Pittsburgh Paper Mourns the Loss of Meaningful Local TV News

By Kevin Eck 

switcher_color barsThe Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ran an op-ed mourning the passing of local TV. The title says it all, “Local TV News, RIP. It used to keep us informed; now, it’s not even entertaining.”

Is the writer disremembering local TV’s Golden Age or is he spot on? You be the judge.

At some point along the way someone came up with the bright idea that the news could be a profit center with commercials and ratings instead of being a public service, and things began to change.

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What has evolved is only a faint remnant of what TV used to be and what it still could be if some executives would realize that quality content sells soap. Instead we are bombarded with a barrage of shameless self-promotion for the sake of ratings.

I actually think they spend more time telling us what they are going to tell us than they do actually telling us. Then there is the extremely annoying and endless teasing. If Chicago were hit with a nuclear bomb, the local stations would say, “Find out which major city was wiped off the map today –— details at 11!”

The actual content of the news is woefully lacking. I think that a house fire in some outlying small town belongs in the local community paper, not on the metropolitan 6 p.m. news.

Check out the entire read by clicking here.

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