Tag Archives: WKCF-18

Recent RogerSimmons.com Orlando TV News reports involving WKCF-Channel 18, the CW affiliate for Central Florida. The station is part of a Hearst Television duopoly with WESH-Channel 2. WKCF originally broadcast on Channel 68.

Daily Buzz ready to make big move

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Moving day is near for the folks at The Daily Buzz.

The Orlando-based national morning show will be vacating its home in the former WKCF-CW18 studios on Friday. The show has been headquartered in the building since moving to Central Florida in 2004. But WESH bought WKCF last year and moved its operations to Channel 2′s Winter Park studios. Then, the WKCF building was sold to religious station WTGL-Channel 52.

So, where’s the Buzz going? To Disney World, of course! The show will broadcast from the Disney-MGM studios for two months while new studios are built for it at Orland0′s Full Sail school of film, art and media production.

"We’re going to have a lot of room at Full Sail, and everyone involved is pretty excited about it," a Buzz insider said.

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WKCF doing well for the CW

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After picking up the pieces from the failed WB and UPN networks, the CW is still trying to find its identity — and its viewers.

But Orlando’s WKCF-CW 18 has emerged as one of the netlet’s strongest affiliates. "The initial ratings were soft, we think, because of a lot of confusion surrounding the launch of The CW," station GM Bill Bauman told the Orlando Sentinel. "But we have seen growth every week."

Bauman, who also manages WESH, praised the CW management team, too. "We’ve had many conversations with the people running The CW, and they appear to me to be the most affiliate-friendly network ever," he said.

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Morning news battle heats up today

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Good morning, Orlando. You may not realize it, but you’re waking up in what has become the most competitive market for morning news in the nation — with more local news, with more national news and with plenty of surprises.

Monday morning, WESH-Channel 2 and WFTV-Channel 9 will start their early newscasts at 5 a.m. and then keep on broadcasting once their respective network morning shows go on the air at 7 o’clock. Instead of watching NBC’s Today, you can view WESH 2 News on CW 18 from 7-9 a.m. by switching over to WKCF-Channel 18. Instead of watching Good Morning America, you can tune to Eyewitness News This Morning from 7-8:30 a.m. by going to WRDQ-Channel 27.

WESH’s and WFTV’s news expansion to their sister duopoly stations sets up a local 7-9 a.m. showdown for the first time. WOFL-Fox 35 has had the 7-9 a.m. local broadcast news franchise to itself for six years since it launched its morning news in 2000. (Oh, and we can’t overlook cable’s Central Florida News 13, whose all-local newscasts do well in the mornings, too.)

WFTV was the first to announce its plans to expand its Eyewitness News franchise in the morning to sister station WRDQ. The details were revealed in early December, but the station has been planning the new morning news since July.

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New news moves Buzz to later air time

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WESH’s decision to air local news on WKCF-CW18 from 7 to 9 a.m. each weekday has displaced The Daily Buzz.

The nationally syndicated morning show will now air on tape from 9 a.m. to noon on WKCF. The show had been airing live from 6-9 a.m. on WKCF since it moved operations to Channel 18′s studios in Lake Mary in 2004.

Once WESH acquired WKCF last year, it immediately indicated its wanted to air local news in the Buzz’s time slot. The big question is whether the Buzz will remain at 9-noon on WKCF or be dropped from the station all together soon.

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CW Signs Up 18 — Plus Other Stuff

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It’s been a newsy couple of days so far this week …

The new CW Network signed up its first round of affiliates on Wednesday, and among the group of five was Orlando’s WKCF-Channel 18. The future former home of the WB network will now be the place where the CW calls home in Central Florida. WKCF won out over independent WRDQ-Channel 27. I’m not sure how strong of a contender Channel 27 was for CW affiliation, but a couple of insiders said the station sure was interested. Emmis-owned WKCF is still up for sale, by the way, and CW affiliation should help those prospects. The other new netlet this fall, Fox-owned My Network TV, will end up on Fox-owned WRBW-Channel 65, currently home to UPN. Read the full story.

Marc Middleton ended a 20-something-year career at WESH on Tuesday, signing off after the noon news. Middleton came to WESH initially as its sports director back in the early 1980s. He later swapped places with then-morning anchor Bill Shaffer. As reported earlier, Middleton is teaming up with former Channel 2 anchor Andrea Coudriet in starting a media relations company.

Reynolds Wolf, former morning meteorologist at WKMG-Channel 6, is joining CNN as a new weathercaster. After leaving O-Town, Wolf was at KMOV in St. Louis. He starts Monday. Here’s more info.

Central Florida News 13 is getting a full-time Tallahassee bureau. Station owner Bright House Networks said the bureau, working out of FSU station WFSU-Channel 11 (PBS), will feed stories to CFN 13 as well as sister station Bay News 9 in Tampa. "What happens in Tallahassee on a daily basis affects all of us living in Florida," Elliott Wiser, vice president of news programming for Bright House Networks Florida Group, told the Orlando Sentinel.

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It’s CW Decision Time for WKCF, WRDQ

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TVWeek reports that more than 200 TV station owners and executives received their first communications from the new CW Network on Tuesday — starting the process for affiliate selection.

In Orlando, that affiliation choice comes down to two stations:

  • WKCF-Channel 18, the current WB affiliate and one of the strongest WB stations in the nation.
  • WRDQ-Channel 27, the independent station owned by Cox and run by the stongest station in the market, WFTV.

Selection of O-Town’s CW station could come quickly, according to the letters sent out. "Affiliation materials will be sent out this week. At the same time, we will be contacting each company involved in the first wave of affiliation discussions," the letter said. "We will do what is necessary to move quickly to evaluate each market, as well as to provide each television station that wishes to participate in our evaluation process an opportunity to do so."

As they say in TV, stay tuned …

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