Sounding Off on Sinclair
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Many of you emailed FTVLive with your thoughts on Sinclair shutting down KTUL in Tulsa. Let’s share some of those emails.
Email:
Dear Scott,
Like you, I was gutted to hear KTUL Tulsa was gutted. You had your first job in TV news there. For me, it was the station that inspired me to get into broadcasting. KTUL epitomized local, committed ownership. In Tulsa, Channel 8 was known by its 1970s and 1980s slogan “8’s The Place”. And it was.
Channel 8 was considered a pillar of Tulsa. In its glory days, it oozed innovation and truly reflected its market. It was nationally known for its creative marketing with 8’s The Place Logo emblazoned on swimming pools and airplanes, its local Total 8 Tulsa News dominated the market, local programming like Chuck Zink, Uncle Zeb, Don Wood’s Weather coverage, and sports with Chris Lincoln who went on to ESPN, created a brand before the word existed in broadcasting. Channel 8 was the fertile ground for creating talent because its owner Jame C. Leake invested in the station and gave its staff freedom. Local and national newsrooms are filled with Lookout Mountain alumni, like you Scott and many others. Channel 8, then and even years after Leake sold it to Allbritton (WJLA owner in DC), Tulsa’s News 8 punched way above its market size.
The dismantling of a legacy station like this is sad, but not shocking. Like many others, it began its slow, long decline years ago - culminating with its purchase by legacy station trasher extraordinaire Sinclair 10 years ago. KOMO, KATV, WJLA, and KTUL have all been victims of its ax. Agains the odds, The KTUL team persevered to do as well as it could under its Hunt Valley overlords.
KTUL long ago fell, from market dominance to dominant family owned Griffin Communications’ KOTV (who had ironically opened KTUL years ago). KOTV News on 6 basically beats all of its competitors combined. Channel 8’s newsroom economics clearly no longer worked. Yet, even though many tuned out years ago, when the new hit - It hit Tulsa hard. It me hard. Social media comments in the thousands pillared Sinclair for desecrating KTUL - and ceding its news product to a cynically corporate BS “Hyperlocal Media Hub Center” 120 miles away in Oklahoma City at KOKH-TV 25. Ironic given FOX 25 was an early candidate of having its local news operation dismantled for the failed NewsCentral Hubbing project 20 years ago. “8’s No Longer The Place”, “I guess hyper local is the fire at a mall in Northwest OKC” is just a small sample of the outrage.
The future of local TV news is dim as local ownership has given away to mega-groups that are doomed to collapse from chord cutting, the loss of retrans, and ad revenue (outside of political) but most importantly and tragically because of the lack of relevance. Like with local newspapers, there will be 1 maybe 2 local TV players left in a market. And the sad thing is most people won’t notice. But what Sinclair did to Tulsa, KTUL, and the industry is a harbinger of things to come. Not only what they did but how they did it.
From an insider who posted on social media: “ All employees were summoned to a meeting on Thursday. corporate showed up and said there would be a "merge", and thus a reduction in staff, but didn't say how many would be cut and in what departments. they scheduled meeting with everyone individually, one at a time, to discuss whether or not they were being cut. there was basically a room full of employees watching their friends get picked off one by one for a couple hours, waiting to see who was next. even managers didn't know what was happening. It was terrible”. These talented, hardworking people deserved better. And yet, professionally they soldier on until the end on Dec 11th.
Following its recent horrible earnings report, Sinclair mooted in an interview that its future didn’t lie in local broadcasting, but other things like pet food and cemeteries. The fact that the Hunt Valley Huns have raised their white flag of surrender from local TV ownership gives me some hope. I am probably kidding myself that maybe, just maybe Channel 8 can be resurrected again, and once again “8’s The Place”.
Email:
Scott,
I agree with what you said about Sinclair screwing over the people in Tulsa, but I will bet you $100 that this is just the start.
Sinclair’s greed is bad for TV news and those of us who work in it.
Email:
It’s sad times in Tulsa.
Sinclair gutted a once great station.
Email:
I’m sure you’ve heard of the consolidation of news operations of Sinclair owned KTUL in Tulsa and KOKH in Oklahoma City. Although I live in Dallas ft worth, I’m from Oklahoma City and KOKH studios is literally a 5 min walk from my mother’s house. Im well aware of the history of KTUL and their once dominant stature in that market. I went to school at oSu in Stillwater and we were able to see both okc and tulsa stations and at the time KTUL always stood out as the best station in that market (this was during the late 90s and early 2000s). I heard a large number of people got laid off because of this. I know Sinclair has brought down the news quality of KTUL for many years (as they have stations in other markets) and I find this ODD that they are doing this while the CEOs And board members continues to fatten their pockets with $$.
Sad time in the news industry
