An election webcast that isn’t TV
Cory Bergman November 5th, 2006
We’re going to be trying something new on election night at KING5.com. Instead of having the main anchor team extend their TV election coverage on the web, we’re going to produce a separate, low-tech webcast that complements our regular online coverage and results. We’ll have a host (an anchor who will try not to be anchorish) who will be pitching informally to live feeds of campaign events, both locally and nationally. Since she’ll be in the newsroom, she’ll give a behind-the-scenes flavor to the coverage, reading emails from users and even pulling staffers aside to explain their roles. There will be no scripts, just a laptop. And I’m going to direct it old-school-style: by punching up sources on a router. I’ll be the first to admit it’s an experiment, and I’ll report back after the election.
11 Comments Add your own
1. Greg | November 6th, 2006 at 12:40 am
WFAA-TV in Dallas did this during the 2000 and 2004 Presidental Election. What they did was they had an achnor (Brett Shipp I think) and some politcal professor from the University of Texas - Arlington. They didn’t do live speeches from the campaign but they took phone calls and answered email from viewers . . . . . hopefully a suggestion for you. Don’t know if there’ll be doing it again for the Midterms.
2. Rex | November 6th, 2006 at 1:30 am
One other site I know that’s done this is cbs4denver.com, a CBS O&O.
3. thedetroitchannel | November 6th, 2006 at 6:25 am
weds. morning will be like many before them… a time to reflect on missed opportunities.
one glaring one is the candidates lack of use of the web.
all that coin spent bashing the other guy and NOTHING about themselves.
good luck to you, cory.
4. Chris | November 6th, 2006 at 7:25 am
WFTS did that during the primary earlier this year. It was DEATHLY boring.
5. Cory | November 6th, 2006 at 7:52 am
From a TV perspective, it WILL be deathly boring. But it’s not TV.
It’s designed to be a complementary option for someone who’s looking at election results and reading the latest stories. Someone who wants to hear more than 10-second sound bites of what the candidates are saying, live as it happens.
6. Alyssa | November 6th, 2006 at 7:57 am
sound interesting. I wonder if any east coast stations will attempt something like it this year…
7. invitedmedia | November 6th, 2006 at 8:33 am
cory, this might be a great time to consider a line taken from chris rooney’s site (wnyt): “there’s nothing more important than getting it right”.
hopefully, this doesn’t come in a close second to “getting it first”.
8. Anon | November 6th, 2006 at 10:37 am
I think KXAS (www.nbc5i.com) is doing three or four hours on election night too.
9. Paul Dughi | November 6th, 2006 at 10:58 am
We’re doing 5 hours of web-only coverage, switching between our three stations in Washington state (KHQ - Spokane, KNDO - Yakima, KNDU - Tri-Cities) from 6:30pm-11:30pm.
10. Steve Safran | November 6th, 2006 at 3:27 pm
I bet the webcast is far more fun and interesting. And I bet it’s not deathly boring at all. Same-old same-old coverage is deathly boring. Nothing boring about experimenting.
11. MOJO | January 18th, 2008 at 6:11 am
Wow, thanks for the excellent information!
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