WBFS-TV
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| WBFS-TV | |
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| Miami / Fort Lauderdale, Florida | |
| Branding | My 33 CBS 4 News |
| Slogan | South Florida's TV |
| Channels | Analog: 33 (UHF) |
| Affiliations | MyNetworkTV |
| Owner | CBS Corporation (Miami Television Station WBFS, Inc.) |
| First air date | December 9, 1984 |
| Sister station(s) | WFOR-TV |
| Former affiliations | Independent (1984-1995) UPN (1995-2006) |
| Transmitter Power | 5,000 kW (analog) 1,000 kW (digital) |
| Height | 282 m (analog) 262.5 m (digital) |
| Facility ID | 12497 |
| Transmitter Coordinates | |
| Website | www.cbs4.com/wbfs |
WBFS-TV, channel 33, is the MyNetworkTV-affiliated television station for South Florida, licensed to Miami. Its transmitter is located in Miramar. Owned by the CBS Corporation, the station is sister to CBS affiliate WFOR-TV. The two stations share studios on Northwest 18th Terrace in Doral.
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[edit] Overview
The station's programming lineup consists of first-run syndicated talk shows, court shows, reality shows, off-network sitcoms, movies, and MyNetworkTV prime time. It also runs children's programming from 4Kids TV on the weekends. The station airs CBS programming if WFOR needs to pre-empt for breaking news coverage. WBFS has been known to air Miami Dolphins games that air on CBS if the game is postponed due to weather (usually hurricanes).
[edit] History
[edit] As an independent
WBFS-TV debuted on December 9, 1984 as an independent station under the ownership of Grant Broadcasting. Before then, the channel 33 frequency had been occupied by a low-power translator for independent station WCIX, whose main signal on channel 6 could not be received very well in Broward County. The station ran numerous off-network classic TV sitcoms from the 1950s, 60s, and 70s along with a number of cartoons. It also ran some off-network drama shows, classic western, and martial arts movies that were shown on Saturday afternoons.
WBFS soon made a name for itself in South Florida for its slick on-air look. It billed itself "Florida's Super Station" (a moniker that Tampa Bay's WTOG also gave itself around the same time) and frequently used CGI graphics of near-network quality. WBFS' sister stations, WGBS-TV in Philadelphia and WGBO-TV in Chicago, adopted a similar look. The station was available on cable in the West Palm Beach area as well, and identified as "Miami/Fort Lauderdale/West Palm Beach" until the 1990s. Unfortunately, while the station was profitable, Grant overextended himself buying programming for his stations. After Christmas in 1986, he filed Chapter 11 bankruptcy. The pressure came from his debt with Viacom which owned the distribution rights for half of Grant's shows.
In January of 1987, a deal was made to cut back the runs of the shows the stations owned and pay some reduced prices. WBFS continued to do well considering its problems and scored a major coup by becoming the on-air home of the brand-new Miami Heat of the NBA in 1988. It added Florida Marlins of baseball's National League and the Florida Panthers of the NHL in 1993. Still, in 1989, Grant Broadcasting was put into receivership due to the fact it could not get out of debt. Combined Broadcasting, a company consisting of executives from the program distributors that Grant owed, took over WBFS and its sister stations.
The company pumped a lot of money into WBFS and WGBS, but ran primarily barter programming on WGBO. In 1994, Combined sold WBFS and WGBS (now WPSG) to Paramount Stations Group who sold its original Philadelphia station, WTXF-TV, to Fox. Almost immediately, Paramount announced WBFS and WGBS would join the soon-to-be created United Paramount Network. WGBO went to Univision, who entered the deal after its then-affiliate in Chicago, WCIU-TV, refused to drop non-Spanish shows, thus angering Univision.
[edit] As a UPN station
Under Paramount ownership, WBFS became a UPN owned and operated station station at the network's sign-on in January of 1995. The station was then known on-air as UPN 33. It had acquired more recent off-network sitcoms over the years. It began to add more first-run syndicated talk and reality shows. The station began to cut back on children's programming from 1998 on. By 2002, the station was only running a morning kids block.
In 2000, Paramount's parent company, Viacom merged with CBS, making WBFS a sister station to CBS owned and operated WFOR-TV. As a result of the merger, WBFS moved into WFOR's facilities. There were several ironic twists in this deal. Notably, Viacom had been one of Grant's former creditors, and WFOR had once been.
When WAMI-TV became a Telefutura station, WBFS picked up a few of WAMI's former shows, including Fox Kids (which by then was only offered on Saturdays). Today WBFS still runs Fox's 4Kids TV which Fox affiliate WSVN does not run. UPN ended its kids block in the fall of 2003. Today, WBFS is owned and operated by CBS Corporation, which was the result of the Viacom / CBS split.
[edit] MyNetworkTV
On January 24, 2006, the WB and UPN announced that they would end broadcasting and merge. The combined network would be called The CW, the letters representing the first initial of its corporate parents: CBS (the parent company of UPN) and the Warner Bros. unit of Time Warner (part-owner of the WB).
The new network announced a 10-year affiliation agreement with Tribune Broadcasting (the WB's other owner) and CBS Corporation. Miami's WB affiliate, WBZL (now WSFL-TV), was chosen as Miami's CW affiliate. It would not have been an upset had WBFS been chosen, however. CW officials were on record as preferring the "strongest" WB and UPN stations for their new network, and South Florida was one of the few markets where the WB and UPN stations were both relatively strong. The CW began broadcasting on September 18.
On February 22, News Corporation announced that it would start up another new broadcast television network called MyNetworkTV. This new service, which would be a sister network to FOX, would be operated by FOX Television Stations and its syndication division, Twentieth Television. MyNetworkTV was created to give UPN and WB stations, not mentioned as becoming CW affiliates, another option besides becoming independent. It was also created to compete against The CW.
On May 1, CBS initially announced that WBFS, along with its Boston sister station WSBK-TV, would not seek the affiliation for MyNetworkTV. It is believed that CBS's initial decision to deny its larger UPN stations MyNetworkTV affiliation was in retaliation against FOX for refusing to affiliate any of their UPN affiliates with The CW. However, on July 12, it was announced that WBFS would become South Florida's MyNetworkTV affiliate. The network began broadcasting on September 5, and at that point, WBFS became known on-air as My 33.
Throughout the station's existence, WBFS has had its own website. This changed on April 25, 2007, when WBFS's official web address, "33mytv.com", was integrated into WFOR's site. The old address now redirects to "cbs4.com/wbfs". The previous web address, "upn33.com", is listed on the MyNetworkTV local station list. However, this redirects to the same web page. Since the 2008 sale of WTCN-CA in West Palm Beach and WUPL in New Orleans, WBFS is the only MyNetworkTV station owned by CBS Corporation.
[edit] News operation
Soon after the merger between Paramount parent Viacom and CBS, WBFS began to air a nightly 10 o'clock newscast produced by WFOR. It was known on-air as UPN 33 News at 10. In 2004, the station began to air a two-hour long extension of WFOR's weekday morning news at 7 A.M. This production was called UPN 33 Morning News. Before the newscast launched, the time slot was filled with children's programming. When WBFS became a MyNetworkTV affiliate, the newscasts were renamed. The 10 o'clock production became My 33 News at 10.
The morning news was now My 33 News on the Move. Starting in June of 2007, Beatriz Canals (WBFS's former weeknight co-anchor) began co-anchoring on WFOR weeknights at 5 and 11 o'clock. She took the place of Maggie Rodriguez who left for The Saturday Early Show. This arrangement was temporary until Shannon Hori from KTVT in Dallas was named the permanent replacement. In September of 2007, the WBFS newscasts were rebranded again. The titles now refer to WFOR and its CBS 4 News programs.
[edit] News / Station presentation
[edit] Newscast titles
- Evening Newscast Titles:
- UPN 33 News at 10 (2001-2006)
- My 33 News at 10 (2006-2007)
- CBS 4 News at 10 On My 33 (2007-Present)
- Morning Newscast Titles:
- UPN 33 News This Morning (2004-2006)
- My 33 News On The Move (2006-2007)
- CBS 4 News This Morning On My 33 (2007-Present)
[edit] Newscast music
- Evening Newscast Music:
- WBFS 2001 News Theme, Unknown (2001-2002)
- WBFS 2002 News Theme, Unknown (2002-2006)
- WBFS 2006 News Theme, Unknown (2006-2007)
- News Source, Gari Communications (2007-2008)
- Moving Forward, 615 Music (2008-Present)
- Morning Newscast Music:
- WBFS 2004 Morning News Theme, Unknown (2004-Present)
[edit] News team
CBS 4 News This Morning on My 33
(Weekday Mornings 7 to 9 A.M.)
- Anchors:
- Jorge Estevez
- Cynthia Demos
- Weather:
- Lisette Gonzalez
- Traffic:
- Christina Loren
- Director:
- Jason W. Smith
CBS 4 News at 10 on My 33 (10 to 10:30 P.M.)
Weeknights
- Anchors:
- Jawan Strader
- Erika Von Tiehl
- Weather:
- Craig Setzer
- Sports:
- Jim Berry
Weekends
- Anchors:
- Ileana Varela
- Weather:
- Jeff Berardelli
- Sports:
- Prim Siripipat
WBFS uses additional news personnel from WFOR. See that article for a complete listing.
[edit] External links
- WBFS-TV/DT "My 33"
- WFOR-TV/DT "CBS 4"
- MyNetworkTV
- Query the FCC's TV station database for WBFS-TV
- BIAfn's Media Web Database -- Information on WBFS-TV
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