Sony Pixel Power calrec Sony

Broadcasters Face the Honest Tru

04/01/2017

Lets face it: Local TV took a bit of a beating during the wild ride of 2016. Now that the year has come to a close, the industry in 2017 will confront a breadth of institutional challenges, as well as some serious soul-searching.

The media faces a confrontational climate like it has never seen before in recent times, says Mike Cavender, RTDNA/F executive director, who puts navigating the Trump presidency and restoring public confidence in the media at the top of broadcasters' 2017 priorities. Public opinion polls regarding our trustworthiness continue to go the wrong way-something that further impacts our believability with too much of our audience.

Station groups and their assets will change in 2017, a year which should, at long last, see both the Nexstar-Media General merger and results of the broadcast spectrum auction, both of which could bode well for participants.

But when you toss in some of the other challenges on tap for the larger industry, such as the encroachment and sway of social media, it looks like 2017 could be another rough one, with lots of navigating to do. Here's a look at the major issues facing local TV:

The Trump Presidency-and the Freedom' of Information

Although the candidate Donald Trump did battle with national news organizations, the negative ramifications of having a president who is openly critical of the media (and who well may circumvent it) could trickle down to local broadcast news outlets. Not only could local authorities follow Trump's lead, creating an adversarial relationship between local TV news operations and the people they cover, but his denunciation of the media has already eroded public trust.

The campaign gave rise to fake news, and consumers' growing penchant for getting their news from a range of sources, whether they're qualified to provide it or not. If the new administration enacts changes it has touted-reducing health care coverage and cracking down on immigration among them-there will be an enormous impact on communities, and the way local TV covers them.

In 2017, local broadcasters will also continue other battles with the government, most notably over their right to access public information, such as police body camera video. Advocates say it should be treated no differently than public records.

Dependence on Facebook

For all the energy local broadcasters have put into leveraging social media, platforms such as Facebook and Twitter still threaten the vitality of the industry. Recognize that Facebook is a competitor, says Steve Schwaid, VP of digital strategies at media research company CJ&N.

Local broadcasters' growing propensity for pushing stories and live broadcasts over Facebook's platform could come back to bite them in 2017 if they don't swap it out for teasers and clips that drive viewers back to their own sites. It only helps increase Facebook dependence, Schwaid said.

Also in 2017, local broadcast news operations have to end the enticing habit of letting social media sway what they cover. Monitoring social media trending for what resonates is important, and those stories should be leveraged on-air or online. But, as 2016 showed, it's incumbent on newsrooms to spend the time and resources to understanding viewers and report the kind of news they want to consume. Spending cash on research could pay off.

Having the Right-and Best-Staff

In keeping with off-year tradition, there won't be much political or Olympics money being pumped into local TV in 2017, meaning those budgets may again be tightened, calling staffing into question. Between the major cuts starting in 2008, and the elimination of industry vets through buyouts, there already is a dearth of institutional knowledge in local TV newsrooms. Further erosion of newsroom staff will only hurt the product, too. It all increases the danger of having too few news people holding officials accountable.

At the same time, though, it will become increasingly important in the year ahead to have newsrooms that are up for creating content that resonates across platforms. As putting more muscle into content creation rises, newsrooms will be faced with hard choices-such as, say, reducing the number of news managers to hire more digital content creators.
LINK: http://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/local-tv/broadcasters-face-hones...
See more stories from bandc

Most recent headlines

05/01/2027

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be demoed at CES 2026

Worlds first 802.15.4ab-UWB chip verified by Calterah and Rohde & Schwarz to be ...

06/09/2026

Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA World Cup 2026 in Germany with Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos

June 9 2026, 23:00 (PDT) Dolby and MagentaTV Bring Fans Closer to the FIFA Worl...

04/08/2026

Dalet Announces Commercial Availability of Dalia, Bringing Media-Aware Agentic AI to Enterprise Productions

Dalet, a leading technology and service provider for media-rich organizations, t...

04/07/2026

Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in Dolby Cinemas Across Japan, Presented in Dolby Atmos and Dolby ...

April 7 2026, 19:00 (PDT) Detective Conan: Fallen Angel of the Highway Opens in...

23/06/2026

Case Study: YES Networks IP Transition Expands Production Possibilities and Redefines Workflows

When we began planning our transition from an SDI-based infrastructure to a new ...

23/06/2026

Imagine Communications Appoints Greg Garmon as SVP, Americas Video Sales

Imagine Communications has announced the appointment of Greg Garmon as Senior Vice President, Americas Video Sales. Garmon will oversee account growth and busin...

23/06/2026

Snap Promotes Emma Wakely to Head of Sports and Media Partnerships, Americas

Snap has promoted Emma Wakely to Head of Sports and Media Partnerships, Americas, succeeding Anmol Malhotra, who has been elevated to Global Head of Content and...

23/06/2026

YES Network and Gotham Sports App to Air MI New York Major League Cricket Matches

YES Network and The Gotham Sports App will air MI New York's Major League Cr...

23/06/2026

HAND Issues Persistent Digital IDs to 2026 NBA Draft Class

The Universal Talent Identifier (HAND) has issued HAND IDs to 34 top projected prospects in the 2026 NBA Draft class, including AJ Dybantsa, Cameron Boozer, and...

23/06/2026

World Boxing Launches World Boxing TV Streaming Platform

World Boxing has announced the launch of World Boxing TV, a subscription-based streaming platform built on the Joymo platform, offering live events, on-demand c...

23/06/2026

FloRacing to Stream 32 Off-Road Motorcycle Racing Events Including AMA Amateur National Motocross Championship

FloSports will stream 32 off-road motorcycle racing events on FloRacing, includi...

23/06/2026

SES Adds 14 Regional Channels and New Set-Top Boxes to ASTRA TV in Spain

SES has announced the expansion of its ASTRA TV platform in Spain with the addition of 14 regional channels in HD and UHD quality and the launch of new hybrid s...

23/06/2026

Appear Supports Rede Legislativas Contribution Workflow for Brazils TV 3.0 Trials

Appear ASA has announced its role in Rede Legislativa de R dio e TV's contri...

23/06/2026

PBS Selects LTN for Nationwide IP Video Network Across 330 Member Stations

LTN has announced that PBS has selected it as its IP video partner to modernize content distribution and contribution across more than 330 public television sta...

23/06/2026

Ease Live Powers Interactive Experience on Rally.TV for WRC

Ease Live has announced that its graphics overlay platform is powering an interactive fan experience on Rally.TV, the official streaming platform of the FIA Wor...

23/06/2026

Chyron LIVE Adds Haivision StreamHub Integration, SCTE-35 Ad Insertion, and Switcher Updates

Chyron has announced updates to Chyron LIVE, its cloud-native live production pl...

23/06/2026

ESPN Announces ESPN Fan House, Fan Engagement Hub Powered by Flowcode

ESPN has announced ESPN Fan House, a fan engagement hub powered by Flowcode, launching in August ahead of the 2026 college football season. Publicis Sports will...

23/06/2026

Sennheiser Relocates Americas Regional Hub to Nashville

The city's solid position in broadcast, entertainment, and sports attracted the major microphone manufacturer Sennheiser Group is moving its Americas Regio...

23/06/2026

Violet Audio's dMix 128 now shipping

128 channels of signal routing & DSP Announced just before the NAMM Show 2026, Violet Audio's latest digital audio matrix offers 128 channels of signal ...

23/06/2026

Minimal Audio launch Memory Rites

Latest Current expansion created by EPROM Minimal Audio have just launched the latest Current Expansion, Memory Rites. Designed in collaboration with renown...

23/06/2026

Undertone Audio's MPEQ-1 goes virtual

Popular hardware EQ gets official plug-in emulation Undertone Audio have just launched a new plug-in that brings one of their most popular hardware designs ...

23/06/2026

Colorfront Support for AWS CDI Unlocks New Potential for Cloud-Based Visual Effects and Content Creation

December 7, 2022 Colorfront (colorfront.com) - the multi-award-winning develope...

23/06/2026

Colorfront Delivers Even More AI Automation Power and Extends Technology Partnerships with Dolby, Apple

April 23, 2026 NAB 2026, Las Vegas - the Academy and Emmy Award-winning develop...

23/06/2026

IAB Tech Lab Releases SupplyChain v1.1

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Besco to Represent PlayBox Neo in South Korea

PlayBox Neo appoints Besco as Channel Reseller to establish a firm foothold in Asia Pacific's thriving high-tech export-driven economic boom PlayBox Neo, t...

23/06/2026

PBS Selects LTN to Power Nationwide IP Video Network

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

PBS selects LTN for nationwide IP video network

LTN, a global leader in IP-based video transport and network services, today announced that PBS has selected LTN as its IP video partner to modernize and future...

23/06/2026

The LiveU Q Era Arrives in ANZ with the LU900Q at ABE2026

LiveU will introduce its Q Era to Australia and New Zealand for the first time at ABE2026 on Stand No. 25, (July 30 31). Leading the showcase is the LU900Q, a n...

23/06/2026

Miri Technologies Ships V410 Live 4K Video Encoder-Decode...

Miri Technologies Inc. has begun shipping its highly anticipated V410 live 4K video encoder/decoder for streaming, IP-based production workflows and AV-over-IP ...

23/06/2026

DHD SX2 and TX2 Consoles Go On-Air at Radio Tzafon

DHD audio reports the completion of an upgrade to the audio production facilities at the Galilee headquarters of Radio Tzafon. The station broadcasts two progra...

23/06/2026

Nagravision Launches Nagra Venturi Security Offering

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

ITN Expands Programmatic Local TV Platform

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Warner Bros. Discovery Taps AWS for New AI-Powered Ad Tech

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Study: Younger Viewers More Distracted But More Receptive to Ads

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Chilevisin, ClaroVTR Tap Pixop for 4K FIFA World Cup Feed

Share Copy link Facebook X Linkedin Bluesky Email...

23/06/2026

Imagine Communications Names Greg Garmon as Senior Vice P...

Multifaceted Growth Executive Brings 20+ Years of Experience Leading Organizations Across Tech and M&E Imagine Communications today announced the appointment ...

23/06/2026

Australians in Film and Screen Australia's talent development initiative UNTAPPED returns for 2026

Australians in Film and Screen Australia's talent development initiative UNT...

23/06/2026

Visual Productions Unveils RdmRelay2 Four-channel Relay Control at InfoComm 2026

Visual Productions Unveils RdmRelay2 Four-channel Relay Control at InfoComm 2026 Brie Clayton June 22, 2026 0 Comments New Relay Solution Combines DMX, ...

23/06/2026

SMPTE Makes Its Standards Freely Accessible, Opening Standards Library to the Global Media Technology Community

SMPTE Makes Its Standards Freely Accessible, Opening Standards Library to the Gl...

23/06/2026

UKTV and BBC Entertainment join forces on first joint comedy entertainment co-commission

23rd June 2026, London: UKTV and BBC Entertainment have unveiled a joint co-comm...

23/06/2026

Gugu Mbatha-Raw leads Sky Original supernatural thriller Possession in first teaser

Also starring Jonny Lee Miller, Sheldon Shepherd and Bel Powley, the ambitious f...

23/06/2026

Arqiva response to DCMS Green Paper

The priority now is a clear and credible plan June 23, 2026, Winchester, UK - Arqiva, the UK's leading communications infrastructure provider, welcomes tod...

23/06/2026

RT AND COMMUNITY FOUNDATION IRELAND ANNOUNCE RT TOY SHOW APPEAL GRANT AWARDS 2026

The RT Toy Show Appeal has raised over 31 million since its inception in 2020 ...

23/06/2026

NVIDIA Powers Over 400 of the World's 500 Fastest Supercomputers

News Highlights: NVIDIA technology runs 81% of the TOP500 and 90% of the systems new to the list. 26 systems on the TOP500 adopted the NVIDIA Grace CPU, up ei...

23/06/2026

How Businesses Are Building Specialized AI They Can Trust

Companies are asking how to build specialized AI that fits with the way their workflows actually run. The first wave of enterprise AI was about access. Compan...

23/06/2026

June 22, 2026

Newly identified molecule strengthens the eye's response to damage in retinal disease Scripps Research discovery finds that restoring the naturally occurrin...

22/06/2026

Behind the Mic: SportsCenters Lisa Cohn to Retire This June From ESPN as Longest-Tenured Anchor

Behind The Mic provides a roundup of recent news regarding on-air talent, includ...

22/06/2026

Cosm Appoints David Ho as Chief Legal Officer

Cosm has announced the appointment of David Ho as Chief Legal Officer, a newly created executive role reporting to President and CEO Jeb Terry. Ho will oversee ...

22/06/2026

Warner Bros. Discovery and AWS Announce AI-Powered Advertising Technology Platform

Warner Bros. Discovery and Amazon Web Services (AWS) have announced the developm...

22/06/2026

Daktronics Completes Audio Control System Upgrade at Petco Park for San Diego Padres

Daktronics has completed an audio control system upgrade at Petco Park in San Di...