They might, but I just doubt they may end up having much economic choice. Besides, they still get half the revenue themselves, and wouldn’t have to bear the cost of a news operation.
No doubt in my mind there would certainly be a lot of pride in WIN wanting to be “more than just a rebroadcaster”; that’s always been evident in their positioning and in persisting in news in non-incumbent markets where others have long given up. They have even more reason to do that than, say, NBN does, given the latter just appear like a slightly rebellious division of Nine in keeping some form of separate identity.
But with the main WIN bulletins outside a couple of markets having atrophied to an “aggregated market” level by now… how long they are able to sustain that, I dunno… it may come down to whether they’re comfortable with going down to noodle updates outside the main markets that are left (eg. Wollongong/Canberra), but that gives little to no advantage points-wise over a statewide evening news so why bother.
No doubt there’ll be bruised egos if ever they decide to pull the pin.
WIN’s bulletins (I know I’ve said this before) feel like webcasts. There is no attempt to make them feel live. WIN has always had the mantra, ‘it’s local - so like it’, ignoring the fact that TV is also company for viewers.
What Prime did very well (when SC9 local happened) was give their news a ‘fun’ live vibe with two presenters and live (to tape) weather in studio. It made the stories come to life and gave the presenters little moments to comment on stories/events. “The weather is looking great for the Wagga Show on the weekend, isn’t it Cassandra shall I get my summer frock out? Why yes Maddie, it is…”
This ‘fun’ vibe is exactly how Sunrise successfully built an audience over Today 20 years ago - on a fraction of the budget. Guests were encouraged to call David Koch “Koshie” - even though the 7 Executive banned presenters from using the moniker - and we felt like Koshie and Mel were our friends.
WIN has cut news back to the absolute bare bones. Story intros are fired off to tape probably in the space of about 7 minutes back-to-back and slotted in later with one awkward sports intro and pre-recorded weather. It shows. As good as the presenters are - there’s not much reaction to story packages and no moment for the weather presenter to join the anchor at the desk for a look at a panda being born at a zoo or whatever.
I would have thought it would be worth doing a proper live-to-tape/live for their bigger remaining markets (I’m guessing it’s Illawarra and Cbr these days - but I’m usually out of date with these things) - which would help bring a bit more personality and life into the bulletins. I don’t understand why they don’t do at least Wollongong live 2-3 nights nights and give Canberra a go once or twice a week or something. Last time I checked, CBN7 did this (I feel like Lismore is live a lot).
A real set would be amazing too (like 7 and 9 GC), but I wouldn’t hold my breath on that.
Despite 9 saying that the 9 news Tasmania bulletin will be launching soon, there doesn’t seem to be much movement on that at all so far. Maybe it’s been delayed or something meaning that Tasmanians continue to watch WIN News as usual for the time being.
Where would they source the 5-6 pm news feed from if they were to go with two hours of news? All they could do is time-shift Melbourne’s 4pm news to 5pm which is hardly ideal. They couldn’t take Adelaide because of time zone differences. At a push they could take the Brisbane bulletin live during DST. Or were you suggesting they produce another hour of news locally?
i can imagine the brief from Bruce, " how many times can we get WIN NEWS on the screen?". - Reply from a low level poorly paid graphic guy- “let me try Mr Gordon”
