page 2
thursday, february 9, 1978
ad lib
TV news' big guns are shooting it
By Jim Williams
Omaha's television news has always been a competitive
business, and station news directors agree that the compe
tition is increasing.
They don't always agree, however, on the reasons and
results of the nightly shootout at 6 and 10 p.m.
Networks, with their higher production budgets, have
virtually eliminated locally -produced entertainment pro
grams from most stations. Broadcasters fill schedules with
network programs, syndicated game shows and re-runs,
and movies from suppliers or the station's own library.
The newscast, though, is something that can't be bought.
Except for an occasional public-service program, it may be
the only program the station produces entirely on its own.
Local news also can be profitable, as stations have dis
covered. Because of this, they take a strong interest
in the results of ratings-Nielsens and ARBs-that give
stations and advertisers an idea of audience size.
Unusually intense
"It's unusually intense now," Dave Henderson, news
director Of KETV channel 7, said of the competitive situ
ation. "February is a rrTonthly rating period-you've seen, for
example, on Channel 3 (KMTV) a promotion. I think
often stations gear up for a rating period."
"Promotion is a continuing task," said Mark Gautier
of KMTV. "Promotion is normally increased during rating
periods. We are in a position where we are changing talent
(newscasters) and changing format. We'd have to promote
this anyway."
Steve Murphy of WOWT channel 6 said the three
Omaha stations have stepped up competition as a con
tinuing.process. "We have rating periods several times a year, and what
I see (increased competition) has been happening over the
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Top
Quality
Bottom prices
and fast
service, too.
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Entertainment Editor: Pete Mason. Cover Design: Liz Beard. Layout:
Kitty Policky.
Ad lib is an entertainment supplement published by the Oaily Nebras
kan. Editor in Chief: Ron Ruggless. Advertising Manager: Gregg
Wurdeman. Production Manager: Kitty Policky. Business Manager: Jerri
Haussler.
Unless covered by another copyright, material may be reprinted
without permission if attributed to Ad lib, entertainment supplement to
the Oaily Nebras kan.
Ad lib is distributed Thursdays with the Oaily Nebraskan.
Cover Photos by Ted Kirk
Japan is the third richest nation in
the world. Many estimate that by the
end of the century it will have
overtaken even the United States.
Production has become for Japan an
end in itself, a new measure of
national greatness.
In 'Holy Growth,' the second
program in the 'World' series
Thursday, Feb. 16 on PBS, English
filmmaker Antony Thomas
documents the price Japan is paying
in human terms for its astonishing
postwar growth.
Thomas takes viewers on a dark
journey through Japan's industrial
miracle. In a six-foot square room in
the squalid suburb of Kamagasaki
that has no windows and no fresh
air can be found a color television
set, an electric fan, a stereo and four
electric clocks. Electric washing
machines are chained to the
pavement beacuse of the lack of
interior space.
'Holy Growth' describes the
encompassing corporate care for
employees as in the scene pictured,
that of a corporate man taking out his
anger in his firm's 'release room.'
THURSDAY FEB. 8, 1978
EVENING
6:00 0000 NEWS
O EMERGENCY ONE
O DICK VAN DYKE SHOW
SUN: COMPUTER SCIENCE
6:30 O NEWLYWED GAME
O MARY TYLER MOORE
O TO TELL THE TRUTH
O CONCENTRATION
Q WILD KINGDOM 'Girl Scouting
And The Wild Kingdom'
O ODO COUPLE
MACNEIL LEHRER REPORT
7:00 O MOVIE ' V "Hatari" 1962
John Wayne, Elsa Martlnelli. A
team of professional hunters cap
ture wild animals for the Momefla
Game Farm In Tanganyika to send
to zoos. (3hrs.)
O O CHIPS An enterprising
lunch truck driver and a muscular
truck driver devise a unique way
o obtaining parking spaces.
Guest star: Rose-Marie. (60 mln.)
last couple of years," Murphy said. "I don't think you can
build an audience by concentrating on a rating period.
"Our various promotion departments get more active
this time of year, but in the news department we keep
trying to do the job we do all year."
Technological improvements
Murphy said technological improvements, like elec
tronic Cameras, have stepped up the news rivalry. Stations
are also enlarging their news staffs as more people with.
TV news training become available, he said.
Dave Henderson of KETV said the station has just
spent $300,000 to buy electronic news equipment like
WOWT's Action Cam.
"We've watched WOWT and learned from their mis
takes," Henderson said.
KMTV's Gautier said the electronic camera is a valu
able improvement, but that sometimes stations overstress
its gimmick value.
"Particularly when a station is first in the market (with
electronic cameras). . .they do inane stories," Gautier said.
"We don't do anything that doesn't add to the perfor-.
mance of the journalistic function. Electronic journalism
is only a tool."
News consultant
Another recent development is the news consultant,
who gives a station suggestions to increase the popular
appeal of its newscasts.
WOWT has consulted with Frank Magid and Associates
of Marion, Iowa, and KETV with Virgil Mitchell and As
sociates of Los Angeles, according to an October 1977
article in Omaha magazine.
WOWT's Steve Murphy said his station uses some of
the consultant's suggestions and rejects others.
"Our relationship with them is that they come in with
recommendations," he said.
WORLD
O O WELCOME BACK, KOTTER
The Sweathogs become alarmed
when Freddy Washington suffers
an injury In a basketball game,
then encounters unexpected
trouble while trying to recover.
O THE WALTONS The Walton'
neighbor, Verdle Foster, traces
her roots and "finds out some
astonishing facts about her lamily
tree. (60min.)
O ADAM 12
WILD WORLD OF ANIMALS
"The Army Ant"
7:30 O O FISH While Phil licks his
pencil to take an aptitude test
suggested by psychologist
Charlie, he's also lacking his
chops about capturing an
obscene telephone caller bugg
ing Diane
O SERGEANT BILKO
O AGRt-SCOPE
:00 O O JAMES AT 16 James' 18th
birthday becomes a special day to
remember when he experiences
his first love affair with an attrac
tive Swedish exchange student.
(60 min.)
O O BARNEY MILLER Refusing
to enforce an eviction order lands
Captain Miller In the departmental
doghouse, and men of the 12th
precinct are faced with making a
full-scale assault on an old hotel.
(Concluding episode)
O HAWAII FtVE-O David Blrney
guest stars as a glamorous young
politician and presidential
aspirant who is being blackmailed
In an effort to force him to
smother an explosive congres
sional Investigation that he is
directing. (60 min.)
O NEWS
G9 FARM DIGEST "Agricultural
Implications Of The Panama
Canal Treaties Part H. Guests:
Allan Grant, President of the Farm
Bureau; Iowa Senator Janet
Culver; and USDA official Thomas
Savior.
O O CARTER COUNTRY Curtis
urges Chief Roy to hire another
black police officer, and
discovers he has made a ' big
mistake.
O NBA BASKETBALL (LIVE)
Denver Nuggets vs Golden State
Warriors (2 hrs., 30 min.)
VICTORY AT SEA "Mare
Nostrum" A look at the second In
stallment in the struggle for the
Mediterranean.
83 O WHAT REALLY HAPPEN
ED TO THE CLASS OF '65 The
class's star basketball player and
most promising senior goes to
college, where he takes part in a
fraternity prank and gets caught
stealing an exam from a
professor's files. Guest stars:
Dirk Blocker, Vincent Van Patten.
(60 min.)
O O BARETTA Ray Bolger
guest stars as Willie Kessler, a
legendary entertainer who Is the
victim of a series of attempts on
his life. (60 min.)
O BARNABY JONES The un
wanted attentions of a rejected
Romeo become so persistent and
unbearable that the desperate girl
involved comes to Barnaby's firm
for help. (60 min.)
NORTHWEST TRAVELER
"Norway"
DATELINE NEBRASKA
O STAR TREK "Menagerie" Pt. I
(60 min.)
QOOQ0NEWS
IB DICK CAVETT SHOW Part two
of a pane! on "Aging In America."
Guests: Maggie Kuhn of the Grey
Panthers; Rep. Claude D. Pepper
(D-FIa); and Dr. Robert Butler,
author.
O O THE TONIGHT SHOW
Host: Johnny Carson. Guest:'
Johnny Ma this. (90 min.)
O O STARSKY AND HUTCH
TOMA Starsky and Hutch-Glllian-
A -beautiful girl creates a
conflict between the detective
partners when Hutch falls In love
with a call girl. (R) Toma-The
Street Toma enlists the aid of a
powerful black pimp to stop mob
takeover of prostitution. (R; 2
hrs., 15 min.)
O FOREVER FERNWOOD
LEGISLATIVE REVIEW
CI GUN8MOKE
O CBS LATE MOVIE " "The
Carey Treatment" Stars: James
Coburn, Jennifer O'Neill. A physi
cian finds himself caught up In
the murder of a prominent doctor.
O MOVIE V, The Gay
Divorcee 1934 Fred Astaire,
Ginger Rogers. A lonely dancer
falls for a woman who mistakes
him for another man. (2 hrs., 15
min.)
EVENING AT SYMPHONY
Modern music takes the spotlight
as Seili Ozawa conducts the
Boston Symphony Orchestra In
Symphony No. 4 by Charles Ives
and Beta Bartok'a Suite from "The
Miraculous Mandarin." (60 min . )
fl SERGEANT BILKO
O O TOMORROW Host: Tom
Snyder. (60 min.)
QGROUCHO
fl ANSWER 18 LOVE
O MOVIE Hatarl 1962
John Wayne, Elsa Martlnelli. (90
min.)
ONEWS
O DRAGNET
ONE
fl FOCUS
O LOVE AMERICAN STYLE
O DICK VAN DYKE SHOW
1 1 NIGHT GALLERY
f 9 THRILLER
O UNTAMED WORLD
O WILDLIFE THEATRE
6:30
9:00
9:30
10:00
10:30
11:00
12:00
12:30
12:45
10
1.10
118
1:45
240
10
3:39
40
60
80
out in Omaha
"I'm not a believer in news consultants' said Mark
Gautier of KMTV, which doesn't use one. "I think they're
the worst thing that's happened to broadcast journalism
in the country."
Low profile impossible
Gautier said that in the early days of television news,
reporters wished they could work as unobtrusively as
newspaper writers, without awkward lights and cables.
He said that now; when such a low profile is becoming
technically possible, consultants are telling stations to at
tract attention at news events. -
He said the influence of consultants is beginning to
appear in the ABC network news and in. some newspapers,
which he says are giving people a little less of what they
need and a little more of what they want.
"I'm not sure that this is the way the American people
can best be served, and we have the consultants to thank
for it," Gautier said.
But the three news directors agree that competition
can make news better.
"Competition is what makes product improvement,"
Gautier said. "However, too fierce and frenzied compe
tition, in short run cases, causes things I don't like to see.
I don't like to see promotion creep into newscasting."
"I think competition is bound to improve It," said
Steve Murphy, whose station's hews, led the last ratings.
"If you only had one TV operation In town, it would
become fat and lazy."
"When we started really competing about two years
ago, Omaha was asleep," Dave Henderson said. "We like
to think we spurred (the competition).
"I think all three stations have a great obligation not
only to the city, but the region. . .and I think we all have
a way to go in doing that."
More details tonight at 6 and 10 p.m.
Tony and Luigi's: Tim YoungbJood, Feb. 13 through
16, 8:30 p.m. to 12:30.
Royal Grove: Sunnuva, Today through Feb. 11,
Feb. 13 through 16, 8:30 p.m. to 1 a.m.
Boar's Head: Tunesmith, Jbday through Feb. 11,
Feb. 1 3 through 1 6, 8:30 p.m. to midnight -
v
Zoo: Sandy Creek Pickers, Today through Feb. 11,
John Walker, Feb. 13 through 14, Jam Feb..: 15, Magic
Slim and the Tear Drops, Feb. 16, 9:30 p.m. to 1 a.m.
Oscar's: Charlie Burton and the Rock Therapy, Today
through Feb. 11, Tim Reddy, Feb. 13 through 15, Lark,
Feb. 16, 3:30 p.m. to 12:30 a.m. .
Stan's: Dusty Blue, Feb. 9 through 12, Timberwolf,
Feb. 15 and 16
Two Eyed Jack's: Freeride, Feb. 10 through 12,8:30
p.m. to 12:30 a.m.
((daytirnej)
MORNING
6:00 QBOZO
O NOT FOR WOMEN ONLY
OPTL PROGRAM
fl ANSWER IS LOVE (WED.)
8:05 O FARM AND RANCH REPORT
6:10 ONEWS
6:18 f l UNO SCENE (WED.)
6:30 O ROMPER ROOM
O LUCY SHOW
O O VARIOUS PROGRAMMING
0 BUNKY'S FUN CLUB
7:00 O ARCHIES
O0TOOAV
ocas NEWS
fl GOOD MORNING AMERICA
0 1 DREAM OF JE ANNIE
05 SESAME STREET
7:30 O FUNTSTONES
O MCHALE'S NAVY
8:00 ilPOPEYE
CI GOOD MORNING AMERICA
O CAPTAIN KANGAROO
O FUNTSTONES
Q IN-SCHOOL PROGRAMMING
(UNTIL 8:30) Commissioner's
Bulletin Board (TUE.)
8:30 O LITTLE RASCALS
CI CARTOONS
8:00 f 1 700 CLUB
O O 8ANFORD AND SON
C I ALL MY CHILDREN
CI TATTLETALE8
CI PHIL DONAHUE SHOW
O NEW ZOO REVUE
1:30 CI O HOLLYWOOD SQUARES
C) PRICE RIGHT
C I BEWITCHED .
10:00 CIO WHEEL OF FORTUNE
O HAPPY DAYS
O HAPPY DAYS (EXC.FRI.)
Martha's Kitchen (FRI.)
O LOVE AMERICAN STYLE
IN-SCHOOL PROGRAMMING
(UNTIL 3 JO)
1048 CI RELIGIOUS PROGRAMMING
CJ O KNOCKOUT
OO FAMILY FEUD
C 1 LOVE OF LIFE
C 1 NOT FOR WOMEN ONLY
1140 CI NOT FOR WOMEN ONLY
fl O TO SAY THE LEAST
tlC 1 120.000 PYRAMID
C I YOUNG AND THE RESTLESS
C I FATHER KNOWS BEST
1130 CIO GONG SHOW
C I CONVERSATIONS
C JO WAN'S HOPE
C I SEARCH FOR TOMORROW
O MAY8ERRY R.P.D.
AFTERNOON
live nigh? on
tfhe flown
THURS THRU WED
nOONEWS
CI NOON SHOW
fl ALL MY CHILDREN . -
C JIM NABORS SHOW .
O SESAME STREET
12nS CI FARM ACTION
1240 fl DICK VAN DYKE SHOW ' " ,
I J O DAYS OF OUR LIVES
C I CROSS WITS
f 1 AS THE WORLD TURNS ""
140 O LUCY SHOW
CIO ONE LIFE TO LIVE
O MOVIE Comrade X" (THUR.),
"Mystery Of The Wan Museum
(FRI.), "Coma Uv With Mn
(MON.), "Ma And Pa Kettle Go To
Town (TUE.). The Brain (WED.)
O IN-SCHOOL PROGRAMMING -(UNTIL
3:30)
1 JO O BEVERLY HILLBILLIES
OO DOCTORS
O GUIDING LIGHT
2:00 O PLEASE OONT TEAT THE
DAISIES - . .
OO ANOTHER WORLD
O fl GENERAL HOSPITAL
240 f GOMER PYLE
CI ALL IN THE FAMILY '
O DENVER NOW
SrflO CI MICKEY MOUSE CLUB
CI O FOR raCHEV
FOR
POOFlfcR - -
O O EDGE OF NIGHT
O MATCH GAME EXC.THURJ
The Winners (THUR.) '
O FUNTSTONES .
3 JO C 1 TOM AND JERRY
CI O G"LUGANS ISLAND
CI TATTLETALES
C 1 PHIL DONAHUE SHOW .
C 1 1 LOVE LUCY
CIMERVGRtFFlN '
J ELECTRIC COMPANY
4.-00 CI GttXJGAN'S ISLAND - .
C I MY THREE SONS
O 1 DREAM OF JEANNK (EX-
C.WED.) ABC Attarscftool Special
WED.)
O DINAH
C 1 SUPERMAN
CJ MISTER ROGERS
440 C 1 LEAVE IT TO BEAVER
11 BEWITCHED
CI BRADY BUNCH (EXC.WED.)
II BIG VALLEY
C 1 FAMILY AFFAIR -
f l SESAME STREET
846 C 1 ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW
1 1 COO COUPLE
CIO ABC NEWS
ClILOVCLUCY
848 fl ROOKIES
CION8CNCWS
Ci&afffTCHcs
81 CBS NEWS
6JMEW3
f ) ANDY GRIFFITH SHOW
U OVER EASY
1340 OPOR RICHER, FOR POORER
