J
Jul
Guest
Any thoughts on this?
Now 1060 is airing a weekend edition of Reporters Roundup at 7 PM to 7:30 PM Saturdays. I also noticed only one anchor is being used Monday-Friday from 6:30 PM-9:30 PM (excluding the CBS evening News broadcasts at 6:30 PM and 8 PM) and the 10 PM-4:30 AM Monday-Friday anchor, does the 9:30 PM news because of the CW Philly 10 PM news simulcast . I don't know if this is the beginning of major changes coming to KYW or not.
The CBS News station in Boston, WBZ, is all-news only between 5AM and 7PM.
Could it happen in Philadelphia too? Sure.
As we've said, there is no other format for an AM. They already are doing sports.
All news gets better ratings than talk. If KYW does what WBZ is doing, they'll just run talk at night.
But what would happen to WPHT 1210, if KYW decides to do news/talk?
They won't. They'll stay news, and cut back local staffing at nights and on weekends. Just as they're doing now.
I'm not joking. I have been wanting to hear this show on Philadelphia radio for years. As you know I have complained about the fact that this program has not aired on Philadelphia radio and being one of the last top markets, not to air this show on the radio. I am so glad that KYW has finally decided to air 60 Minutes. Now the next thing they need to do, is start airing the CBS top of the hour newscasts 24/7 and revamp their news format and schedule. The current changes with some additions to their programming so far is a start.
Me too. I still think that CBS might cut costs and merge the 2 formats on 1060 and 1210 and making KYW perhaps a news/talker, either staying on 1060 or move to 1210 AM. It would save CBS a lot of money consolidating the 2 formats into one station, instead of running them separately on 1060 and 1210 AM, as they have for the past 19 years.I have two reactions to the fact that KYW is going toward programming that is not local (CBS Evening News) and/or live (the 8 pm airing) during the evenings:
The idealistic part of me is disappointed that I can no longer get traffic on the 2s at 8:02 pm on weeknights. I was in my car last night during that time ... no traffic report from 8:00 to 8:05 when I finally switched to another station.
The realistic part of me knows that all-news is the most expensive format (local talk and local sports talk come close). KYW has been busy in the last 1-2 years cutting costs: The list of veteran on-air personnel who have been let go or are "retiring" (I doubt some were truly retirements), not to mention some who have been bumped back to part-time status, has been growing. Latest: Mike Dunn. First they trimmed Accu Weather back to AM drive only, then they got rid of it altogether. Last local business anchor (Vince Hill) - gone. Business outsourced to Bloomberg. Not many KYW-only sports people left. Much now handled by WIP personnel. And the list goes on and on.
I'm guessing that, if CBS didn't own 1210 WPHT in Philadelphia, we'd see a situation like WBZ in Boston where it's all-news from 5 am to 8 pm, and talk evenings and overnights. If KYW were to do that, they'd be competing with their own co-owned station, so I guess as long as CBS owns 1210 in Philly, "all news, all the time" is safe on 1060.
Kinda sad to see this happen. And all this is happening while they are hyping their 50th anniversary this year.