I’ve been wondering about something for a while.
Call me crazy but why are Spanish stations used to support the approval of the WTVJ sale?
If the public airwaves are supposed to serve the public, ie taxpayers, how is including a station that broadcasts in a foreign language serving the public interest?
And yes Spanish is a foreign language so don’t go about arguing with me how it’s not. When you go to get a visa at consulate abroad, such as student, work, or even a visitor visa a decent command of the English language is expected from you. I know, been there done it. English is also a requirement in the citizenship test.
And yes I know public interest bla bla you’re on crack. I haven’t smoked anything, really, I know it’s all bullshit, business and all about making money for the rich white guys to buy their hookers and everything but still. Just wondering, or ranting as it is by now.
This rant of course assumes there will be no news on WTVJ once, or if, it merges with WPLG. So there are a lot of unknowns still at play.
I don’t particularly get my news from local tv stations anymore even for someone with a blog like this, but many other people do. It would be elitist to assume everyone wakes up in the morning and checks RSS feeds and what not.
Even though the polls say majority of people think the media isn’t honest and the daily sludge that passes as news is anything but I’d like to think there is still some redeeming quality to local news in general.
Still. The more I think about it the more I’m starting to believe the removal of an English language newscast, if it should be done, should be considered on fair terms.
Based on data from english language stations only since viewers of Channel 6, or most of them, probably do not speak Spanish so Spanish stations can’t really be considered a choise.
But then WTVJ wouldn’t be 6th overall. On many days WTVJ’s news finish 3rd and 4th at 11pm and lead in the morning. Assuming ratings data is correct and don’t even get me started on flawed ratings.
So if we were to accept that the newscast is the most important part of the station then using sign-on to sign-off ratings data and include Spanish stations is another way to adjust the numbers to suit the goal. Kind of like car dealers.
And FYI, I’m not anti anything, I just feel like there’s an apples and oranges thing going on
* My views are in constant state of flux in a space where gravity and normal laws don’t apply. So if you feel they’re wrong do tell why and why I should change them
As we all know, the MIA/FTL market is unique. To exclude Spanish stations would be to exclude about half of the market’s population.
Two things: English is not the official language of South Florida, or even of this country. There is no such thing as an “official” language in the United States.
English is not required to take the citizenship test. It can be taken in Spanish. That’s a whole other argument, but facts are facts. (Not even sure why that would be an issue in this debate.)
However, I understand your argument, though I don’t agree with it. Viewers are viewers, and advertisers are fighting for them, whether they “habla” or not.
Truth is the FCC judged the spanish station differently for years. I agree that it should not be considered into the WTVj sale. If you look at the ratings in NEw York & Los Angeles, they aren’t as high as they are in Miami. A merger like this would never fly in any one of those cities, so why should it in Miami. If the FCC approves this, it will just be bad for the industry as a whole. Miami has always been some sort of weird petri dish. If the FCC lets this go, expect to see it again and again until it’s too late.
Remember, the FCC considers sign-on to sign-off ratings, NOT newscasts.
Post Newsweek is only using the ratings for a portion of WTVJ’s rogramming. 9am to midnight, excluding NBC’s morning news and Today Show and excluding the secon dhalf hour of Jay Leno. I think it is wrong, since NBC6 is powerhouse in morning TV, Today Show is number 1 and shoe is their morning news for the most part. I hope no one pops up saying WSVN leads, since WSVN is averaging their ratings for 4 hours and not on an hour by hour basis. Anyway, this doesn;t represent the true ratings of WTVJ, no matter how bad you think they are. Also, from what Chaos Theory said, maybe I musunderstood you, but ratings in Los Angeles and New York are higher than Miami. Even if you see lower numbers, 1.0 rating point in Miami is 15 thousand viewers, while I think 1.0 rating in Los Angeles and New York is 100,000 viewers.
Spanish is holding on strong and growing like crazy in nearly all large AMERICAN cities. Univision in Ny and LA is in 1st place.
If you do the math of english and spanish viewers of all the stations, English is still largely king, by far.