Diana Marszalek

Apparently, 21st Century Fox, the media conglomerate controlled by Rupert Murdoch, is weighing options to help thwart a potential takeover of Tribune Media by Sinclair Broadcast Group. Fox is deliberating over possible choices after having been approached by several parties, which are interested in acquiring Tribune directly or as part of a consortium, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the talks are private. One of the parties that has talked with Fox is activist investor Starboard Value LP, which owned a 4.4 percent stake in Tribune as of March 15.

While Sinclair recently approached Tribune about a possible merger, the companies aren’t close to a deal, other people familiar with the matter said. Nexstar Media Group is also weighing a bid, although it hasn’t hired a financial adviser yet, the people said. Nexstar has a history of laying in wait for a potential deal, striking an agreement to acquire Media General in 2015 only after Media General had announced plans to merge with Meredith Corp. While some of the parties eyeing Tribune are interested in teaming up with Fox for a bid, Fox doesn’t want to acquire the broadcaster, the people said. Murdoch’s company may ultimately decide not to intervene at all, apparently. A combination of Tribune and Sinclair, two of the country’s biggest TV station owners, would give Sinclair control of 28 percent of the Fox-affiliated channels that Murdoch’s company doesn’t own directly, the people said. That would give Sinclair a stronger negotiating hand in future talks with Fox about how to split fees from cable providers, the people said.

For a growing number of TV station newsrooms, election season will be more than election night with fancy voting graphics, talking heads and remotes from hotel ballrooms, say local TV news executives and observers.

Debates, roundtables, aggressive campaign beat reporting and political fact-checking will be more prevalent on-air between Labor Day and Election Day than they have in the past, they say.

Local broadcasters say the nature of their political coverage this season will be markedly different, too, as they heighten their commitment to probing candidates’ claims versus being an outlet for press conferences and talking points -- and hopefully hook viewers by doing so.

“The role of journalists in terms of sorting truth from half-truth or lack of truth is becoming more critical,” says Hearst Television’s VP of News Candy Altman. “There is so much out there now, that trying to find trusted sources for reality is really important.”

Speakers at the recent Investigative Reporters & Editors conference say that 76% of local broadcasters partner with other news outlets, and it behooves TV reporters to maximize the potential -- and benefits -- of those collaborations, whether they like it or not.

And the same goes for collaborating with their own digital teams. There should no longer be a division between on-air and digital departments.

For the most part, TV news targeting African Americans has been a bust. Two now defunct cable networks, Black Family Channel and New Urban Entertainment, tried it in the early 2000s, and the pioneering BET now limits itself to breaking news and occasional specials, eschewing regular newscasts. But despite some skepticism, the concept is showing new signs of life at both the local and national levels.

The idea for one of them, the Black Television News Channel, dates to 2008 when former-Rep JC Watts (R-OK), a founding partner in the venture, announced his intention to raise $20 million to build the operation. Watts’ partners include Bob Brillante, a cable industry veteran who founded the Florida News Channel, a regional 24-hour cable channel; former US House of Representatives Budget Director Steve Pruitt; and Frank Watson, a media management consultant.

Brillante says the demise of black-owned TV stations has fueled the need for black-targeted programming -- to say nothing of the potential money that can be made serving an audience that watches 37% more TV than other groups. According to Brillante, BTNC programming plans call for a nightly one-hour newscast featuring “culturally specific” content as well a business news show and a morning news show. Other slots will be filled with talk shows.

The key contract it wants to resurrect is with Comcast. It had agreed to air BTNC in seven of the country’s top 10 African American markets -- Chicago, Philadelphia, Washington, Atlanta, Detroit, Miami and Baltimore.

With social media testing journalism, newspeople have to maintain the industry’s core virtues -- fairness, accuracy and the like -- to maintain ethics in reporting, a group of industry leaders said.

“We don’t like to be told that Twitter kicked the mainstream media’s butt. I think that gets to journalists,” said Internet Broadcasting’s Scott Libin, chair of the Radio Television Digital News Association (RTDNA) ethics committee. “But we need to be aware of that and develop our own standards, which includes being right even if it doesn’t mean being first.”

Libin, along with Michigan Radio’s Vince Duffy, a past RTDNA chairman, and WDEL-AM Wilmington (DL)’s Chris Carl, the current chairman, said it is becoming increasingly difficult for journalists to maintain ethical reporting practices, largely because of the pressures imposed by social media.

Social media, particularly Twitter, is testing journalistic standards by pushing out large amounts, though often unconfirmed, information that reporters are expected to compete with, they said. Libin said the problems that arise from social media -- from the abundance of unconfirmed reports, to the demand on reporters to have the correct information first -- are not wholly new, but journalists need to protect themselves from getting swept up in them.

With growing consumer demand for video on smartphones and tablets, broadcasters need to take charge in making mobile TV a robust business, even if other players like manufacturers are hedging, industry leaders say.

“Mobile TV is really in the hands of the broadcast industry,” Salil Dalvi, an NBCUniversal Digital Distribution SVP, said during a panel discussion on mobile TV at the National Association of Broadcasters Show. “TV stations have a lot of power to both light up for mobile as well as create awareness and bring people to the table.”

Dalvi said that was proven during the 2013 holiday season when Dyle, a mobile TV product backed by broadcast groups including NBCU, tested its viability in 12 markets across the country. That test run showed that consumers like the idea of mobile TV, with 15% of Dyle mobile TV consumers watching at least two hours of TV a week on their smartphones or tablets, he said.

TV ads were instrumental in building demand for Dyle, he said. “We went from zero awareness to significant awareness,” he said. But mobile TV won’t thrive if broadcasters don’t push it rather than wait for other segments of the industry, such as electronics manufacturers, to take the lead, he said.

Meantime, indicators point to growing consumer interest in mobile TV, said Jamie Spencer, a Magid Associates VP. He said research shows that “smartphones and tablets are becoming full-blown TVs.” About 44% of Smartphone owners and 61% of table owners currently watch video on their devices -- and local broadcasters have opportunity to capitalize on that interest, Spencer said. Nearly 40% of consumers who don’t watch local TV news said they would be more likely to do so if it were available on mobile, he said.