WTKR Anchor Les Smith suffered a mild heart attack on his way to work last week.
He returned to work yesterday after a short hospital stay, where Doctors put in a stent.
While he was suffering his heart attack, Smith made sure someone snapped a selfie for him and he used it on the air in his return.
Why a polished Anchor like Les Smith would have a heart attack outside the rating book is beyond us.
Let's go to the video:
WPLG in Miami has bumped up Betty Davis to the role of Chief Certified Meteorologist .
Davis now leads the WPLG Weather Authority Team with Max Mayfield, former director of the National Hurricane Center who is WPLG’s hurricane specialist, along with meteorologists Julie Durda, Trent Aric and Jennifer Correa.
Davis, who joined the station in 2011, holds the highest credentials available for a broadcast meteorologist. She holds the CBM seal from the American Meteorological Society and a seal of approval from the National Weather Association.
H/T TVNewscheck
While many people had the day off yesterday (FTVLive worked all day) Reporter Josh Chapin started his first day at KHOU in Houston.
Chapin came to Texas from WVIT in Hartford.
According to his bio, Chapin joined WVIT in November 2012 as a reporter in NBC's New Haven bureau. Before that, he worked at News 12 The Bronx and News 12 Brooklyn as an Anchor/Reporter.
H/T Mike McGuff
The event you guys have all been waiting for happens in 9 days.
TruTV will show the news battles between WABG and WXVT in the tiny market of Greenville, Miss., in their reality series "Breaking Greenville."
It will be a look at how TV news is done in a small market and it should be good for some laughs.
Sherry Nelson, general manager at WABG, said the stations received assurances they would not be made to look foolish. “We were concerned with the angle they wanted to take,” says Nelson (and she believed them?!)
Several staffers from both stations chose not to participate in Breaking Greenville. Some who did have come across, at least in the pilot, as self-reverent and petty, being way more focused on ratings than delivering good stories for viewers. “My primary concern,” says Nelson, “is that we’re portrayed as the station we are, and for the stories we do.”
Set your DVR's, you are not going to want to miss this.
H/T B&C
Update: You can watch the first episode on YouTube for $1.99 which is exactly $1.98 more than I want to spend to watch that crap.
On his lame Sunday show, Fox’s media critic Howard Kurtz took a brief few seconds to talk about FNC's apologies for airing claims about the discredited “no-go zones” in European cities, including the now-retracted statement by terror “expert” Steve Emerson that Birmingham, UK was “totally Muslim.”
But then Kurtz turned the story around and blamed CNN's Brian Stelter, Huffington Post and others that wrongly identified Emerson as a "Fox News contributor"
Kurtz said, “several news outlets wrongly identified Emerson, with the Huffington Post variously calling him a ‘Fox News contributor,’ ‘Fox News expert’ and ‘Fox News idiot’ — rather than just a guest.”
Of course Emerson is not the "Fox News Idiot" Howie, everyone knows that's you.
Here's the video:
H/T Mediaite
Juan Kincaid, who left New Orleans CBS affiliate WWL earlier this month, will join Fox affiliate WVUE as sports director, the station announced in Today.
Kincaid replaces Fred Hickman, who recently left WVUE.
Interestingly in the WVUE announcement, the station never mentioned WWL, because God knows all the viewers would immediately turn to that station.
Kincaid had been at the station for 14 years before leaving.
"We couldn't be more excited to have Juan join our award-winning sports team," said Mikel Schaefer, WVUE's news director, in the station's press release.
Kincaid must sit out a noncompete clause in his WWL contract, and will work behind the scenes at WVUE until making his July debut on WVUE's newscasts.
Longtime WMAQ Reporter Nesita Kwan has left the Chicago NBC O&O after 20 years.
Most recently Kwan the health editor at WMAQ.
She is a past president of the Asian American Journalist’s Association, and on the board of the Chinese American Service League.
“I want to thank Nesita for her many years of service to our news team,” said VP of News Frank Whittaker.
in 2013, Kwan completed 200 hour yoga teacher training with Tejas Yoga, and is now a certified teacher.
We're guessing that training will be part of her next move.
The website Breitbart.com was doing a story about CEO's salaries and how it compares to the CEO company's workers.
The site says that "the perceived disparity between a company’s CEO and its average worker has been a trope of the left and an obsession of the news media for decades."
They point to NBC's Brian Williams to make their point.
"Television’s top news anchor, NBC’s Brian Williams, earns a reported $13 million a year to read the news. His pay packet is 350 times the earnings of the average TV news anchor, reporter or correspondent, who pull in around $37,000 a year. This disparity far surpasses the 150-1 ratio earned by the average CEO, according to Bloomberg.
If Brian Williams’ salary were brought in-line with the average amount CEO pay eclipses that of rank-and-file workers, his earnings would be around $5.5 million a year, rather than $13 million. No one is suggesting Mr. Williams take such a pay cut."
Today we get to pick the mind of TV's best Reporter (at least in his mind) Gary Vosot.
Every Reporter has some Gary Vosot in them and we thought it would be cool to see how Gary Vosot works.
So we asked him.
Twitter Name: @GaryVosot
Location: NYC
Current gig: Beloved Local TV Reporter & Social Media Influencer
Current computer: MacBook Pro
Current mobile device: iPhone 6
One word that best describes how you work: Passionate
What are your favorite Apps that you can't live without? Twitter & TurboScan
What's your workspace like? Neat & Organized
Besides your phone and computer, what gadget can't you live without? Generation 3 iPod
What Music are you listening to? Anything on WFUV
What's your sleep routine like? Upstairs at midnight. Comb hair. Brush teeth. Comb hair. Sleep till 7am.
Best Advice you Ever Got? If not now, when? Translation: Take the risk & follow what you love.
Previously: How I Work - Matthew Kingsley
How I Work - Derry London
As a golfer, there is nothing worse than missing the cut, but today I'm happy that I did just that.
I was called for jury duty for this morning. The jury notice gave me a phone number to call on Sunday to tell me if I had to report today.
I called the number yesterday evening and there was no answer. The notice said that if there was no message then you are required to report. Damn!
About an hour later I figured I would try calling back the number one more time. The message said that jury group numbers 1-16 must report and jury group numbers 17-20 are excused.
I looked at my number and I was in group 18. YES!
No jury duty for me and FTVLive for you.
I call it a win, win.
How WMC in Memphis did not save this story for the ratings book, we have no idea.
WMC broke the exclusive story that school kids in Memphis are on a bus ride straight to hell. A local parent that obviously has way too much time on her hands, contacted WMC, saying that the school busses in town have a satanic symbol in their brake lights.
No really!
"Anyone who fears a God, if not God and Jesus Christ, should be outraged," parent Robyn Wilkins told WMC for a story about the lights.
School officials refused to answer WMC's claims that the school buses are coming straight from hell, because you know, they have like real school stuff to do.
Here's the station's story:
I'm sure that most of you have heard of a "selfie Stick"...if you haven't, it is exactly what it sounds like, It's a stick that you mount your iPhone on and use it to help you take selfies.
You go to a city like New York and you see many people walking around with a selfie stick. But what is really sad and a sign of the times, is the selfie stick making it's way into TV news.
This photo was snapped of a Reporter working for WOR's "Chasing New Jersey" and yes, she's using a selfie stick.
While you my laugh and think it looks funny, it might not be long before you are shooting your stand up with a selfie stick.
Just saying...
Gary Stromberg worked as a Reporter at WJW in Cleveland for 32 years. Which is about 28 years longer than we have worked at a single station.
Back in 2003, Stromberg was elected Akron-based Broadcasters Hall of Fame. He was supposed to be presented with a plaque at the time, but there was a problem and he was told they would get the plaque to him.
As time went by, Gary's plaque never arrived and he forget about it. But years later he finally got his reward.
We'll let him tell the story:
"In 2008, five years later, I retired from FOX8, and moved to Las Vegas. In late September of this year, I received a Facebook message from Suzy Gigante. She's the secretary to the station's General Manager. She told me that Dollis Rogers of The Broadcasters Hall of Fame was trying to reach me. She provided me a number and I contacted Mrs. Rogers. She told me that they came across my Hall of Fame plaque from 2003. She had no idea why it was tucked away in the office for 11 years. She said they would make sure I got it.
After all of those long years, I guess there was no real sense of urgency. Three more months went by and I was pleasantly surprised to receive a package the other day. There it was. It had survived 11 years stashed in an office and a cross-country journey. Now all I have to do is decide which wall in my home is best suited for my Hall of Fame plaque."
I guess it's true, good things come to those that wait.
KRIV Weekend Morning Meteorologist Caitilin Espinosa is calling it a career and getting out of the TV news game.
"The past 6 months I have been dealing with personal health issues, and I took it as a sign to leave the TV industry," Espinosa told mikemcguff.com. "My health is good now but I need a job with fewer environmental stresses. The cold studio, long unusual hours really made things worse for me."
Espinosa says she can mark TV career off her bucket list. The Houston native goal was to work in a top 10 television market and her hometown. She's now done both.
Prior to coming back to Houston, Espinosa was the morning meteorologist for KIII-TV in Corpus Christi. Before that she was at KVEO-TV in Brownsville. She is a graduate of Baylor University.
"It was a very tough decision to leave and everyone at FOX has been incredible, begging me to stay," Espinosa told mikemcguff.com. "I am really going to miss my FOX family!"
Espinosa is launching a new YouTube channel called #DearCaitilin. You can call it an advice channel for life.
She says she signed a contract extension with KRIV to help out until the station finds a replacement.
"I am happy about how and where my TV career is ending," Espinosa told me.
Back in early December, FTVLive told you how KSAZ Fox O&O weekend anchor Kristen Keogh was leaving the station to start her own venture.
Keogh teamed up with KPNX Reporter Hailey Frances to launch a YouTube channel called the CraftCasters.
It is newscasters that do crafts...get it? CraftCasters!
Now, Frances has ditched TV news as well and along with doing the CraftCasters, she is hosting Dog parties. Yes parties for dogs, we're assuming their owners will be coming to the parties as well.
And who said there isn't life after TV news?
Word is that ABC is looking to pull the plug on 'The View' after this season.
The show has run it's course and in a last ditch effort, ABC brought back Rosie O'Donnell to try and boost ratings. The move has backfired and the back and forth bitching between O'Donnell and Whoopi Goldberg is turning viewers off.
Sources say as bad as it is on air, it is even worse behind the scenes. Producers hate working around both Goldberg and O'Donnell and tensions are extreamly high.
When/if .....let's be honest WHEN ABC pulls the plug on The View it will fill the slot by extending Good Morning America.
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