Repackaging reality: the contours of originality among U.S. local television stations
Date
2022
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Publisher
University of Delaware
Abstract
The consolidation of local television news station ownership groups through tactics like shared service agreements has avoided FCC regulatory mechanisms and led to fewer independent voices in local broadcast media. In television markets, shared service agreements have been previously shown to allow station owners to broadcast previously aired, unoriginal news content across multiple stations. This paper investigates the extent of unoriginal, pre-produced local news programming across local television news stations in the U.S and the characteristics of local television stations and markets that are more likely to originate news content. Frequency analyses and linear regressions were performed on a sample of 895 English-language local television news stations operating between Sept. 1st and Nov. 30th, 2019 to determine the characteristics of stations that were more likely to originate news content and the characteristics of stations more likely to air news produced at another station. Station revenue, owner size, and market size were the most significant predictors of news station originality. All three variables were positively correlated with the likelihood that a television news station originated the news it broadcasted. This paper demonstrates how the economies of scale created by local television station owners in the absence of FCC regulation of shared service agreements have enabled nearly a third of all local television news stations to broadcast unoriginal, previously aired news content.
Description
Keywords
FCC, Media, News, Originality