Back on December 17th FTVLive told you that WOFL in Orlando had very quietly parted ways with Reporter Shannon Butler.
Now Butler will resurface across the street at WFTV.
The veteran reporter will start freelancing for WFTV-Channel 9 in June, the ABC affiliate announced Monday.
WFTV also announced that it has hired reporter Stephanie Bertini from ABC affiliate KRGV in Weslaco, Texas, in the Rio Grande Valley. She will join WFTV in mid-June.
H/T Orlando Sentinel
Back in October of last year, FTVLive FIRST told you that KNBC Anchor Lucy Noland was getting pushed out at the NBC O&O.
This was the same story that KNBC PR person Terri Rosales Hernandez promised to call us back "in two minutes." Here we are in May 2014 and she still hasn't called us back.
Noland has finally landed another gig.
At the end of June, Noland becomes that evening Anchor at WTXF in Philly.
She will anchor both the 5 and 10PM newscasts for the Fox O&O.
Just another reason why newspapers are dying:
Yahoo has posted a job for an Anchor. The posting states "Were looking for a creative, driven, experienced producer able to producer anchor level talent.The successful candidate will have at least 5 years of experience working in broadcast TV and/or digital video..."
Wait a minute! Isn't this the same job Yahoo hired Katie Couric to do?
Is the company already posting Couric's job or are they adding another Yahoo Anchor?
FTVLive has to wonder if this job pays $6 million bucks a year as well.
If so, we know a number of people that might want to apply.
People like to sue TV stations and networks hoping to make a boatload of money. Most of the time the lawsuits are pure crap and should have never been filed in the first place.
But one guy is suing MSNBC and he appears to have a strong case against the cable net.
The man says MSNBC misidentified him as a criminal on one of its programs, allegedly causing him public humiliation, crying spells and loss of employment income.
During an episode of “Caught on Camera: Dash Cam Diaries on MSNBC, a man who had reportedly stolen a limousine was arrested by police officers after he was hit with a stun gun in the back of the stolen vehicle.
The man’s name is Todd Keith. He was later convicted of receiving stolen property, resisting arrest and destruction of property. However, MSNBC identified Keith Todd — a construction worker from Michigan — as the perpetrator instead. His name and picture were shown on the national reality TV show.
More after the jump.
Read MoreThe folks at the Weather Channel just can't keep their mouth shut.
TWC got into a Twitter fight with a Ft. Worth Council member.
Councilman Joel Burns, who has been leading a fight for gay teens and to end bullying had downloaded TWC's app and got tired of seeing pictures of Dallas when the Weather Channel app was giving weather details for Ft. Worth.
Burns took to Twitter to get TWC to make the change:
He then did as promised and deleted the Weather Channel's app from his phone.
Only then did The Weather Channel reply on Twitter:
Many on Twitter thought the Weather Channel's response was a bit crass and they started tweeting their disproval:
After all the negative tweets, The Weather Channel said they were sorry:
No word if anyone from TWC is now looking for employment. But someone should be.
The last time we heard from former RT Anchor Liz Wahl, she was hanging out of Twitter trashing her former co-workers that are still working at RT.
But, now we here that Wahl has found a better way to spend her time. Wahl is doing some fill in work at The Blaze, Glenn Beck's conservative website.
The Blaze staff tells FTVLive that Wahl is filling in for a few days while Laurie Dhue and Amy Holmes are off.
"We are big fans of Liz’s solid track record of great journalism and standing up for truth" said Mike Sorrentino Senior Producer at The Blaze.
Beck made mention and discussed Wahl's filling in on his radio show.
Longtime Morning Anchor Kyle Dyer says that she has chosen to go part time at KUSA in Denver.
"I will continue to anchor the 11 a.m. and noon newscasts on 9NEWS. I will also produce interview segments and stories that will air during the 9NEWS morning show. I will be engaging on our social media platforms and looking forward to meeting you at community events. This all will take effect July 7. Until then, I will continue to be with you all from 4:30 to 9 a.m." Dyer says on the station's website.
More of why she says she's cutting back at KUSA after the jump.
Read MoreIt appears that no one wants to hang out with David Gregory, even if it's for a good cause.
The website Charity Buzz is offering a chance to meet David Gregory and attend a taping of Meet The Press.
The site pegs spending the day with Gregory worth $1000, but with just one day left, bidding hasn't even reached half that.
The current bid stands at $450 and the winning bidder so far is Jimmy K (Jimmy Kimmel perhaps?).
FTVLive thought of placing a bid, but we're not sure that Mr. Gregory would want to hangout with us for the day (in reality who would?)
CNN's Anderson Cooper got the get that all the news organizations were trying land.
Cooper sat down with Racist and LA Clippers boss Donald Sterling as the NBA owner tries to turn the court of public opinion to his side.
CNN will air the interview on Cooper's show Tonight with set up clips airing all day on CNN (think missing plane of racists).
CNN did release a clip showing Sterling trying to cry fake tears and doing a poor acting job to say the least.
Let's go to the video:
NBC's Ann Curry was hiking on a mountain in New York when she fell and broke her ankle.
Lucky for her, the Boy Scouts from Troop 368 from Berkeley Heights, N.J were also hiking on the same mountain.
The scouts jumped into action to help the former Today Show anchor. They made a splint for her leg and built a stretcher to carry Curry off the mountain (lucky for them, it wasn't Al Roker).
Scouter Rick Jurgens recounts what happens in Scouting Magazine:
"The guys on their own, with no direction from me, start running into the woods," Jurgens said. "And she didn't know what was going on, and I didn't know what was going on either."
Turns out they were finding pieces of wood for a makeshift stretcher — the same kind they teach you to make in first-aid classes. They found two strong sticks and tied on a tarp. One of the Scouts, Andrew Stecher, got on the stretcher to test its load-bearing ability. It worked.
They set the stretcher next to Curry, her ankle really swelling up now. She slid onto it, and the Scouts picked her up. Jurgens and another adult helped guide the Scouts and point out rocks along their path.
The boys didn't know that they had just saved a real live TV star until one of the boys Googled Curry on his phone.
A few days later, Curry sat down and wrote the boy scouts a thank you letter:
H/T Gawker
TV stations love to waste viewer's time with on air marriage proposals. FTVLive always thought that if you're going to show that crap on TV, you should also show when the couple files their divorce papers.
Now, at least one New York Anchor has picked up on our idea....sort of.
WPIX Anchor Tamsen Fadal is writing a tell-all about her nasty divorce from ex-husband Matt Titus.
The Anchor's book “The New Single,” details the rocky split with her ex-husband, and she provides a road map to being a new divorcee.
Sources say Fadal kicks off the book by saying: “In 2007, I was married in the New York Times. In 2012, I was divorced in the New York Post. Not exactly Cinderella’s story, but it is mine.”
Fadal married Titus, a self-proclaimed “relationship expert,” in 2007, and her wedding was covered by the Times’ Style section’s “Vows” column.
The couple subsequently created a matchmaking business and wrote several books on relationships together.
But the two parted ways in 2012, and Page Six revealed at the time that Titus had a relationship with an employee at their “Love Consultants” business while he was separated from — but still married to — Fadal.
Ouch!
“The New Single” will be released in May 2015.
Looks like one Chicago area man didn't learn his lesson even after killing his friend.
Scott Hirschey, who in 2008 drunkenly crashed a snowmobile in Wisconsin, killing a Chicago TV news anchor, was sentenced to two years in prison on Friday for a later DUI.
Hirschey, 50, was charged with drunken driving in Crystal Lake in July 2012, just around the time he was due to complete a three-year probation sentence for the snowmobile crash that killed his longtime friend and passenger, WBBM-Ch. 2 morning news anchor Randy Salerno.
Salerno, 45, had been a passenger on a snowmobile that Hirschey was driving when it slammed into a pine tree in Vilas County, Wis., after a night of drinking. Salerno died at the scene after the snowmobile hit an embankment and sailed about 45 feet, authorities said. Some four hours after the crash, Hirschey’s blood-alcohol content was .225, authorities said, nearly three times the legal limit to drive.
Before he received his sentence today from McHenry County Judge Gordon Graham, Hirschey told the court that he accepted fault.
He admitted to making a "horrendous" decision to drive drunk in 2012 and was "grateful" that no one was hurt by his actions that day.
"I will regret that decision for the rest of my life," he said. "I truly had reached a new rock bottom in my life."
He said he had attended his first AA meeting the day after this accident and has attended regularly since. He said he recently became an AA sponsor.
Breaking into tears, Hirschey spoke of how he feared losing his business, his wife and his relationship with his son.
The state asked for the maximum five-year prison sentence.
The facts of this case are "extremely troublesome," said Assistant State's Attorney David Metnick, noting Hirschey’s involvement in the crash that killed Salerno.
In July 2009, a Vilas County judge had sentenced Hirschey to three years of probation and 100 hours of community service after he pleaded no contest to homicide by intoxicated use of a vehicle in that fatal crash. The judge ordered Hirschey not to drink alcohol. Salerno’s family had asked the judge to spare Hirschey prison time.
It was right around the time that Hirschey was released from probation in that case that he was accused of drunken driving, and a host of traffic offenses, in Crystal Lake.
H/T Chicago Tribune
It was a big story in SoCal, a great white shark was caught on camera swimming just off the coastline of San Diego.
A juicy story for May ratings.
Both KGTV and KFMB ran the pictured that was posted on the Shark Research Committee's website.
Just one little problem, the picture was fake.
Ralph Collier of the Shark Research Center posted the photo after he received it.
Two days later, he said the two stations, KGTV and KFMB, contacted him to ask about the photo for news stories. "I did not contact them," he said.
"I'm not out for publicity after 50 years. That's not what's important to me," he added. "What's important is reporting accurate information."
KGTV's news director Joel Davis confirmed with iMediaEthics that the station first saw the shark photo on the committee's website and then began looking into it for a story. He said that the station interviewed Collier as part of its verification and tried to find the original photographer for more information.
"We questioned [Collier] about the authenticity of the photo, and he felt very strongly that it was real. We tried different search engines to find the person who actually took the photo to get his story, but he has a very common name and we were unable to contact him. So, we ran the story with the context that it was posted by the Shark Research Committee website, and explained that they as experts believed it to be authentic."
Collier said that after the news reports aired, a friend told him the photo may have been doctored. He later received a copy of the original photo showing the dolphin.
"You can see where an individual had a photograph of the white shark swimming at the surface and cut from the dorsal fin to the back fin off and placed it on top of the dolphin," he explained.
"Had I known this was a fake, an altered picture, of course I would not have put it up," he said, adding that he alerted the two media outlets when he found out the photo was not real.
KGTV's Davis added that the original photographer contacted the station to let them know the photo was fake after seeing the news report.
The PGA Tour's Players Championship happened over the weekend here in Ponte Vedra Beach, Florida.
This is one of the premier events for Professional Golf and one that broadcast partner NBC devotes a lot of time to.
Normally the broadcast opens with Bob Costas setting the stage and then handing off the coverage to Dan Hicks and Johnny Miller. Costas would then handle the players interviews and set up pre-packaged stories.
But, this year there was no Bob.
Former Good Morning America Anchor Josh Elliott was in the chair and did all the parts of the broadcast that Costas normally did.
When NBC Sports hired Elliott, rumors started swirling that he would replace Costas. NBC denied that, but this weekend Elliott was in the same chair that Costas sat in for years and Bob was nowhere to be seen.
Hmmmmmmm?
We'll believe it when we see it.
But, Barbara Walters says she’s ready to go cold turkey when she signs off from TV this week.
Walters signs off from “The View” on Friday, wrapping up a half century in which she became one of the most influential and recognizable news and talk personalities on television.
“It’s the first time I don’t have something else [on the air] to go to,” says Walters, who turns 85 in September. “I look forward to that.
“I could stay on if I wanted to. I control the show. It’s not as if anyone asked me to leave.
“But I’ve accomplished what I wanted to accomplish.”
“The View” plans a week of specials, including a reunion Thursday of all past and present hosts.
On Friday night, 9-11, ABC will broadcast a two-hour retrospective on Walters’ career.
The network is also naming its New York news headquarters after her.
Walters says she hasn’t yet written what she will say at the end of Friday’s “View,” beyond that she will thank her long-time co-producer Bill Geddie.
“I’ll say something,” she says. “It won’t be long, but it is the end of my whole career.”
So she says, anyway.
“I have friends who are news junkies,” she muses. “They’re sitting there checking their iPads every minute.
“I try to know what’s going on, but I’m not like that. If you put me on an island without an iPad or any news source, I’d be very happy.
“For two days.”
H/T NY Daily News
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