Meredith announced they put TV Stations for sale

[Justin Hill]

I'm thankful the Allen Media situation didn't turn out like the Sinclair Broadcasting/Howard Stirk situation in Birmingham, Alabama and Charleston, South Carolina, which created a whole mess of changes that have bumped ABC onto a digital subchannel of an inferior frequency in some cases...

 

[mwdxer1]

Analog ones? Will take money to convert to digital

Is anything analog today? The translators here are all digital with sub channels.

 

[Mr Tony]

Is anything analog today? The translators here are all digital with sub channels.

all analog stations (which were mostly translators) had to convert by July this year or go off the air until such time as they did convert to digital

 

[Justin Hill]

all analog stations (which were mostly translators) had to convert by July this year or go off the air until such time as they did convert to digital

What I meant to say, is I'm glad the switch at WMOW 34 did not turn out like these switches pulled off by Sinclair Broadcasting and Howard Stirk Media, which both occurred after 2009, during the digital TV era, in 2014, these are all full-powered stations:

In Charleston, South Carolina:
* WGWG 4.1, formerly ABC 4, now currently H&I:

WGWG - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

* WCIV 36.1 (formerly WMMP) now has the ABC 4-branded local TV station on 36.2, main channel is MyNetworkTV:

WCIV - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

In the Birmingham, Alabama metro area, these ABC stations switched to Heartland in 2014, then their current affiliation, H&I, in 2015. Since then, this ABC affiliate's current branding of "ABC 33/40" on this station is now a misnomer:
* WSES 33 (formerly WCFT-TV 33) and WGWW 40 (formerly WJSU-TV 40; both station were formerly with ABC, but WGWW moved ABC from 40.1 to 40.2):

WSES - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

WGWW - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

* ABC 33/40 also has subchannels on two affiliates of The CW plus one MyNetworkTV affiliate in that area, as well as a low-power digital (LD) repeater, WBMA-LD 58, which also carries the ABC 33/40-branded station...

WBMA-LD - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

These stations were with Albritton Communications prior to their acquisitions by Sinclair Broadcasting and Howard Stirk Media, they seem likely to be castoffs from the Albritton acquisition which ended with the buyout of former WB network affiliate, WBSG-TV 21, and the failed ratings after the launch of new ABC affiliates WBSG 21/WJXX 25, both in the Brunswick, Georgia and Jacksonville, Florida area (WBSG 21, now WPXC 21, is currently an Ion O&O, while WJXX 25 is now part of a TEGNA duopoly with WTLV NBC 12) after luring ABC away from their long-time affiliate WJKS-TV 17 (now WCWJ 17)...

 

[Mr Tony]

What I meant to say, is I'm glad the switch at WMOW 34 did not turn out like these switches pulled off by Sinclair Broadcasting and Howard Stirk Media, which both occurred after 2009, during the digital TV era, in 2014, these are all full-powered stations:

Different situations. WMOW was used as a satellite station so Gray could keep it as long as it was still a satellite station. If they wanted to keep it as ABC they would have been required to sell it off as they already owned a full powered station (WSAW) in the market. Low powered stations do not count (same with subchannels). So thats why Gray has both CBS & FOX in the market.

My market (Mankato, MN) Gray owns all the stations in the market
KEYC 12-1 CBS & 12-2 FOX
KMNF-LD1 7-1 NBC & 7-2 CW

In the Sinclair situation they had to sell those stations because the FCC frowned upon the JSA/SSA's that Sinclair and others use to get by with shell companies. So thats why Gray and Sinclair would buy the programming on the station they want to dump and move it to their owned station as a subchannel then sell off the full powered station they can't own legally to someone else and allow them to run it.

Heck Gray now has figured out how to buy back those stations they sold. Wait until the station is no longer in the top 4 in a market and then buy it back. They did it in Duluth, MN (well former owner Quincy did) with KDLH. Was CBS then when Quincy bought it they moved CBS to a subchannel of their own station (NBC) and made CW the -1 on KDLH. Then a few years later they bought it back. They can't put CBS on the -1 as then it would be back to the "cant own 2 of the top 4 stations in a market"
Gray did it in Nebraska. Sold what was KHAS 5 NBC to a owner who put Sonlife on it. Gray moved NBC to their own stations (KOLN/KGIN). Bought KNHL (former KHAS) back 4 years later and put the Me/My affiliate on the -1 and NBC on -2 (which allowed them to own both).

 

[Justin Hill]

Different situations. WMOW was used as a satellite station so Gray could keep it as long as it was still a satellite station. If they wanted to keep it as ABC they would have been required to sell it off as they already owned a full powered station (WSAW) in the market. Low powered stations do not count (same with subchannels). So thats why Gray has both CBS & FOX in the market.

My market (Mankato, MN) Gray owns all the stations in the market
KEYC 12-1 CBS & 12-2 FOX
KMNF-LD1 7-1 NBC & 7-2 CW

In the Sinclair situation they had to sell those stations because the FCC frowned upon the JSA/SSA's that Sinclair and others use to get by with shell companies. So thats why Gray and Sinclair would buy the programming on the station they want to dump and move it to their owned station as a subchannel then sell off the full powered station they can't own legally to someone else and allow them to run it.

Heck Gray now has figured out how to buy back those stations they sold. Wait until the station is no longer in the top 4 in a market and then buy it back. They did it in Duluth, MN (well former owner Quincy did) with KDLH. Was CBS then when Quincy bought it they moved CBS to a subchannel of their own station (NBC) and made CW the -1 on KDLH. Then a few years later they bought it back. They can't put CBS on the -1 as then it would be back to the "cant own 2 of the top 4 stations in a market"
Gray did it in Nebraska. Sold what was KHAS 5 NBC to a owner who put Sonlife on it. Gray moved NBC to their own stations (KOLN/KGIN). Bought KNHL (former KHAS) back 4 years later and put the Me/My affiliate on the -1 and NBC on -2 (which allowed them to own both).

Now, thanks to Gray's purchase of WYOW 34, WAOW 9 (and it's semi-satellite, WMOW 4) are involved a few changes of their own, a tiny game of "musical chairs" which creates a ripple effect across Wausau and the rest of Northern Wisconsin: Now that The CW is phased out on Allen Media-owned both stations, they replaced the subchannel with Decades, and in WMOW's case, moved ABC to CW's former position of 4.1, to make way for Decades on ABC's former position of 4.2. After Gray purchased WYOW 34, they removed everything but The CW (which they moved to ABC's former position of 34.1), and moved a repater of WSAW 7 and WZAW-LD 33 onto the second and third subchannels.

 

[Don in CT]

It says in that article that Allen Media Group owns the Weather Channel??? I had no idea on that. I had in my mind that NBC or Comcast owned Weather channel.

Technically IBM owns the Weather Channel name and website. Allen Media has a long term licensing deal for the name for the channel.

 

[JosephB]

With ATSC 3.0 on the horizon, they want to sell their ota properties and concentrate on publishing magazines? Sounds like a half-assed decision to me.

Well, this year is the first year that Meredith made more money on "digital" vs. traditional publishing (meaning their magazines' websites made more money than sales of the magazines) so it's not like the other side of their business was 100% old school magazines. Those brands all have big online operations

But, also, the other half of Meredith is being bought up by IAC, which has other online publishing properties. So, they are selling the whole company, just to two different suitors

 

[localclassictvfan]

It says in that article that Allen Media Group owns the Weather Channel??? I had no idea on that. I had in my mind that NBC or Comcast owned Weather channel.

did'nt ted turner owned it at one time

 

[Don in CT]

did'nt ted turner owned it at one time

No. Landmark Communications owned it from the beginning.

 

[Justin Hill]

No. Landmark Communications owned it from the beginning.

Landmark Communications, who owned The Weather Channel from 1982-2008, sold it to Weather Group Television, LLC (a consortium of NBCUniversal/Comcast, Blackstone Group and Bain Capital) who owned it from 2008-2018. During that time, in 2012, the holding company for The Weather Channel changed its name to The Weather Company and bought its rival, Weather Underground. The Weather Company was sold to IBM in 2016.

TimeWarner Entertainment and TimeWarner Cable were seperate entities from 2009 leading into the entertainment side's merger with AT&T in 2018 (they changed their name to WarnerMedia) and the cable company, which merged with Charter Communications (and became Spectrum), Just like TimeWarner before it, The Weather Channel started out as one big company before splitting into two, with The Weather Channel providing weather information on TV, and the The Weather Company providing weather information online.

 

[navychop]

Whew! Say THAT three times fast!

 

[Don in CT]

Landmark Communications, who owned The Weather Channel from 1982-2008, sold it to Weather Group Television, LLC (a consortium of NBCUniversal/Comcast, Blackstone Group and Bain Capital) who owned it from 2008-2018. During that time, in 2012, the holding company for The Weather Channel changed its name to The Weather Company and bought its rival, Weather Underground. The Weather Company was sold to IBM in 2016.

TimeWarner Entertainment and TimeWarner Cable were seperate entities from 2009 leading into the entertainment side's merger with AT&T in 2018 (they changed their name to WarnerMedia) and the cable company, which merged with Charter Communications (and became Spectrum), Just like TimeWarner before it, The Weather Channel started out as one big company before splitting into two, with The Weather Channel providing weather information on TV, and the The Weather Company providing weather information online.

Warner never owned TWC.

 

[JosephB]

Warner never owned TWC.

Turner (part of Warner) and TWC were both based in Atlanta, which probably helps fuel the confusion

 

[Justin Hill]

Warner never owned TWC.

I know they aren't related in any way. I was just comparing the spinning off of The Weather Company from The Weather Channel to the spinning off of Time Warner Cable from Time Warner Entertainment. Read it carefully before responding...

 

[Ascbommgjrsurf]

Gray hasen't started changing on the stations they purchased from Meredith out any of the Sub Channels yet.

 

[Don in CT]

I know they aren't related in any way. I was just comparing the spinning off of The Weather Company from The Weather Channel to the spinning off of Time Warner Cable from Time Warner Entertainment. Read it carefully before responding...

The Weather Company was bought by IBM and has no connection to the Weather Channel TV network. Just licensing deals.

 

[Justin Hill]

One of Gray's purchases is WPCH-TV 17 "Peachtree TV," an independent station (and the origin of Ted Turner's Superstation WTBS/TBS Superstation feed for many years before WTBS 17 Atlanta became separated from the cable feed of TBS Superstation, now simply known as TBS, in 2017) which was sister station to WGCL-TV, "CBS 46," another Meredith property involved in the sale...

One of the quirks of the separation of WPCH-TV 17 from TBS during and after 2017, is that cable providers in Canada still carried WPCH-TV 17 not long after they changed their callsign from WTBS to WPCH and the branding from TBS17 to Peachtree TV. Much of the schedule remained the same as it did in Atlanta, but with simultaneous substitutions during the CBS 46 newscasts, which replaced the newscasts with infomercials.