three stations while channel-surfing, and realized that all three newscasts share feeds with each other. they could save a ton of money if they fired two of the three news teams and just figured out a way to digitally superimpose each channels logo into the feed on each separate channel.
is there also a news show on their CW channel? i think that’s ridiculous, considering only people w/ digital TV can see it. i just wish they’d get off their asses and start broadcasting in HD so i can convince mrs. nino it’s time to pull the trigger on a new 50″ LCD!
I used to work as an engineer for 29.
The owners of the 4 newbie stations have dumped tons of money into the equipment here in Charlottesville, but unfortunately, the crew that works there knows nothing about proper lighting, makeup, delivery, etc. That’s the reason all the announcers look and sound like crap. The guy who does the weather looks like the Geico lizard – rather scary. The boards are “automated” so they can reduce the broadcast crew, therefore you get poor sound, poor video, poor transitions, etc.
I knew Beth Duffy when she worked at 29, and believe me, she is a lot better looking in person, than the way she comes across on the new stations. She had to bail out for a year, as the contracts at 29 state if you leave, you cannot announce closer than, I believe a 50 mile radius for at least 1 year.
Finally, 29 does have seasoned pros, and they coach the other members. Everyone was critiqued routinely. They don’t have anyone with enough experience to do that at the new stations.
I only made it, not quite a year at 29. There wasn’t another engineer (on the computer side), so I stayed on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week, 365 days a year. I burned out pretty quick, although I loved the people, loved working with the equipment. Even Norm, who is very funny.
My .02 worth. I only tune in to the new stations when I want to watch something in HD. Cheapwad comcast hasn’t switch on high def in the zion crossroads area.
You can pretty much assume that everyone under 30 working at the tv stations or the local papers is making less than 25K a year. That kind of scratch in an expensive little town does not lead to people sticking around.
Regardless, I’ve come to the conclusion that local television news is just a crappy venue for “reporting” in general. People watch it for the weather or maybe to see highlights from their kids’ basketball games.
Age-ist!
my office is next door to the ‘plex’, and I see the on-air talent coming and going every day – they are some fine looking people in person.
I have no problem with my newsies having lives – Christina Cruise was a lot of fun to hang out with, and I met Stephanie Hockridge (sp?) at X one night, very sweet (and very gorgeous) young lady.
best post title i’ve seen here in quite a while. nicely done.
Is it just me, or is anyone else who uses a plain-jane antenna to get their tv fix having trouble getting sound on NBC29 these days? The picture is perfectly clear, but I get nothing but static for sound and The Office ain’t exactly a visual experience. Fox/ABC/CBS and even the two public television channels both work fine. Did 29 recently change anything about their signal transmittion or does my set just hate my Heroes addiction?
LYS IS BACK YAY!!!!!
Actually, I’m in Manhattan at the moment, but I’ll be back as of Sunday night fo real. Last week was vacation and the week before was Ohio.
Lys phone home.
We’re so far from being a major market station that we’ll never have seasoned anchors (unless one resigns in shame from a Florida affiliate after a drunk driving arrest and can only get work here).
I would SO love to check out the studios at our stations. I worked for a short time at one of the big name cable news stations and I imagine the differences are ginormous.
wait a minute, we have local news on local stations? i spend as much time as possible avoiding televised news broadcasts, and have DC-area locals on my Dish subscription, so i didn’t even know about this. this must be a small-market problem because the same things happened in rural Lancaster county when i was living up there. local “talent” that you’d see out at bars and restaurants, low production value broadcasts, etc. their saving grace i guess was that there was rarely any serious news to report.
Lys – noticed that last night during the news as well, sound was out about 95% of the time
(not that it made me change the channel – gots me a crush on Sharon Gregory)
Last spring I was asked to be in a focus group for ch 29. I went to one meeting, was promised all this stuff – email addresses for bigwigs at the station, followup meetings, free cookies. They came through with none of it. Well, there were some cookies. A pox on their house. Plus, I’m not a fan of the retreads they’ve brought in (sorry, oy). Cvillenews did a story on a couple of them who had legal problems and then landed on the air here.
I like the change of pace on the new stations with the hungry young faces. And most of them are hungry because they’re paying dirt. When they were starting up, they wanted to pay the sports director around $22K. Of course there’s going to be turnover with pay that low.
In glamour business like art, fashion, news, pay is always low low low for the unexperienced. Just the way it is. The people at these stations are here to get experience and build a resume beforemoving on to bigger and better things.
GRAPE: Of the three newsplex broadcast stations (owned by Gray), only one (CBS 19) is a full fledged broadcaster. The other two have special licenses from the FCC to broadcast a low-power signal. This why people outside of town can’t receive these stations. Why a low-power license? The FCC limits the number of regular stations that can be owned by a single company in any broadcast area, so it’s the only way Gray could get on the air. For Gray, what they lose by broadcasting a signal most people can’t receive they gain by having their stations available on cable.
As to the shared news broadcast: It is simply more efficient to have one set of reporters and equipmement contribute to all news broadcasts. The morning show is simulcast on all three stations with the same achors. Again cost savings. Why have all this news? Big revenue for relatively little cost.
Nice post, Grape
no offense Stormy – but I do find it odd that you can abuse drugs, get a DWI and still be President, but not an anchor in a major market…
The CW is NBC29’s, I believe.
What I would love for them to do is take one of the existing newscasts, and do something incredibly radical with it. Have a “news” show that is just features on local music, art, culture, whatever. Do live-shots from bars where cool acts are playing. That sort of thing.
obadiah spittle, I love your handle so much. Have I told you that yet? Six times?
And ditto, LaGrape, it’s delicious.
When I’m CBS19’s new anchor, I will insist in my contract that that be the way I’m presented to the public!
(it’s from a movie – a prize to anyone who knows which one)
The Last Remake of Beau Geste. Check out the youtube link. 4:00.
What’s the prize?
Lil”: Are you saying Grape is delicious? Why doesn’t she hang out with us?
Grape: Come meet up with us. It will be fun.
I’m delicious!
When I google “obadiah spittle” all I get are your Cvillain posts. Are you sure you have the reference right?
Who’s to say I haven’t already hung out with you? Who’s to say I’m not one of the girls who you always see at gatherings but who always wears a different name on her nametag?
Silmo: how do you know all this? Do you work for the Newsplex?
Okay, since other people started in on the looks of our local anchors…
Joanna Shrewsbury (29) looks like a lost waif anchoring the weekend news all alone. I expect her to stop reading, look into the camera and say “Hello? Can you get me out of this lonely box?”
@ 20 Grape – No I don’t work for the newsplex; just have a wide if shallow body of knowledge
I know we didn’t meet because I asked everyone at the Crush party to open their mouths, and none of them matched your photo on MySpace
That was funny until I imagined you actually doing it. Then it made you seem like a cereal killer.
I think
Sharon Gregory (29) is like a newsbot…
Beth Duffy (used to be 29, but now Newsplex) has dimples so deep park rangers patrol them.
I couldn’t find his picture, but the skinny guy with tiny head and crooked eyes, creeps me out. I think he’s on Fox. Anyone know his name.
The side doors at 29 are always open. Just pop in and take a tour. Bring donuts and you would probably land an anchor job.
Forget seeing 29 take on anything. After the 1 million lawsuit which was lost a few years ago, you can bet everything gets filtered 100 times or more.
And UVA has a strong hold on every media here in town, so you’ll only see pretty pictures of Sandridge accepting mega bucks from donors.
If I won the lottery, I’d love to start a rag just to expose the graft and corruption at UVA. That’s my new ambition in life.
I can dream, right?
You’ll never get me Lucky Charms™—because they’re DEAD.
keyboard, you don’t need a million dollars. That’s what Cvillain is for. Expose away.
Stephanie Hockridge (Newsplex) looks like a Barbie…not like a pretty dollie, but like an actual plastic Barbie who was given life by the ghost of an executed murderess who screams “GIVE ME THE POWER I BEG OF YOU!” every night upon waking at moonrise.
Dude! Lay off the hotties.
Yeah, I’m in love with LaGrape. well then…
For the record…. Beth Duffy is pretty hot in person.
I don’t know… maybe it’s the celebrity that does it for me.
She actually lives right across the street from me. My 12 yr old son is in love with her.
Ummm… yeah. Not the best idea at UVa. They are well aware of this site and will come chat with you if they don’t like what you’re posting (if you’re an employee).
The network gurus can trace who made a certain post based upon the timestamp on the post and their network logs. They can nail it down to a workstation’s IP and then determine who was logged onto that workstation at that time.
Oh yeah – did you think there was any such thing as anonymity in the digital age? The “anonymity” of the intarwebs is one of the greatest myths there is about the intarwebs.
Maybe if you were on a shared workstation using a generic logon you could be anonymous. Seems like an awful lot of effort, though. There are few of those logons, however, which allow you to just logon to any old workstation. The ones you can logon to with a generic account are in very high traffic areas.
Well I wish I could blow the whistle. I’ve been advised that Sandridge would come to my house in person if a leak about bribes, mis-use of property, graft, corruption, etc., appeared in any media.
And yes WizardSleeve, there is no anonymity at all on the web. I might as well find an old printing press and bang out 1 sheet flyers. But I couldn’t put them any where without having my video posted on youtube.
But I got the goods…..
*cough cough* proxy servers and IP spoofing *cough cough*
*cough cough* proxy servers and IP spoofing… *cough cough*
um yeah…you can still be anonymous. It’s called using the city library computer lab. It’s called having an unregistered laptop and a dynamic IP address. Or plain and simply, kick it old school and use someone else’s computer. Or…email your revelations to T and L with a new freemail from Mudhouse.
The real revealer of anonymous tipsters is that they reveal things that only they could know. Don’t do that. Only reveal the things at least 10 other people could know. And make sure there’s no unique intersections that point to you.
Or just don’t be anonymous. Live off your husband when you get fired. Run for city council as the righteous whistleblower.
Back to our news anchors’ looks:
*Eric Pritchett (29) looks like a nervous Conan O’Brien.
*Bo Sykes (Newsplex) looks like that sargeant from Gomer Pyle.
*Brantley Ussery (Newsplex) looks like a scarecrow on crack, and his little brother…
*Myles Henderson (Newsplex) looks like a funeral director.
*They are *all* too thin, none of them are from central Virginia, and all of them have giant foreheads.
Thor says “they” are mad about this thread. Who’s “they”, Thor?
Well, I don’t care if “they” get mad. I’ll hit ‘em again: their new weather guy’s hair looks like Flock of Seagulls.
Travis Koshko looks like Dilbert
Eric Pritchett’s from the Valley – but yeah, I think he has a Howdy Doody vibe going. I like the 5 show they do at 29.
And that Sharon Gregory, what a great smile. I’m not a big Steve fan because he either a) looks asleep or b) comes off as an egotistical smartass.
that light-skinned girl on the weekend news looks like she’s always high. but her hair has been fierce lately.