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Fox 25 now Cox 25

Variety reports Fox has sold WFXT to the Cox Media Group. The station will become a Fox affiliate, so don't worry about missing the Simpsons.

Ed. question, possibly completely offbase: Would this let Uncle Rupe buy the Herald?

Via Dan Kennedy, who hopes Cox doesn't decimate the Fox 25 news team.

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Comments

please, Cox, layoff that blowhard VB!

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VB's our local version of Brian Kilmeade!

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that smart.

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the channel changes VB has been responsible for and the worn out clicker batteries.

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He's actually softening now that he's a dad.

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it can... but he would have to sink allot of $$$ into it, also I think they decide to sell a TV Station in one in Top Ten Markets (Boston is 7th), it could mean that News Corp. is looking to get out of Boston and consolidate their properties.

I don't see Rupert Murdoch buying a TV Station, Newspaper or Radio Station in Boston at all. Say goodbye to Uncle Rupe, he is not retuning to Boston.

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Yeah I kinda wonder what Murdoch is up to because the reason WHY he owns WFXT is because he wanted an affiliate in every major market (of course after a failed attempt to acquire WCVB when he purchased MetroMedia in 1986 when he was forming Fox Broadcasting and Fox Television Stations). This is him kind of getting out of it all together. I doubt he'll buy anything else here too, but it makes me you wonder what he's up to. As much as I dislike Murdoch, he is a smart business man, so he's up to something.

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It's more then just owning a TV station in a major market, News Corp use to own CSN New England before it turned into Comcast Sports Net, they have no other property in New England and they have no other moves to grow here in this market.

When Cox wanted to trade two of the California TV stations to FOX, I'm sure they were more then happy to make the trade. Boston is the 7th largest Market in the country, one of the stations in the trade that Fox is getting, KICU-TV, is in San Francisco, the 6th largest market in the country, so Fox moves up one notch. But they also have FOX Sports Net West that covers all of California.

This means Fox has more coverage of California, more eyeballs watching the channel and more money. They just can't get that here in Boston.

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He spun off the NY Post to a separate corporation, which he still owns, but it sounds like he is finally getting tired of sinking millions into ego projects like big city papers. And the Herald is a shadow of its former self when Murdoch saved it in the 80s. All newspapers are shadows of their former selves, of course, but few are as ghostly as the Herald, down from 500,000 circulation to 90,000 now.

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Meh the local media is already almost totally homogenized I doubt anyone will really notice a difference.

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I agree that the local news soundbites and bystander interviews from the big 3 networks is pretty similar, especially with video sharing, but the longer in studio interviews on FXT make it a more produced (flashy) and mainstream (accessible? compelling?) version of local PBS news style. I too hope they keep the news, about the only programming on FXT worth watching.

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I agree. I seldom watch news but if there's something going on, like a snow storm, in the morning I'll turn on Fox 25. They seem a bit more easier on the eyes and ears to me over ch 7, 4 or 5. I used to love NECN, Mike Nikitas did a great job on the morning program, but they too went for the younger set of eyes and dumbed down their morning news casts.

It's really quite painful to watch local news now, although I am a fan of Jack Williams. He's just an all round great guy and maybe one of the last local anchors who've been on the air in Boston for decades.

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Does this mean that the website will be changed to mycoxboston.com?

Please lets not pick on Virgin Boy. Last week he actually thoughtfully opined on Dick Cheney (and his ventriloquist daughter) offering an opinion on the Iraq war. I almost choked on my cheerios.

Back to you, Maria.

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I wish local stations could have less eyerolling domain names, or at least the ones they promote on tv.

myfoxboston.com? didn't we get over the stupid "my" web 2.0 buzzword in 2004 or so?

then of course the pointless and egotistic thebostonchannel.com for wcvb but I guess they changed the promotion of it.

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You need to lighten up, maybe find a hobby. If tv station domain names are really upsetting to you, perhaps therapy is a good idea.

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I'm not hot and bothered by it, but it's still something I always thought was silly.

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blame fox.. almost all fox tv stations websites start with "my"

myfoxboston.com
myfoxphilly.com
myfoxla.com
myfoxatlanta.com

I think its more of a branding strategy and avaliable domain names. Its easy to remember a fox stations' website because it always starts with "myfox.."

Plus from a System Administration point of view, having a domain name that is not the same as your corporate emails is far better. (meaning the email addresses for newscasters at Fox25 are @Fox25.com and not @myfoxboston.com). Sure www.fox25.com redirects to myfoxboston.com but I'm sure they are hosted separately at different server farms.

PS - It's not as bad as all Hearst Television Stations' websites all are some formation of:

the channel.com

i.e. TheBostonChannel.com (WCVB) or TheNewHampshireChannel.com (WMUR) or TheChamplainValleyChannel.com (WPTZ/WNNE)

Which are obnoxiously long URLs to remember. Fox kinda made it easy.

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I believe the site went "myfoxboston.com" not because of 2.0 thinking, but because they were forced to promote "MyNetworkTV" network that came about after UPN and WB merged into the CW network. A whole bunch of Fox stations had to do it.

Of course, they have been too lazy to change it back, but it fox25.com remains as a redirect.

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Yeah "MyNetworkTV" is bizarre marketing decision as well.

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they've always been a Fox affiliate, ever since the Fox network started.

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Yea... Ever Fox Owned & Operated Station does that, there is MyFoxNY.com, MyFoxDC.com etc. etc.
with Hearst Television they did TheBostonChannel.com, and if you went to other Hearst in another part of the country they did the same thing in that city as well.

This is why I wish for the days of Westing House Broadcasting, They owned WBZ, KPIX in San Fran, WJZ in Baltimore, the list goes on. But each station had its own identity and felt like it was a locally owned station. Now we have all the stations that use a one size fits all approach to the Identity to the stations. Its like the name tag that you fill in that says "Hi, My name is (Insert Name Here)."

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I should have scrolled down before writing my reply above.

Marketing 101 Rule: Don't pick a branding option that is a fad.

My = 2005ish Fad (aka MySpace)

At least Face.... didn't catch on..

FaceFoxBoston.com
FaceFoxDC.com

;)

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Bob's Discount Furniture is the worst offender (of many tastes) with MYbobs.com or whatever. The only person who has any claim to bobs is Anna Wintour.

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grows bigger and bigger."

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Is activated milliseconds after one of these commercials comes on.

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iPod, iPad, iPhone.

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S.F. and Boston are almost identical in size, but S.F. 49ers are played on Fox, the Patriots are played on CBS. They will generate more $ in S.F

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I'm trying to remember if the last time I watched Fox 25 news was when they ran a story about a toddler being rescued from a fall down a dry well or some such deep pit, without mentioning once where this occurred or when it happened, but, hey, lots of cute toddler footage. Or maybe it was the night that we caught multiple misspellings in whatever you call those segment titles above the crawl (probably "segment titles").

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by newscasters telling the producer to drop it so an important part of a video clip is then visible to viewers.

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