No, local TV folks, you're still not doing OK

Several months ago, I blogged about how TV stations face their own newspaper-like problems and issues, just on a more-delayed timeframe. That was after a local programmer on the TV side said "we're doing fine."

I cited a number of links to show that, even if his individual station is doing fine (he may have been extrapolating from just it, but didn't explicitly say so) his industry is not.

And, a snafu on the Trump campaign express illustrates. In two ways.

Per Joe Monahan, now independent, but former media, and a dean of New Mexico political consultants and analysts, talks about Trump's visit to New Mexico this week.

KOB, long one of the two biggies in Albuquerque, went dark just as Air Force One touched down. Bugs in a new graphics system did it.

First, that really shouldn't happen. Second, it shouldn't have long-lasting effect. But it did. Monahan quotes an unnamed source at the station:

Joe, the station just went to a new graphics system. It had a bug in it and took the entire system down, We could not get any remote camera coverage from KAFB or the Santa Ana center or the studio. Obviously, it could not have happened at a worse time. Of course, everything is done on a shoestring budget around here these days. 

KOAT, the other biggie, was live and lapped up. Why?

KRQE didn't even bother. That's NBC, ABC and CBS in order.

Fox? Don't have a station in Albuquerque on a main channel, per Wiki. KRQE runs them as a second channel at 13.2. In one sense, that doesn't matter in today's digital TV age. But, in another sense, it's interesting that a top-50 TV media market doesn't have four fully independent stations.

As for why KRQE didn't show? Joe knows:

While the early going was a disaster for KOB it hardly registered with much of the public (especially those younger) who long ago abandoned TV news for social media and/or alternate video streams. 

The TV news audience is much smaller than it was back in 2000 when another disaster befell local media. That's when the Los Alamos fires broke out.

So, no, TV guy, you're not doing so well. It's OK to join newspaper folks and stop whistling in the dark.

For security reasons, there probably wasn't much private video of the Air Force One touchdown. But the Trump rally? People were surely Facebook Living that all over the place off their smartphones.