Ohio Media Watch, The Next Generation is coming soon. We hope the transition won't be too jarring for you. The core of this effort will remain as it is now, and the new site hopefully won't cause many complaints. Again, it isn't a retreat to social media like we tried in the recent past...if anything, it'll be an expansion. In the meantime, there's more media news to cover and talk about... ROVER'S AFTERNOON COURT DATE:The case against Clear Channel rock/talk WMMS/100.7 and syndicated … [Read more...]
A Compact Stack
Posted on November 8, 2013 · 7 Comments
Sometimes, media news items happen in clusters of three or four, and that makes this blog much easier to write... NEW CLEVELAND SOUND: The on-air deck is being shuffled at Murray Hill Broadcasting alt-rock/AAA WLFM-LP/87.7 "Cleveland's Sound", and the sound you won't hear anymore is from the station's original morning host. Yes, we were scratching our collective heads when the new station, dropped onto the FM dial as a result of the audio of analog TV channel 6, announced a novice as host in … [Read more...]
Changes Are Coming, But First…
Posted on November 4, 2013 · Leave a Comment
One reason we've been almost "hiatus scarce" in recent days has been technical. But that's about to change, and other changes will come to the Mighty Blog of Fun(tm) as a result. No, don't worry...we aren't planning on forwarding the website to our social media presence again. But as an early hint: you might want to start accessing the blog via our dedicated domain name... NEW BEAT: Long-time local radio sports reporter Matt Loede was part of the launch staff at CBS Radio sports WKRK/92.3 "The … [Read more...]
Quick Hits For May
Posted on May 13, 2013 · 2 Comments
Some quick hits before we focus on Cleveland's media obsession this past week...which will be in a separate item as soon as we get a Round Tuit(tm)... SUNNY FORECAST: Congratulations to former Scripps ABC affiliate WEWS/5 "NewsChannel 5" morning weather forecaster Christine Ferreira. As predicted, she's landed at a TV station in her new/returned to hometown area of Central Pennsylvania, Hearst NBC affiliate WGAL/8 in Lancaster PA...where she's that station's midday and weekend … [Read more...]
Welcome To A Busy 2013
Posted on January 5, 2013 · 2 Comments
And as usual when we start a new year, or return from a hiatus, there's stuff waiting to land like so many airplanes. We are probably missing a topic or three, so don't be surprised if there's a crash...we'll pick up where we left off in a future update... UPDATE 1:35 AM 1/5/13: Cox and Raycom have reached an agreement, and OMW social media followers tell us that the local stations, WOIO/19 and WUAB/43, are back in the Cox lineup. Here's part of what we originally wrote before Friday … [Read more...]
Press Release Theatre (Vol. 9), The Time Warner Cable SportsChannel Edition
Posted on December 20, 2012 · Leave a Comment
UPDATE 12/20/12 10:07 PM: We're told that the network actually launched in August...we haven't had Time Warner Cable's digital service since before then. But TWC's own release talks about the network in terms of "will be" and "will bring", so they must see this as a post-soft launch statewide. Some wording fixed... ----- Having apparently lost or abandoned its reported bid to buy SportsTime Ohio, Time Warner Cable is going ahead full steam with its own statewide sports network...called "Time … [Read more...]
Posting To The Holidays
Posted on December 15, 2012 · 4 Comments
This will be the last regular news post of 2012, barring any major (and we mean major) Northeast Ohio media news. We'll continue to put breaking media bulletins and other observations on the OMW Social Media Presence(tm) (uh, our Twitter and Facebook accounts). May all of our readers have a very happy holiday season, and we'll see you in January...but, until then... AL BARTHOLET'S REPLACEMENT: Kent State University public radio outlet WKSU/89.7-and-its-many-simulcasters has found its … [Read more...]
The Clear Channel Aftermath
Posted on December 7, 2012 · 6 Comments
We should be used to this by now, but you never get used to hundreds of broadcast professionals getting tossed out of their radio studios for Christmas. Or any other time, really. In what's become a very sad tradition around this time of year, broadcast giant Clear Channel Media+Entertainment+Pork Rinds looked at its staffing levels in markets across the nation and said, "oh, we can do without these people" as the year comes to a close. (And really, anymore, we're only half kidding about the … [Read more...]
A Wide Variety Of Items
Posted on October 20, 2012 · 2 Comments
No clever theme, just a Wide Variety of Items this time around. As usual, some have already been seen on Twitter, and others are brand new...or at least, running first in this post... ALLIE'S DEPARTURE: We learned at the end of last week that Local TV LLC Fox affiliate WJW/8 "Fox 8 News" was losing another popular personality. This time, it was sports reporter/anchor Allie LaForce heading "to California", to a TV destination that was not revealed last Friday when she said her on-air goodbyes … [Read more...]
TV Retrans Wars Hit Cleveland – Fox 8 and DirecTV
Posted on August 29, 2012 · 2 Comments
UPDATE 8/31/12: Both DirecTV and WJW Fox 8 owner Local TV LLC announced an agreement today, with no signal interruption... UPDATE 8/30/12 10:20 AM: Fox 8 has put up a more extensive site on their side of the dispute - keepwjw.com. Note that there's not one mention of trying to pick up the station's currently anemic over-air signal as an alternative... ------ The ongoing wars over TV retransmission consent are hitting Cleveland. Local TV Fox affiliate WJW/8 has posted a note on its … [Read more...]
