KRON bills itself as the "Bay Area's 'News Station'" which must be vivid imagination because as I turn on the news station on Sunday Morning past 10 AM I am watching televangelists Joel Osteen and Dr. Charles Stanley.
Meanwhile, the worst fire in California history up north in disaster-stricken Paradise is once again experiencing hellish conditions as winds fan the flames and fire conditions are worsening --but you wouldn't know it watching the alleged "news station" running religious programming.
TALK ABOUT a DISASTER.
This is supposed to be KRON's bread and butter. This is precisely the reason KRON exists; to provide up-to-date local and legitimate breaking news. Real breaking news as a matter of fact as the weather conditions have hampered firefighters' efforts to contain this firestorm. You would think someone in charge at the news station would get with it.
Yet KRON is MIA and only further embarrasses itself.
Yes, KPIX, owned by CBS is running NFL football but is contractually obligated to do so as is NBC Bay Area's KNTV to program Nascar. Yet even those stations have run updates and KRON is nowhere to be found.
Shameful.
I suspect that Joel and Dr. Charles paid for those spots.
ReplyDeleteThey didn't know what to do and couldn't reach their N.D.—he was busy with the Morning Show Countess and left his phone off.
ReplyDeleteJoel Osteen, etc is on EVERY Sunday AM...
ReplyDeleteAnd yes, KRON 4 is still showing FRIDAY's NY Stock Closing Market numbers...which was 2 days ago!
KRON 4 had complete coverage of the fires in Northern & Southern CA at 9AM which very thourgh.
ReplyDeleteKRON isn't the same television station it was 25 years ago. The deYoung family decided to cash in and count its money. Granite which bought the station turned down an offer from NBC and the rest is history. The station will never again be what it once was, just as KGO Radio will never be what it was once.
ReplyDeleteThe simple answer is get over it and move on, just as many other people have done.
The paid religion shows are what they area. That is station revenue, which you don't move if you cannot replace it. The fact that the broad casts continued, provide the answer to that. Just as other stations are contractually obligated to show sports, KRON has the contractual obligation for the religion programs.
And a suggestion: Pay up or you cannot comment. Turn off the anonymous ability.
I'm speaking as someone who was worked both a radio and television... Unless there is a national emergency or something going on in San Francisco proper, this is not a hard decision to make. Paid programming and spots are your bread and butter and must be played. You can do make goods till the Sun goes down with the commercial spots, paid programming not that easy. Bad air quality in the Bay Area does not warrant going to live programming.
ReplyDeleteSo, how many more charred bodies have to be found(100 still missing, 23 dead in Paradis fire so far)) before you figure out that this is a California emergency?
DeleteThe last I checked, Paradise is not in the SF DMA. Actually, nowhere near it. While tragic, it is not a Bay Area story that is threatening the local area like the Santa Rosa fire. No need to go wall to wall unless circumstances change. You should be able to find more than enough media outlets so you can your dose of other peoples' pathos from the safety of your living room comfy chair.
Delete8:26---Not a local story? Hazardous air quality in the Bay Area, cancelled local sporting events and hour-long delays at SFO because of the smoke? Then there are the people who live in the Bay Area who have friends, relatives or vacation property in the Paradise area.
DeletePutz.
Anon 3:11pm, so what? The bodies are dead, the missing either will or won't be found -- those sad facts cannot be altered by KRON reporting them. The kind of "emergency" that would warrant immediate publicity would be the equivalent of a warning for the public to take action, such as "evacuate now!". This is not an "emergency" that's about to occur but might be avoided or alleviated if people are alerted -- it's just a tragedy that's already happened.
ReplyDeleteSo your theory of how to be a journalist is that you should look for what is worth"publicity". FYI, the fires are still raging.The levels of toxic pollutants in the air more than a hundred miles away can trigger extreme discomfort, lung damage and much worse for everyone, especially those with COPD, asthma, cardiac issues..etc. This thing has killed more people than the recent shootings in Thousand Oaks and Pittsburg combined and you say "so what"? The public would also like to know causation..Was it PG&E, arson? is there any public recovery ?How about the huge new population of homneless people, uninsured people? How about the response from the WH that there should be "better forest management"..when this is not a forest fire and when most forests in California are managed, brace yourself, by the feds? You can't see the immense and tragic ripple effects of all of this, because you can't see...period.
DeleteAgree with previous poster that this story does not warrant wall to wall coverage. If it truly was a huge story the other stations would have dropped their football coverage, contractual obligations be damned.
DeleteWhat else us there to say? The fire has happened and the damage done. Nothing that we can do about it in the Bay Area.
I can guarantee you that if there wasn't football or other sports none of KTVU, KGO, KPIX, or KNTV would be live covering the fires at 10am. Don't be picking on KRON when everyone else would be doing what KRON did.
ReplyDeleteThe remarks here on the news positioning of this story (and the fire in SoCal)clearly show some flunked Journalism I. This is an international story, Christine's remarks are spot on. Should KRON have continued the 9AM coverage, that is a question for the bean counters that I am sure were not communicating with the news department Sunday morning. I guess it could be said KRON was doing the Lord's work.
ReplyDelete