Weighing in on Scripps Anchorless News

Yesterday, in a Patron Only story, FTVLive showed you a clip of what Scripps newscasts, sans anchors, look like.

Many of you commented on our Patron page.

One Journalist emailed us with their comment:

Hello Scott,

Just reading how Scripps has cracked the daVinci Code of "re-imagining" local news. Unfortunately for the genius management/business bro's in Cincinnati, anchorless, mostly pre-recorded local news has been tried a few times before.

Last time I heard about this was from a forgettable local non-affiliate station in one of the BIG Texas metros. Haven't heard much about them or their hashmark ratings lately, have we? But I do remember the arrogant bluster from the manager bro on how successful it would be.

Of course, who could forget the disaster in Seattle when they decided the anchor desk had to go and we got wandering anchors in Out of the Box News? Genius re-imagining there too!

Since the day I started in local TV news back in October of 1990, the business has been continuously assaulted by management bro's (and yes, the female equivalent too) of these graduates of the Dunning-Kruger School of Management Incompetence and Toxic Leadership hoping to re-imagine the local news business. If you want to connect with a human audience, you're going to need relatable, credible humans delivering your product. Otherwise, all you're doing is laying off people so the CEO can (and I hear did) get a big pay-raise.

I can't wait to read your future coverage of Mr. Symson's whining about his business' lack of relevance in the community.