During the coverage of this year's Fair St. Louis, there was little mention from local TV stations about how many people attended. Fair officials later estimated some 250,000 people came to the two and one-half day event. But there was perhaps a shot at the lower attendance at the parade fired by Channel 5. A graphic noted "dozens turn out for 132nd VP parade." Clearly, … [Read more...] about Channel 5 captions leave room for improvement
Tripp Frohlichstein
TV station’s reputation takes hit in aftermath of school safety ‘test’ story
Editor’s note: Tripp Frohlichstein has been retained by Kirkwood in the past, though not on this incident. He had two sons go through the Kirkwood school district. Also, a shorter version of this story appeared in the spring 2014 print issue of Gateway Journalism Review. This is the story of a good idea gone bad. It is the story of a series of mistakes made by a … [Read more...] about TV station’s reputation takes hit in aftermath of school safety ‘test’ story
Slacking election night coverage exposes other website flaws
Many people now rely on the Web to get results on election nights. Such Web-savvy folks likely were frustrated with St. Louis’ local TV election-night website coverage. Viewers would have been unable to find anything on KSDK Channel 5’s website. There was no reference to the election on the station’s main page. A search provided unrelated stories and election results from … [Read more...] about Slacking election night coverage exposes other website flaws
St. Louis TV station does disservice to viewers
St. Louis television station KMOV (Channel 4) did an extraordinary disservice to viewers on March 7. Anchor Sharon Reed read, in her usual dramatic style, this promo at 6:20 p.m.: “Tonight at 10, tainted beef on local store shelves. News 4 exposing a major alert that your family needs to know about before your next meal. Tonight at 10.” If it’s so important, tell us now ... … [Read more...] about St. Louis TV station does disservice to viewers
Covering the St. Louis winter
This winter, the most-talked-about local news is the weather. It seems like every few days we have another storm of some type. This puts extra pressure on the local television stations who know that people are tuning in to see what it is going to do – and when. Technology has helped weather coverage a great deal. All of the stations can now broadcast video of conditions … [Read more...] about Covering the St. Louis winter