Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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Big Red Machine
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

Post by Big Red Machine »

Laviemarg wrote: Mon Aug 07, 2017 7:10 am I don't understand why Sinclair didn't cool it with the Boris' segments and such. If you are going to be biased, don't rub it in people's faces before the FCC approves your merger.
Yeah. It's just common sense to cool down something that might get you heat until your deal goes through. It's not like they won't be able to put them back on after the merger. To connect this to ROH a bit, there does seem to be a culture of stubbornness in place at SBG, which is bad news for ROH both in terms of it decreasing the likelihood of a booking change and also in terms of a general lack of common sense on things.
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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Tribune Media shareholders have approved $3.9B Sinclair merger, vía http://www.fiercecable.com/broadcasting ... air-merger:
Against a backdrop of rising opposition to its proposed $3.9 billion merger with Tribune, at least one thing is looking up for Sinclair as Tribune shareholders “overwhelmingly” voted in favor of the deal.

Among Class A and Class B stockholders in the company, 73,566,589 votes for the merger while 182,337 voted against (341,265 abstained). Roughly 85% of Tribune shares were represented in the vote, which swung more than 99% in favor of the transaction.

"Today's vote is an important milestone in the merger process and confirms that Tribune stockholders strongly support this transaction and the value it delivers," said Tribune Media CEO Peter Kern in a statement. "We look forward to continuing our work with Sinclair toward the closing of this deal."

On the same day Tribune shareholders signed off, the FCC decided to extend the review period for the deal by about two weeks. The commission will continue accepting comment on the deal until Nov. 2, pushing back the original deadline set by the agency’s traditional 180-day shot clock on merger reviews.

The decision to pause the review arrived as groups like the Save Local Media Coalition—representing Dish Network, the American Cable Association, the Competitive Carriers Association and others—have heightened their rhetoric around the deal’s potential harm to public interest and media industry competition.

“Throughout this process, Sinclair and Tribune have failed to provide adequate justification that this merger is in the public interest and have not answered questions raised by the FCC and other parties in this proceeding. In this comment period, the FCC, as well as the Department of Justice and other parties, should pay close attention to the serious concerns that continue to be raised. This merger should be denied,” the Save Local Media Coalition said in an email statement.

Meanwhile, conservative news publications Newsmax has ramped up its opposition to the deal, even recruiting Democratic lawyer and advocate David Goodfriend to pen an op-ed in which he concurs with Newsmax CEO Chris Ruddy and accuses Sinclair of ushering out local sportscasters.

“That’s right, hell hath frozen over and pigs are flying overhead because Ruddy and Goodfriend agree that the Sinclair-Tribune merger would stink for everyone, especially sports fans who want nothing more than to watch their favorite local high school, college, and professional teams on television—with local sportscasters calling the plays,” Goodfriend wrote.
famicommander
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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Seems like this will finally go through soon.

http://variety.com/2018/film/news/sincl ... 202687573/

Sinclair is going to seek waivers to avoid having to sell stations in markets where they would have more than one station. The fact that they're trying to do this would indicate they are confident the deal is going to go through in the first place, as part of the original deal was them selling the stations. No point in them applying for an additional waiver if they had any inclination that the FCC or Justice Department would reject the whole deal.
Laviemarg
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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The FCC's Patel is now being investigated, related to potential Sinclair favoritism. This will delay the deal, and even if it closes, it can be contested. We'll get Sinclair's take at the investor call later in the month.

http://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/w ... une/171830

https://www.nytimes.com/2018/02/15/tech ... t-pai.html
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

Post by The Dragon Saga »

From this side of the planet America as a whole appears to be bat shit crazy.
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supersonic
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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The Dragon Saga wrote: Fri Feb 16, 2018 3:45 am From this side of the planet America as a whole appears to be bat shit crazy.
Nonsense. None of our citizens have a sense of entitlement in which they cherish holding on to the things they desire even as those things cause externality burdens to pile up.
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Wilson
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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America's run by lobbies and """benevolent""" plutocrats. We're even back to practically having our news being controlled by press barons again. To add to that, the political apparatus of the people just looks to be dismantled more and more everyday. And then their's our elected officials--it's completely exhausting.

Can't wait to hear which particular portions of the media will attempt to "report" on the integrity of the Department of Justice for their mounting investigations.
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

Post by famicommander »

They're not my elected officials. I didn't elect any of them. Nor would I spit on them if they were on fire.
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Wilson
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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I guess I should also say that given how volatile political conversations can be, explicit dialogue might be a little much for our small staff here to moderate. Generally, I like expressing political identity and possibility, but I'm likely to tamp down on real contested issues because I don't want to see things get messy.
famicommander wrote: Fri Feb 16, 2018 3:23 pm They're not my elected officials. I didn't elect any of them. Nor would I spit on them if they were on fire.
Saying all that, I should probably give this just the lightest edit to round off any rough edges, but alsooooo . . . show me the lie, though.
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supersonic
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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Abortion, gun control, police brutality, and gender self-identifying public restrooms.

Go.
Big Red Machine
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Re: SBG close to buying all Tribune TV stations

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How about we just steer this back to the actual topic at hand, so... we all agree that a delay is worse for ROH, right?
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

Post by Wilson »

Ahem. Now that Sinclair has blown up in all our feeds, let's just have a space to keep up with all the media mayhem.

Steven Perlberg of Buzzfeed just reported on the perceived "tamping down" of left-leaning reportage inside the large media conglomerate.
https://www.buzzfeed.com/stevenperlberg ... xyokkQpPob
She faced discipline for social media posts and restrictions in reporting on guns, white nationalism, and Liberty University, she said. Company documents do criticize some of her work as unfair and her behavior as unprofessional at times. Overall, the documents provide an unusually close look at one reporter’s experience working for a Sinclair station, and how the smallest details mattered and were recorded.

Crowe told BuzzFeed News that before the October 2015 climate change segment aired, she was ordered by Stevens to include Donald Trump’s opinion on the matter. “When I instructed you to balance the story, by including some of [the] other argument, you insisted there was no need to add such balance to the story,” he wrote in her Jan. 22, 2016, performance review.
Crowe told BuzzFeed News that she pitched a story about the rise of white supremacists in the area who she said she could get on camera for an interview. According to Crowe, Nichols told her that he didn’t see the news value. The piece would have been prescient, Crowe now says, because she offered the idea well before the race-fueled clashes in nearby Charlottesville that would bring national attention to the region.

Nichols did not return a request for comment for this story.

Crowe also claimed she was called off from digging into potential Title IX issues at Liberty University, a topic that was later covered at length in the local media. Crowe attributed the decision to close ties between WSET at the evangelical university, which is led by Jerry Falwell Jr., an ardent Trump supporter.

“We leave Liberty alone,” said another former employee. “It’s like Liberty is untouchable.”
Toward the end of the contract, Crowe said she was whisked into a room and told that the company had exercised an escape hatch to force her out early. It was her last day at Sinclair and, as it happened, her last day in the news business. She now works in the health and fitness industry.

“I believe the ire at me was politically tainted,” Crowe said. “If they perceived you as a liberal, or someone not going along with that whole credo, then you are done.”
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Wilson
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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And I don't know where to put this nugget other than here. I linked to this article by Bix in the SCOH thread, but I'm gonna reference it here too cause it's a doozy.
Seemingly out of nowhere, with the Golden Lovers in a top storyline and Dalton Castle as champion, a wrestling company backed by Sinclair has a case as the most LGBT-positive promotion in wrestling. While Castle is also never explicitly said to be gay, pro wrestling is not a subtle form of storytelling and it’s clear what the intention is in presenting a flamboyant, pink-wearing dude who is always accompanied by his shirtless, identical twin houseboys. And while there are certainly stereotypes at work in there, Castle has always been a fan favorite and has never been portrayed as anything less than a kickass wrestler worthy of being champion. But while NJPW and ROH appear to be connecting with LGBT fans on a level that wrestling promotions haven’t before, Koff seemed hesitant to make the connection.

“I’ve been asked about that,” he said. “I see the wrestlers as—I don’t want to say gender-agnostic. I see them for what they do as wrestlers, unless it’s part of the gimmick, [then] it’s a different story. Maybe I’m naive, but I don’t pay that much attention to it in life. People are people, and how they live their lives is really a personal choice. I try not to dwell on it.” After I clarified that I was referring to LGBT fans who are excited to see positive representation in wrestling where they haven’t before, Koff responded that this was “actually a very excellent point and a fair point, but I’ll tell you what they’re coming to see: They’re coming to see these guys work and put on an incredible half hour, 20 minutes, seven minutes, 60 minutes of work, where every minute is measured and every minute is done well.” Koff did mention how great Castle’s ring entrance is and how the fans are “welcoming to people like Dalton because they make the show better.” But that was the extent of his answer to the question about LGBT characters in ROH.

After the interview, during the show itself, and while writing this article, something kept sticking out in my mind: I wasn’t surprised that Koff had an answer for questions about over reliance on NJPW talent, because that has become the question that he’s always asked in interviews. I was surprised that he was relatively forthcoming about the controversy surrounding Sinclair. But I couldn’t shake how strange it was that he wouldn’t or couldn’t quite give an answer to what was effectively an alley-oop of a question about LGBT fans’ affinity for NJPW and ROH. Sometimes, saying nothing speaks loudest.
[Emphasis mine.]
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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Koff didn't dance around the LGBT question. He answered it how I react to questions or the subject of. I could care less if the person sitting next to me is gay, straight, Muslim, Jewish, atheist, white, black, liberal, or conservative I'm not going to treat them a certain way because of their beliefs/culture/sexuality/political view. We're all there to watch a (hopefully) good wrestling product. I don't care about those things at all, I just care that your a fellow wrestling fan and that makes you a friend of mine. If you're gay what can I do besides shrug my shoulders and say, "So?" To me these things should have never been issues especially in 2018.
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

Post by famicommander »

I really, really don't care about Sinclair's politics. WWE is run by Trumpsters, NOAH was owned by the freaking Yakuza.

To me any and all politicians are vermin in the first place. If I stopped supporting every company that disagrees with me politically I could never buy anything again.
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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dhads7161 wrote: Mon Apr 23, 2018 4:51 am Koff didn't dance around the LGBT question. He answered it how I react to questions or the subject of. I could care less if the person sitting next to me is gay, straight, Muslim, Jewish, atheist, white, black, liberal, or conservative I'm not going to treat them a certain way because of their beliefs/culture/sexuality/political view. We're all there to watch a (hopefully) good wrestling product. I don't care about those things at all, I just care that your a fellow wrestling fan and that makes you a friend of mine. If you're gay what can I do besides shrug my shoulders and say, "So?" To me these things should have never been issues especially in 2018.
I agree with your sentiment 100%, but if feels a little odd for Koff to not welcome praise. This is a pro wrestling promotion after all, and all promoters love getting their horn tooted.
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Wilson
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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dhads7161 wrote: Mon Apr 23, 2018 4:51 am Koff didn't dance around the LGBT question. He answered it how I react to questions or the subject of. I could care less if the person sitting next to me is gay, straight, Muslim, Jewish, atheist, white, black, liberal, or conservative I'm not going to treat them a certain way because of their beliefs/culture/sexuality/political view. We're all there to watch a (hopefully) good wrestling product. I don't care about those things at all, I just care that your a fellow wrestling fan and that makes you a friend of mine. If you're gay what can I do besides shrug my shoulders and say, "So?" To me these things should have never been issues especially in 2018.
The interviewer was just looking acknowledgement of the fresh interest as a result of this particular direction. All Koff had do in response is to feed a line in the vein of, We're excited to see this newfound interest in our product. Including a diverse fanbase is very important to what we do. No one is expecting that Koff respond like an activist. What is discouraging is that he responded in a very uncharitable and circular way about the topic, which makes you think that either he or Sinclair is uncomfortable handling the topic in any capacity.

And I understand the urge to see individual agnosticism as the acceptable measure toward, and perhaps even the resolution of, inequality. However, most bias against minorities come from systems rather than individuals. In order to build equity, it's key to understand the social frictions working against particular minorities, like the gender pay gap, racial household inequality, violence toward Native and disabled women, and so on, as intersections tend to mount. Social scripts work against people in very nuanced ways, and it's been the work of the underpriveleged to bring that to light so that historically enfranchised (especially white men, like me) are completely ignorant of their plight.
famicommander wrote: Mon Apr 23, 2018 6:24 am I really, really don't care about Sinclair's politics. WWE is run by Trumpsters, NOAH was owned by the freaking Yakuza.

To me any and all politicians are vermin in the first place. If I stopped supporting every company that disagrees with me politically I could never buy anything again.
I don't expect this thread to be for everyone. Sinclair has been popping up in the news a lot since the new administration. For some, it's vital to engage with ROH's parent company as they encounter the product.

Also, I can see this thread being useful for non-US members/lurkers--at least in broad terms, if they want that. US politics are complicated.
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

Post by famicommander »

US politics aren't complicated at all. Both parties love murdering brown people, though one pretends not to. And both love debasing the currency, raising taxes (directly or indirectly in the form of tariffs), and expanding welfare even though one pretends not to.

Any and all other issues are ancillary and only serve to divide and distract people. Warfare, welfare, and currency debasement are what has destroyed every major empire in the history of the world and neither party will ever stop doing any of those things.
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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famicommander wrote: Mon Apr 23, 2018 9:01 am US politics aren't complicated at all. Both parties love murdering brown people, though one pretends not to. And both love debasing the currency, raising taxes (directly or indirectly in the form of tariffs), and expanding welfare even though one pretends not to.

Any and all other issues are ancillary and only serve to divide and distract people. Warfare, welfare, and currency debasement are what has destroyed every major empire in the history of the world and neither party will ever stop doing any of those things.
Just... wow. I don't even know how to respond to a view so ridiculously cynical. So... do you think that police shootings of non-whites happen because police officers think politicians want them to do that, and that politicians get together behind close doors and have a good chuckle about it?

And all other issues are ancillary and only used to divide people? You really think these politicians actually don't have deeply held personal beliefs about the morality or immorality of things like abortion and the death penalty and gun control? That this is all some sort of scheme to take our attention away from... what, exactly?
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Wilson
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Re: Sinclair Thread incl. Tribune Merger

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Above, I read famicommander as using brown people as victims in the Middle East. And . . . maybe he's right to be cynical about it. Using short, non-committed strikes in the Middle East is still an impossibly popular tactic, both from bipartisan camps and more than enough reporters, despite the very real human costs and its ineffectiveness.

But I will disagree about the complexity of the politics making up the US. Even without mentioning how to amend policies, just bringing awareness to certain issues is so difficult. It's a constant battlefield, in policy and culture. To me, its very process is what makes its definitionally complicated.

(And maybe we can tone back some of the general politics, in favor of focusing on Sinclair media. We can be political without being totally free-wheeling.)
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