NBC Owned Television Stations

About 75 local broadcasters representing mostly NBC affiliates around the country are geared up to go to the Winter Olympics in Russia. The NBC Owned Television Stations are sending 25 anchors, reporters and producers. Gannett Broadcasting will have 20 in Sochi, including several from newly acquired Belo stations. And Hearst is sending nine. In each case, the contingents are larger than ever before.

NBC has moved its mobile website and app development for its stations in house, building the sites off its content management system and aiming for four to six niche apps for each of its 10 stations. “Strategically, the overall goal for us is to find one or two things that we can do really well in each of our markets,” says Lora LeSage, senior VP of digital media at NBC Owned Television Stations.

The new syndicated daytime show will debut on the 10 NBC Owned Stations in fall 2014, giving it coverage in 27% of the United States..

Meredith McGinn becomes SVP of diginet Cozi TV Network and LX.TV Productions, and Jeff Kurtz is now SVP of digital media and multicast sales for the station group.

The company’s 21st Century Solutions program will again award 30 grants totaling $1.2 million to local nonprofit organizations in the 10 markets served by the NBC-owned stations.

David Doebler, the former head of the network’s WVIT Hartford-New Haven, Conn., is tapped to lead its Windy City O&O.

Tony Chiulli, former WNBC New York local sales manager, becomes SVP of national sales, East Coast, for the station group.

The multicast channel offers a mix of classic TV shows, original network programs and local programs supplied by its affiliates. On board at launch are the 10 NBC O&Os and 14 other stations.

NBCUniversal is getting ready to turn the clock back with Cozi TV, a new digital subchannel filled with “retro reruns” and old movies. Nothing is official yet, but it’s slotted to debut Jan. 1 in all 10 markets with NBC-owned stations.

With freshman talker Jeff Probst faltering and the NBC Owned Television Stations looking at options, at least two of the major syndicators would like to supply a replacement. Sony Pictures Television is pitching Queen Latifah and NBC Universal is said to be developing a show tailor-made for the group’s daytime schedule. “Just a few weeks ago, NBC stations had an entire afternoon of problems,” says one syndication executive. “Now, in just a few weeks, after having a daytime problem for years, they have [only] one problem,” he says referring to Probst.

She will handle editorial and special content responsibilities, audience development and digital marketing coordination for the websites, social platforms and mobile apps of the 10 NBC-owned stations.

Begun as a bottom line necessity for many stations back in 2009, the pooling of news coverage and helicopters is still growing, even though one of the original participants, the NBC stations, is getting out or reducing its involvement in several markets, including New York and Los Angeles. Other broadcasters remain bullish: “This is about enhancing our coverage; this is not about skimping,” says Scripps Television’s Lana Durban Scott.

The station group’s leader, Valari Staab, is betting two new syndicated shows — Steve Harvey from NBCUniversal and Jeff Probst from CBS Television Distribution — will flow nicely with current shows and help turn around the fortunes of her 10 stations.

A multi-platform approach to covering the games will include more than 25 reporters, editors, producers and photographers, more than twice as many that covered the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games.

News staffers are prohibited from tweeting, posting or distributing via other social networking means “anything that compromises the integrity and objectivity of you or NBCUniversal,” even using a personal account. Some observers see the policy as overly broad, but NBC says if material is not solid enough to include in a newscast, it shouldn’t be distributed via social media either.

With the July 27 start of the London games getting closer, news crews from NBC O&Os and affiliates across the country are hard at work producing stories, profiles and packages to give them a local ratings boost. And some are prepping to make the trip overseas to be on hand for the 17 days, generating more material for themselves and, in some cases, their group-owned siblings.

The past year has seen an increase in investigative reporting by stations in Washington. “You’re not going to distinguish yourself by covering that fire — unless you can follow up on why the fire hydrants didn’t work,” says WUSA News Director Fred D’Ambrosi.

A new initiative, 21st Century Solutions, will support “high-impact” local iniatives through a $1.2 million nonprofit grant program in 10 cities.

After six months of working together on investigative reporting and other stories, the participants have a list of important stories they’ve broken together.  Poynter’s Al Tompkins observes: “At one time, partnerships were mostly about distribution and publicity. But these days the partners are taking their roles much more seriously, adding significant content according to each partner’s expertise.”

Seven stations expand their websites to highlight local investigative reporting.

Under a new agreement announced today, the NBC Owned Television Stations group will sell national advertising for four Comcast SportsNets.

Cathy Jones is tapped to be SVP of national sales for the NBC-owned stations in Los Angeles, Chicago and Dallas.

The business news weekly aimed at African Americans will be carried on subchannels in New York, Dallas-Fort Worth, San Francisco, Miami and San Diego beginning Feb. 12.

When Comcast first announced its plans a year ago to buy NBC Universal from General Electric, the experts felt it was the cable networks, not NBC and its television stations, that Comcast really wanted. There was across-the-board gnashing of teeth about what would happen to NBC. But Comcast executives assured regulators and tried to persuade the experts that that wasn’t the case. They really believed in broadcasting, they said. They looked forward to reinvigorating the business and restoring the Peacock’s colors. And over the past 12 months, Comcast has shown that it meant everything it said.

NBC News taps Kevin Keeshan, the former news director of KGO San Francisco, for the post.

NBCUniversal will deliver news, information and entertainment to 12,000 taxis and thousands of gas stations nationwide in markets including New York, Chicago, Boston, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Washington and Miami.

NBC Owned Television Stations today announced it has entered into agreements to create cooperative newsgathering and reporting arrangements with a series of locally-focused, nonprofit news organizations.

Rebecca Campbell (l), CEO of the ABC Owned Television Stations, and Valari Staab, CEO of NBC Owned Television Stations, face very different tasks. Staab has before her a full-blown reclamation project while Campbell is charged with maintaining her group’s reputation as local TV broadcasting’s premier franchise. But the two women also share attributes: Both are engaging personalities and boast proven aptitude at running major market TV stations. It will be interesting to see how they approach their respective challenges.

After going it alone for eight years, NBC Owned Television Stations outsourced its master control centralcasting to Encompass Digital Media. From a single hub in Atlanta, Encompass handles basic master control chores for the 10 NBC O&Os — their main channels as well as their subchannels as well as six of NBCUniversal’s Telemundo stations. The classic hub-and-spoke centralcasting model runs on the Snell Group’s Morpheus software-based automation and media management system.

Eight of the 10 NBC Owned Television Stations will carry the new daytime talk show in fall 2012, including WNBC New York, KNBC Los Angeles and WCAU Philadelphia. Also clearing the talker are stations in 16 of the top 20 markets.

Rather than a series of individual regional and local multicast channels, NBC Owned Television Stations is now going with a single national network with a mix of national and local programming. Veteran local news executive Meredith McGinn is charged with developing programming and seeking affiliates in markets beyond the 10 of the NBC O&Os.

Valari Staab, a longtime ABC local broadcaster who was hired away to lead the NBC Owned Television Stations, is reinventing the group through a four-pronged strategy of bigger budgets and staff for better, stronger newscasts; better promoting those newscasts and stories; increased local autonomy; and otherwise recharging the non-network daytime schedule.

Broadcast Interactive Media (BIM), a provider of revenue generation tools and data services for local media, announced today that Telemundo Station Group has selected BIM as its website technology provider. […]

The former finance VP of WNBC New York is promoted to oversee finances for the company’s 10 owned stations.

The 10 stations will carry the new show from Endemol USA that will debut in syndication next fall. The one-hour show will be based largely on Harvey’s relationship advice books.

Two new programs will give recent college graduates or newspaper journalists wishing to move into TV the opportunity to receive training at the 10 NBC Owned Television Stations with a possibility of employment at their completion.

Veteran TV marketing exec Therese Gamba will help the stations created unique brand strategies and coordinate NBCUniversal promotional campaigns and marketing.

One of the first moves made by the new head of NBC’s television stations, Valari Staab, was to rename her group from NBC Local Media to NBC Owned Television Stations. While I applauded the introduction of Local Media four years ago, the time is now right for the new moniker. Staab has smartly focused the attention of every one of her employees on strengthening the 10 stations. And the name change also tells the world that the new controlling owner of NBCUniversal, Comcast, believes in the vitality and growth potential of broadcasting.

The group that oversees 10 TV stations will begin selling national advertising for New England Cable News beginning at the end of this month.

In an apparent effort to emphasize the unique value of the company’s TV stations, Valari Staab, newly appointed NBC station group president, is rebranding her NBC Local Media division as NBC Owned Television Stations.