With CBS News moving forward with its second round of layoffs since the network’s owner, Paramount, merged with Skydance Media and Friday’s announcement that the nearly 100-year old CBS News Radio would be shut down, the organization representing media tech employees is calling for more oversight.

In an announcement on Friday, the IBEW (International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers) said the sudden developments were cause for concern.

“The IBEW is proud of its longstanding partnership with CBS and is deeply troubled to be learning of these developments only now,” the union said in a statement. “CBS works because of the skill, dedication, and professionalism of the IBEW technical and production workers who make its broadcasts possible. The IBEW believes that a workforce of this caliber—and partnership of this duration—warrants direct and transparent communication about decisions that affect the livelihoods of its members.”

“Skydance’s actions raise serious questions about the future of good union jobs in broadcasting,” the union added. “And with Skydance reportedly planning to merge CBS News into CNN following its proposed acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery, lawmakers and regulators must ask whether further consolidation in the broadcast industry will help working people or hurt them.”

IBEW International President Kenneth W. Cooper called on the company to act more professionally when it comes to such incidents.

“Our members and this union deserve to hear about decisions that affect their livelihoods with proper notice, not in headlines the same day they’re being shown the door,” he said.

Although the companies officially merged in 2025, they are in the midst of a deal to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery after beating out Netflix, in a deal valued at $111 billion.

IBEW's announcement comes a week after the Teamsters union submitted a detailed report to the DOJ's Antitrust Division outlining its own concerns about the proposed merger and urging the DOJ to intervene and block the deal unless substantial and enforceable safeguards are put in place to increase domestic production and protect jobs. warned

"This merger threatens the livelihoods of the very workers who built these studios into industry giants," said Teamsters General President Sean M. O'Brien. "We've seen what happens when corporations consolidate power: jobs disappear, production leaves American communities, and workers pay the price. The DOJ has a responsibility to stop deals that eliminate competition and harm working families. Unless Paramount and Warner Bros. can guarantee enforceable protections for domestic production and labor standards, this merger can't be allowed to move forward."

LOS ANGELES and NEW YORK—Paramount has announced it is acquiring The Free Press, a subscription commentary website, and that site co-founder and CEO Bari Weiss will join CBS News as editor-in-chief.

Paramount did not disclose financial terms of the deal but reports have valued the acquisition at $150 million.

The deal follows months of turmoil at CBS News, whose coverage of the Trump administration became a major sticking point in getting the Federal Communications Commission to approve the Paramout Global-Skydance merger. Earlier this year, some top news executives resigned following reports that Paramount was planning to settle a lawsuit brought by Donald Trump over its handling of an interview with then Vice President Kamala Harris during the 2024 election.

The FCC eventually agreed to approve the merger after Paramount paid $16 billion to settle the suit and agreed to hire an ombudsman to oversee its news operations. It also agreed to end all DEI efforts. All three decisions were widely criticized.

In announcing the acquisition, Paramount said that the combination “brings together CBS News’s scale and reach with The Free Press’s culture-shaping voice and innovative spirit, united in the pursuit of setting a new standard for trusted journalism in America.”

In a statement, David Ellison, chairman and CEO of Paramount said “This is an important initiative for our company and Bari will report directly to me—leading the work of The Free Press and collaborating with our CBS News team in the pursuit of making it the most trusted name in news. We believe the majority of the country longs for news that is balanced and fact-based, and we want CBS to be their home.”

Ellison also noted: “Bari is a proven champion of independent, principled journalism, and I am confident her entrepreneurial drive and editorial vision will invigorate CBS News. This move is part of Paramount’s bigger vision to modernize content and the way it connects—directly and passionately—to audiences around the world.”

Paramount reported that the Free Press will maintain its own independent brand and operations, and continue to do reporting, video and audio podcasts, and events for its fast-growing community of subscribers.

Paramount also reported that The Free Press, founded in 2021, has become one of the largest and fastest-growing digital media outlets today. Over the past 12 months, its revenues are up 82% and subscribers up 86% to 1.5 million over all; more than 170,000 of those subscribers are paid.

As editor-in-chief of CBS News, Paramount said that Weiss will shape editorial priorities, champion core values across platforms, and lead innovation in how the organization reports and delivers the news.

More specifically, Paramount reported that "Weiss will partner with CBS News president Tom Cibrowski, who reports to Paramount’s chair of TV Media, George Cheeks. Cibrowski’s decades of journalistic, operational, and broadcast experience provide essential continuity and expertise. Their partnership reflects Paramount’s recognition that the future of CBS News as a dynamic, multiplatform newsroom requires unified editorial leadership across television, streaming, digital, audio, social media, and events."

“This is a great moment for The Free Press,” Bari said. “This partnership allows our ethos of fearless, independent journalism to reach an enormous, diverse, and influential audience. We honor the extraordinary legacy of CBS News by committing ourselves to a singular mission: building the most trusted news organization of the 21st century.”

SAN FRANCISCO—CBS Bay Area (KPIX-TV) has announced a partnership with KION that will see KPIX deliver news and weather coverage to additional Northern California communities in Monterey and Santa Cruz Counties beginning Tuesday, Sept. 23.

As a result of the partnership with KION, which is owned by News-Press & Gazette Company, viewers in Santa Cruz, Salinas, Monterey, and Carmel will now see local reporting and weather coverage delivered by CBS Bay Area, which has deployed an innovative AR/VR studio to present local news and weather forecasts.

As part of its commitment to covering news across Northern California, CBS Bay Area also reported that will add more newsgathering resources to covering the Santa Cruz–Monterey–Salinas region and that it will extend its weather forecasting to include local coverage for those communities.

“CBS Bay Area is proud to serve viewers who call the Monterey Bay and Santa Cruz communities home, by telling their stories," said Scott Warren, president and general manager of KPIX. “We are also excited for viewers to now see and experience their local weather forecasting in a more dynamic and accessible way through our cutting-edge AR/VR presentation technology.”

“Our partnership with KPIX ensures that viewers across the Monterey, Salinas and Santa Cruz region continue to receive the high-quality local journalism they deserve,” said Rall Bradley, executive vice president of broadcast at News-Press & Gazette Company. “This collaboration brings together KION’s deep roots in the community with the trusted reporting and innovative storytelling of CBS Bay Area — delivering a seamless experience for viewers during a time of change.”

This launch marks a return to the region for KPIX, which originally supplied CBS programming to KION (then KMST) when the station signed on in 1969.

WASHINGTON—In a notable effort to obtain approval for the Skydance-Paramount Global merger, lawyers for Skydance have sent letters to the Federal Communications Commission saying that it will end all diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) efforts and that it will set up control to ensure “unbiased journalism.” Those controls will include the creation of a CBS News ombudsman to handle bias complaints for the next two years.

During the July 24 press conference following the agency's open meeting, FCC Chair Brendan Carr declined to say when the agency might approve the merger, but applauded the promises made in two separate letters to the FCC by Skydance on July 22. Carr has repeatedly stressed that alleged complaints about bias would be part of the FCC’s merger review.

“I will say that I was pleased with some of the filings that came in from Skydance just this week,” Carr added. “Again, my view has been pretty clear. I think Americans trust in national programmers, ABC, CBS, NBC, is at the historic low … So I was very pleased to see Skydance put in a filing that says, if this deal goes through, they are committing to serious changes at CBS. I think that will be a good day. They've committed to addressing bias issues. They committed to embracing fact-based journalism. They've also committed to either not extending or removing invidious forms of DEI discrimination. I think those are all significant commitments that they've offered. And so we're gonna take a look at that. We're gonna weigh it in our proceedings.”

Later, Carr added: “These are voluntary commitments that they put in the FCC record. When people put commitments into the record, it goes into the mix as things that the FCC takes into account as it looks at the public interest benefits of this … in terms of a final FCC decision, and how that decision characterizes those things.”

In response to another question about some of his comments on a recent Fox News Channel interview about their being consequences for biased news coverage, Carr added: “President [Donald] Trump … ran against this idea that a handful of national programmers that are backed by a lot of executives based in Hollywood in New York, get to control and dictate to the American people what the narrative is, what they can say, what they can think. And most government officials, they just accepted the narrative that these gatekeepers would lay down. And President Trump ran directly at it. He smashed the facade that they have a gatekeeper position.

“The consequences of that are still being felt,” he continued. “[T]hat's why you see a lot of consequences that are flowing from the undermining of that from President Trump, smashing that facade of their positions. I think those consequences aren't finished, and they can continue to flow.”

In remarks at the press conference, Democratic FCC Commissioner Anna Gomez once again attacked the agency’s push to regulate news content at broadcasters, complaining about “the unprecedented way in which this once-independent agency has used its vast power to pressure Paramount to reach a private settlement and to further erode press freedom. Just recently, we learned that Skydance, or New Paramount, as some call it, will cowardly capitulate to adopt never-before-seen controls over newsroom decisions and editorial content. This is in direct violation of the First Amendment and the law.

“The company also said it will comply with this agency's ideological demands that undermine efforts to combat discrimination and expand equal opportunity. Turns out, it is quite easy to sell out your principles for pure profit.”

Gomez added: “I believe the public has a right to know how the government's First Amendment violations drove Paramount capitulation” and once again called for “our leadership to bring this transaction up for a vote by the full commission. We should be clear whether this commission stands on the side of the First Amendment and freedom of expression or in support of this administration's campaign of censorship and control.”

In terms of DEI, the Skydance letter to the FCC said: “I write to confirm the elimination of diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) initiatives that were in place at Paramount and to confirm our commitments moving forward. Skydance, for its part, does not have DEI programs in place today and will not establish such initiatives.”

It also noted, “Paramount also eliminated or modified DEI programs across the company to ensure that they are consistent with the company's commitment to equal opportunity and governing law.”

A second letter stressed that “we ‘recognize the importance of unbiased journalism and are fully committed to presenting a diverse array of viewpoints on television.’ We further reaffirm that, after consummation of the proposed transaction, New Paramount's new management will ensure that the company's array of news and entertainment programming embodies a diversity of viewpoints across the political and ideological spectrum, consistent with the varying perspectives of the viewing audience. Skydance recognizes that, as a broadcast licensee, it will be charged with operating in the public interest, and the company intends to undertake a comprehensive review of CBS and to make any necessary changes to ensure compliance with that standard. In all respects, Skydance will ensure that CBS's reporting is fair, unbiased and fact-based.

“Moreover, Skydance reaffirms its commitment to localism as a core component of the public interest standard,” the letter noted. “Indeed, the CBS affiliate network's over 200 local broadcast stations provide service throughout the country and are a trusted voice in local markets big and small. The value of these stations in their local communities cannot be overstated and Skydance will work closely with its affiliated broadcast stations to ensure a productive partnership, including by considering technological improvements, investments in local news resources and other measures that bolster local broadcasting.

“To promote transparency and increased accountability, Skydance also will commit, for a period of at least two years, to have in place an ombudsman who reports to the President of New Paramount, who will receive and evaluate any complaints of bias or other concerns involving CBS,” the letter continued. “New Paramount's executive leadership will carefully consider any such complaints in overseeing CBS's news programming. In evaluating Comcast's acquisition of NBCUniversal, the Commission found such a mechanism effective in preventing editorial bias in the operation of the NBC broadcast network.”

The two letters can be found here.

Broadcast and cable TV news outlets saw strong social media growth in March, according to new data from the social video analytics company Tubular Labs .

Fox News, for example, grew its U.S. unique viewers across Facebook and YouTube by 32% month-over-month, to 60.1 million, while minutes watched soared 26% to 1.6 billion (both 13-month highs).

CBS News saw a 51% bounce in unique viewers to 38.5 million and a 29% increase in minutes watched to 140.4 million in March, Tubular reported.

The growth comes amid a busy news cycle in March, with major news involving policy changes, tariffs and economic concerns.

CNN in March saw unique viewers grow by 21% to 31 million, while minutes watched grew 80% month over month to 426.3 million.

MSNBC had 35.2 million unique viewers, up 20% from a month earlier in March, but its minutes view hit 1.4 billion, up 28% month over month, according to Tubular. That made it the only one of the news organizations to come close to Fox News in minutes viewed.

ABC News had the second highest unique viewers, with 54 million, but the slowest growth, up 5% month over month in March. Its minutes viewed only grew 1% in March to 346.5 million.

More information about Tubular can be found here.

Former president and Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has filed a federal lawsuit seeking a jury trial and $10 billion in damages against CBS over claims that it edited an interview with Vice President Kamala Harris, the Democratic presidential nominee, in a “deceitful” manner designed to influence the election.

CBS News' actions represented a “partisan and unlawful acts of election and voter interference through malicious, deceptive, and substantial news distortion calculated to (a) confuse, deceive, and mislead the public, and (b) attempt to tip the scales in favor of the Democratic Party as the heated 2024 Presidential Election” said the lawsuit, which was filed in U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas, Amarillo Division.

CBS News has dismissed those claims. "Former President Trump’s repeated claims against 60 Minutes are false," a CBS News spokesperson said in a statement to Reuters. "The lawsuit Trump has brought today against CBS is completely without merit and we will vigorously defend against it."

The National Association of Broadcasters also lambasted the suit.

“A free press must report, inform and scrutinize without fear of reprisal,” NAB President and CEO Curtes LeGeyt said in a statement. “Frivolous lawsuits aimed at stifling this essential role risk undermining democratic principles and ignore the First Amendment’s protection of how news is reported. NAB stands firmly with our members against any attacks on their First Amendment-protected reporting.”

Earlier, Trump had called for CBS to lose its broadcast licenses over the editing of the interview even though the FCC licenses local stations, not broadcast networks.

“‘60 Minutes’ is a major part of the News Organization of CBS, which has just created the Greatest Fraud in Broadcast History,” Trump wrote in a social media post. “CBS should lose its license, and it should be bid out to the Highest Bidder, as should all other Broadcast Licenses, because they are just as corrupt as CBS—and maybe even WORSE!”

That prompted this response from CBS:

“Former President Donald Trump is accusing ‘60 Minutes’ of deceitful editing of our Oct. 7 interview with Vice President Kamala Harris. That is false.

“‘60 Minutes’ gave an excerpt of our interview to ‘Face the Nation’ that used a longer section of her answer than that on ‘60 Minutes,’ ” CBS said. “Same question. Same answer. But a different portion of the response. When we edit any interview, whether a politician, an athlete, or movie star, we strive to be clear, accurate and on point. The portion of her answer on ‘60 Minutes’ was more succinct, which allows time for other subjects in a wide-ranging, 21-minute-long segment.”

NEW YORK—An estimated 43.15 million viewers watched the CBS News Vice Presidential Debate across 15 networks on Tuesday, according to Nielsen. The first and only vice presidential debate of the 2024 election was held at the CBS Broadcast Center in New York and featured the Republican nominee, U.S. Sen. JD Vance of Ohio, and the Democratic nominee, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz.

The debate aired live from approximately 9:00 p.m. to 10:45 p.m. ET on Tuesday evening. A full list of reported networks can be referenced in the viewership table below.

The bulk of viewers—just over 38 million—watched on the four commercial broadcast networks and three biggest cable networks, CNN, Fox News Channel and MSNBC, according to “The Hollywood Reporter.”

While these preliminary numbers only cover the broadcasts, Fox News Media claimed the highest number of viewers of the simulcast event. Unlike Nielsen, though, Fox News included viewers across all platforms—including its Fox Business Network and its streaming platforms—with 10.4 million viewers estimated to have watched, it said.

Ratings were down 25.5% from the 2020 debate between Democratic candidate Kamala Harris, now the vice president, and then-Vice President Mike Pence, which drew just under 58 million.

Viewers of the Vice Presidential debate on CBS tonight will be able to use QR codes to fact check Republican VP Candidate JD Vance and Democratic VP Candidate Tim Walz.

Fact-checking has had a rather checkered history in recent campaign debates, with certain presidential candidates advocating the process—which allows moderators to correct incorrect statements from the debate stage—while others claim biased moderators corrupt the events.

Former President Donald Trump, for example, severely criticized moderators of the only debate between himself and Vice President Kamala Harris last month, calling for one of the moderators—ABC News Anchor David Muir—to be fired and for the FCC to repeal ABC’s broadcast license, eliciting this response from FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel:

“The First Amendment is a cornerstone of our democracy,” she said. “The FCC does not revoke licenses for broadcast stations simply because a political candidate disagrees with or dislikes content or coverage.”

CBS News, which will air the debate live tonight at 9:00 p.m. ET, is taking another approach—offering up a QR code for viewers to scan with their devices that wil take them to a CBS News website where about 20 CBS journalists will fact-check the debaters comments in real-time, according to the New York Times. Although the debate will be simulcast on most major broadcast and news networks, the code will only appear on CBS.

“The idea is to give people that second-screen experience,” said Claudia Milne, the senior vice president for standards and practices at CBS News told the Times, adding, “The audience can get the takeaway they need in a responsible and smart way.”

The debate will be moderated by Norah O’Donnell, the anchor of “CBS Evening News” and Margaret Brennan, host of CBS’s Sunday morning political talk show “Face the Nation,” and marks the first time a presidential or vice presidential debate has been moderated by two women. Ms O’Donnell will be stepping down after the election.

CBS News has named Lindsey Reiser an anchor and correspondent for CBS News 24/7, the network’s live, streaming news service. Reiser, who was most recently an anchor and correspondent with MSNBC, is based in New York.

While at MSNBC, Reiser anchored across all news platforms and reported on the world’s biggest stories, including Queen Elizabeth II’s funeral, the COVID-19 pandemic, former President Donald Trump’s Manhattan legal cases and more. She got her start in Phoenix, Ariz., as the weekend anchor at KPHO/KTVK and as an anchor and multimedia journalist at KTSM/KDBC in El Paso, Texas.

Reiser graduated from the Walter Cronkite School of Journalism and Mass Communication at Arizona State University with Bachelor of Arts degrees in journalism and Spanish.

CBS News 24/7 is CBS News and Stations’ free live, anchored streaming news service. It is available on more than 30 platforms across mobile, desktop and connected TVs for free, as well as CBSNews.com and Paramount+ and live in 91 countries. CBS News’ streaming services, across national and local, were streamed for more than 21.3 billion minutes in 2023, the company said. 

NEW YORK—Syncbak has announced that VUit, its free, ad-supported national streaming service, has reached a carriage agreement with CBS to feature a slate of both local news and national entertainment and lifestyle content on its burgeoning streaming platform. 

With the addition of CBS’s content and channels, VUit now carries local news and content from more than 260 stations across the country, covering nearly 80% of the country’s DMAs (167 markets).

Through the agreement, VUit will gain carriage rights to the local CBS streaming channels produced by a number of CBS-owned stations, including the top two U.S. DMAs: New York and Los Angeles. Other markets include Baltimore, Boston, Chicago, Denver, Dallas/Fort Worth, Miami, Minneapolis, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh, Sacramento and San Francisco.

In addition to the expansive lineup of local news channels, VUit will also carry an array of Paramount’s premium national entertainment and lifestyle content. This will include three channels – “Mixible,” formerly known as “ET Live,” “Inside Edition,” and “Dabl,” CBS Media Ventures’ lifestyle network.

“From our continued expansion of local news streaming across the country, to becoming a fresh and intriguing model for the syndication of national content, major players in the media world recognize the power and potential of what we have built,” said Jack Perry, CEO of Syncbak, VUit’s parent company. “In an increasingly streaming-first world, this deal is a win for everyone – for the stations looking to expand revenue opportunities, for advertisers looking to reach audiences in hyper-local and hyper-targeted ways, and for viewers who want to access content in a flexible, easy manner.”

“VUit is a product built around local news, and we are thrilled to add our 13 local streaming channels to broaden their US coverage,” said Sahand Sepehrnia, senior vice president, streaming, CBS Stations. “We have had a long-standing relationship with Syncbak and are excited to grow our partnership with Jack and his team.”

The CBS deal is the most recent of a string of programming expansions, including carriage agreements with stations groups such as Capitol Broadcasting Company, Lockwood Broadcast Group, Marquee Broadcasting Inc., Fort Myers Broadcasting Company, and Sunbeam Television. 

In June, 2022 the company also announced rapid advertising growth across the platform. This includes a 31% year-over-year increase in ads served between June 2021 and June 2022, a 37% average CPM increase in the first half of the year, and revenue sharing among station groups growing by 121% for the first half of 2022. For the year to date, revenue sharing is up 192%.

DALLAS—Veteran CBS journalist Scott Keenan has been named vice president and news director at CBS News and Stations’ local businesses in Dallas-Fort Worth, including KTVT-TV (CBS 11), KTXA-TV (TXA 21), the CBS News DFW streaming channel and CBSDFW.com.  

Keenan is assuming his new role after having served as the Dallas-based bureau chief for the CBS News southern bureaus since 2006. Keenan has overseen the Network’s news bureaus in Dallas, Houston and Atlanta, which cover news stories in 13 states.

Keenan’s new position marks a return to KTVT, where he served as the station’s assistant news director from 2004-06.

“Scott’s outstanding professional experience in North Texas, both as an executive with CBS News and here at CBS 11, his thoughtful approach to leadership and his commitment to innovation make him ideally suited to serve as our news director,” explained Raquel Amparo, president and general manager of CBS Dallas-Fort Worth. “We are excited to have him coming back to our newsroom and helping us deliver on our commitment to serving our viewers across our broadcast, streaming and digital platforms.”

“I have had the pleasure of working with Scott for many years, going back to my time as the news director at KTVT,” said Adrienne Roark, president of CBS Stations. “He is a tremendous journalist and a true difference maker. I am so pleased, personally and professionally, that he is continuing his nearly 30-year career with CBS as our Dallas-Fort Worth news director.”

Keenan will be succeeding Laurie Passman, who in June transitioned to the newly created role of director of special content for CBS News DFW.

Prior to moving to Dallas-Fort Worth in 2004, Keenan spent eight years in various roles with WBBM, the CBS Station in Chicago. He also spent three years as a Chicago-based field producer for CBS News. Overall, he has been a member of the CBS family for 28 years.

Keenan’s background also includes two years with WGN-TV in his hometown of Chicago.

LOS ANGELES—KCAL 9, the CBS-owned independent station in Los Angeles, has announced plans to launch a local morning news franchise that will air from 4:00–11:00 AM, PT on weekdays, beginning this fall. 

The addition of these daily seven-hour newscasts will extend the KCAL 9 News brand to weekday mornings for the first time in the station’s history. 

In March 1990, KCAL 9 became the first television station in the country to launch nightly, three-hour local newscasts during primetime (8:00-11:00 PM), a move that has helped establish KCAL 9 as one of the most recognizable, trusted and popular local news stations in the Los Angeles market.

With the launch of KCAL’s morning newscasts, sister station CBS 2 has announced that it will  expand its commitment to national and global news coverage by airing live broadcasts of CBS Mornings From 4:00–6:00 AM, PT while also continuing to carry the West Coast editions of the CBS News’ morning program in its longtime 7:00–9:00 AM, PT time period.

KCAL 9’s morning news will air on both CBS 2 and KCAL 9 during the 6:00-7:00 AM hour.

The addition of KCAL 9’s morning news franchise will give CBS 2, KCAL 9 and the CBS News Los Angeles streaming channel a combined total of 91.5 hours of regularly scheduled live local newscasts per week – more hours than any other station in the Los Angeles market, the company said. 

“By launching morning news on KCAL 9 and adding a second daily broadcast of CBS Mornings on CBS 2, our local-to-global news organization is perfectly positioned to showcase its premium content on our broadcast and streaming channels in the Los Angeles market,” said Wendy McMahon, president and co-head, CBS News and Stations. “As one of the most trusted local news providers in Southern California, the window of opportunity for KCAL 9 News in the morning is wide open. We also believe this is an audience growth opportunity for CBS Mornings by giving early risers and commuters in the Los Angeles market the chance to watch live from 4:00-6:00 AM.”

“These bold moves will allow us to have the best of both worlds, with the strength of KCAL 9 News establishing a local news beachhead and two runs of CBS Mornings making CBS 2 a more prominent provider of national network news,” said Joel Vilmenay, president and general manager of CBS News and Stations’ local businesses in Los Angeles, including KCBS-TV, KCAL-TV, the CBS News Los Angeles streaming channel and CBSLA.com. “The investments we are making in people and technology will allow us to produce more hours of live, regularly scheduled local news than any other station in the market.”

Vilmenay added that KCAL 9 has already begun hiring additional full-time staff to support the production of the station’s morning newscasts.

NEW YORK and ATLANTA—CBS News is teaming up with The Weather Channel to offer enhanced weather news and information to its viewers, the two companies announced today. 

The Weather Channel will provide its Emmy Award-winning Immersive Mixed Reality (IMR) technology to give CBS News viewers a "Virtual View" into American communities' weather conditions. Originating from TWC’s Atlanta studios, its IMR technology allows viewers to visualize future weather forecasts—to see how snow, rain, floods or tornadoes can affect a community before the conditions arrive. The partnership also draws upon live reporting from meteorologists Stephanie Abrams, Jim Cantore and Mike Bettes, as well as the entire Weather Channel meteorological and newsgathering team.

(Read: How The Weather Channel Virtually Destroyed its Studio)

The Weather Channel's reports will be featured during CBS News' award-winning morning and evening newscasts, "CBS Mornings," "CBS Saturday Morning" and "CBS Evening News with Norah O'Donnell." CBS News' 24/7 digital streaming news service will also showcase regular reports from The Weather Channel. 

The CBS News investigative team and the Weather Channel's meteorological and newsgathering teams will also partner on special investigative climate reports.

"By bringing together CBS News and the Weather Channel's weather teams and virtual view technology, we will not only be able to forecast the weather but show viewers what it's really going to look like," said Neeraj Khemlani, president and co-head of CBS News and Stations. "This is a holistic partnership that brings together the scale of both companies' reporting teams, technologies and audiences. In addition to the virtual forecasts and live reporting, we will also collaborate on field reporting and pair our investigative teams to expand our environmental investigative efforts. Together we will deliver deeper coverage of one of the most important stories of our time — the impact of the climate on the communities we live in."

"This year, the Weather Channel celebrates its 40th anniversary, and there's never been a more important time to provide viewers cutting-edge visual presentations and compelling storytelling about our weather," said Byron Allen, founder, chairman and CEO of the Weather Channel's parent company, Allen Media Group."This new collaboration is designed to offer the CBS News audience the most innovative weather reporting, as well as greater reach for the Weather Channel's brand. CBS News and the Weather Channel will work closely together to explore and investigate issues related to climate and our environment."

NEW YORK—CBS News has announced the hiring or promotion of three senior executives who will help the news organization “accelerate our streaming ambitions,” said Neeraj Khemlani, president and co-head of CBS News and Stations.

The news organization has been in the process of revamping its streaming operations and the new hires are part of the company’s plans to make streaming an even more important part of its operations.  

The new appointments to its senior leadership team for streaming include Anthony Galloway as senior vice president of CBS News Streaming; Kaci Sokoloff as vice president of bookings for CBS News Network and Streaming; and David Reiter as executive producer of CBS News special events across Network and Streaming. 

In his new role, Galloway will oversee day-to-day programming and production for CBS News’ streaming service. He begins the new job on Feb. 14 and will report to Khemlani.

Galloway joins CBS News from The Wall Street Journal, where he most recently held the newsroom role of chief content officer, editorial video, audio and voice programming, after a three-year run serving as the organization’s global head of video and audio. 

During his tenure, Galloway's team doubled the organization’s video viewership and podcast audience, in addition to earning the organization’s first Emmy Award.

Galloway previously held senior positions at Condé Nast and Vice Media, following 15 years at NBC News.

Kaci Sokoloff, an award-winning booking producer, has been promoted to vice president of bookings for CBS News. In this new role, Sokoloff will lead a centralized Network bookings unit encompassing CBS News’ broadcast and streaming platforms and will report to Ingrid Ciprian-Matthews, executive vice president of Newsgathering for CBS News.

Sokoloff has held senior editorial roles at CBS Mornings, most recently as senior producer and the head of the booking department. Sokoloff worked at NBC News prior to joining CBS News in 2012.

David Reiter, an award-winning journalist and seasoned multiplatform news executive, has been named executive producer of special events for CBS News, reporting to Khemlani. Reiter will oversee breaking news and major global event coverage, including the upcoming State of the Union, CBS News’ midterm elections and election night, across traditional linear and digital platforms.

Reiter has more than 20 years of experience in senior roles at ABC News. He served as executive producer of special events at ABC News from 2017-2021. He helped launch ABC News’ streaming channel and served as executive producer and head of programming. For nearly a decade, 2008-2017, Reiter was vice president and domestic managing editor of newsgathering at ABC News, which included oversight of presidential campaign coverage and the ABC News polling unit. Earlier in his career, Reiter held a series of key positions at ABC News from senior producer of ABC News special events to senior broadcast producer for “ABC World News Tonight Weekend,” to deputy bureau chief of the L.A. bureau and, in 2003, head of the ABC News Baghdad bureau during the Iraq War and fall of Saddam Hussein.

DETROIT, Mich.—WWJ-TV (CBS 62), the ViacomCBS-owned station in Detroit, has announced ambitious plans to build from scratch a full-scale, hyper-local news department in 2022. 

CBS News Detroit is currently expected to launch in the late summer or early fall of 2022. It will feature a 24/7 streaming service with live local news coverage from 4:00 AM to 11:35 PM, Monday-Sunday, for a total of 137 hours per week. In addition, CBS 62 will broadcast live CBS News Detroit newscasts 40 hours per week in early morning, midday, early evening and late news time periods, the company said. 

“We view this as an unprecedented opportunity to start from scratch at a large-market, network-owned station and build the newsroom of the future – where we focus first on streaming and then have our content flow like water across our linear broadcast, digital and social media platforms,” said  Wendy McMahon, president and co-head, CBS News and Stations. “When Brian [Watson, vice president and general manager of WWJ-TV and sister station WKBD-TV] and his team presented their vision for CBS News Detroit earlier this year, I thought to myself ‘This never happens. Until now.’”

This marks the first time CBS 62 will have its own full-scale local news department. WWJ (formerly known as WGPR-TV) became a CBS Television Network-owned station in 1995. From 2001-2002, WWJ aired an 11:00 PM newscast produced by WKBD until that station’s news department was shuttered in December 2002. From 2009-2012, WWJ produced a weekday 5:00-7:00 AM newscast that offered weather, traffic and headlines from the Detroit Free Press and also WWJ Radio. In recent years, the station has aired local weather reports several times a day, the company said. 

CBS News Detroit will be recruiting and hiring a full staff as soon as they hire a news director. The reporting staff will consist of a diverse team of journalists who will be embedded full-time in communities across the Detroit area, as well as at the State Capital in Lansing, Mich.

Adrienne Roark, president, CBS Stations, who has worked closely with CBS 62 on developing the plan for creating CBS News Detroit, added: “The time has come for our Detroit employees and the communities served by CBS 62 to have a full-fledged news department that utilizes the latest advances in newsgathering and streaming technology and a team of multi-skilled journalists who will be embedded in neighborhoods across the market.”

“This is a landmark moment in the history of our station and, for that matter, local news,” Watson said. “I don’t believe there is another station in a large market like ours that has done anything like this, so we are excited to help write a bold new chapter in the history of local news.”

Watson added: “CBS News Detroit will stand out as the market’s only grassroots, community-focused newsgathering organization. We will super-serve our audiences on every media platform with more hours of live, local news than any other source in Detroit. Our journalists will be committed to giving a voice to people who might otherwise be unheard, and shining a light on the issues that are impacting communities throughout Metro Detroit.”

NEW YORK—CBS News is launching See It Now Studios, a new content provider that will produce news, documentary and unscripted programming for Paramount+, CBS, the ViacomCBS networks, international broadcasters and other content platforms. 

Former CBS News president Susan Zirinsky has been named president of See It Now Studios and will report directly to George Cheeks, president and CEO of CBS and chief content officer, news and sports for Paramount+.

Studios Launches with two 9/11 documentaries premiering on Paramount+ and the CBS Television Network. Docuseries on Ghislaine Maxwell and the January 2021 attack on the U.S. capitol are also in production for Paramount+

“This is a studio built on the foundation of the incredible journalism and storytelling of CBS News but with a broader remit,” said Cheeks. “See It Now Studios will have the flexibility to work across a range of production formats and concepts to meet the growing needs of linear and streaming platforms, including producing premium documentary content for Paramount+. There is no one better to lead this new unit than the journalistic and producing force of nature that is Susan Zirinsky. She and her team have already hit the ground running.”

See It Now Studios will develop original documentaries and docuseries, and will be an in-house pipeline for Paramount+, CBS and ViacomCBS networks. The unit will also produce for third-party platforms and partner on projects with outside production companies. See It Now Studios’ productions will be distributed globally by the ViacomCBS Global Distribution Group.

The studio will also create spinoffs of CBS News brands, building on the reporting and resources of CBS News, and produce “insta-docs” in the wake of monumental current events in collaboration with Neeraj Khemlani and Wendy McMahon, presidents and co-heads of CBS News and Stations.

“See It Now Studios will deliver premium, impactful non-fiction series and unscripted programming,” said Zirinsky. “We’ve got a slate of powerful projects that use immersive storytelling to illuminate people and places that rarely grant access. These are strong, story-driven projects, with engaging narratives and compelling characters that will keep viewers watching. All told through with the high-quality standards set by CBS News.”

The name See It Now Studios is inspired by the famed series “See It Now,” produced by Edward R. Murrow and Fred Friendly, which launched on Nov. 18, 1951 and opened with the first live simultaneous coast-to-coast broadcast TV transmission. “See It Now” was a major influence on television journalism and led to the launch of “CBS Reports” and “60 Minutes.”

Joining Zirinsky in See It Now Studios are senior executive producer of content oversight Terence Wrong, an experienced, award-winning storyteller who has produced more than 200 hours of documentaries and docuseries for broadcast, premium and cable, and Aysu Saliba as supervising producer, development. 

Grace Kim is the unit’s production manager, and Amy Gardner is an associate producer. Zirinsky will also draw on the strength of executive producer Mitch Weitzner and his team of Sasha Reuther and Danielle Levy.

NEW YORK—CBS News has announced that its “CBS Mornings” show will go live on September 7 in a new studio that will feature new technologies to enable the show’s new format and approach to telling stories. 

The second-floor studio space inside the ViacomCBS headquarters encompasses more than 3000 square feet, providing for multiple interview areas and production capabilities. 

The new studio includes touch-screen technology, augmented reality, monitors throughout the room, and LED walls. 

The new technologies and studio design will dramatically enhance CBS Morning’s storytelling capabilities and provide new ways for the broadcast to showcase interviews, blend feeds from CBS News’ vast newsgathering arms and its affiliates, and deliver engaging content to viewers on television and through ViacomCBS’ streaming networks and social and digital platforms, CBS News said. 

CBS senior vice president of news operations Rick Jefferson, creative director Renee Cullen in collaboration with Jack Morton Worldwide and their teams designed and developed the studio.

The show will also debut a new team and a new format. Gayle King, Tony Dokoupil and Nate Burleson will co-host “CBS Mornings” Monday through Friday. Jeff Glor, Dana Jacobson and Michelle Miller will to co-host “CBS Saturday Morning” and Jane Pauley to anchor “CBS Sunday Morning”

“All CBS News morning broadcasts will now be part of the same family, with a focus on original reporting and exquisite storytelling, connected by the sound of the iconic trumpet music and an ethos of optimism that carries all the way through to the sunshine logo itself,” said Neeraj Khemlani, president and co-head of CBS News and Stations.

CBS News said the show will feature hard news and smart conversation in the mornings during the 7:00 AM hour and expand its feature reporting during the 8:00 AM hour with live interviews as well as in-depth pieces, covering topics from news, sports, climate, and technology to race, health, parenting and personal finance. 

It will also feature signature arts and culture pieces from Anthony Mason and Vlad Duthiers will continue his “What to Watch” segment.

BALTIMORE, M.D.—CBS News and Stations have launched CBSN Baltimore, the 12th of ViacomCBS’ 13 local direct-to-consumer streaming news services in major markets across the country.

It also announced that CBSN Miami will be the next streaming local service to launch. 

CBSN Baltimore features anchored programming and coverage of live breaking news events in the region, produced by WJZ-TV.

“We are very excited to launch CBSN Baltimore and extend our community-leading newscasts to our viewers on a 24/7 basis,” said Audra Swain, vice president and general manager, WJZ-TV. “As our audience viewing patterns continue to evolve, WJZ will be at the forefront of the ever-changing digital space with original content and programming on CBSN Baltimore. We plan on using this platform to present extended versions of news stories and community specials that are hyperlocal and of great importance to our audience. In addition, we will be expanding our franchise of ‘Purple’ programming on CBSN Baltimore, and will feature more hours of Ravens news coverage than any other station in the market.”

CBS became the first major media company to launch a local OTT news service when CBSN New York debuted in December 2018. Since then, the company has launched CBSN Local services in Los Angeles, Boston, San Francisco Bay Area, Minnesota, Philadelphia, Denver, Pittsburgh, Chicago, Dallas-Fort Worth and Sacramento. Following today’s debut of CBSN Baltimore, CBS News and Stations will soon be launching CBSN Miami.

CBSN Baltimore is available through CBSN, on CBSNews.com and on the CBS News apps for mobile and connected TV devices. In addition, the service is available through CBSBaltimore.com and the CBS Local mobile app.

CBSN Baltimore also launched on Paramount+ on August 23 and will be available on Pluto TV on August 24. 

NEW YORK—CBS will combine CBS News and the CBS Television Stations with Neeraj Khemlani, Hearst Newspapers, Cable Networks & Digital Media executive; and Wendy McMahon, former ABC Owned Television Stations Group president, taking the lead. They have been named presidents and co-heads of the newly formed division. They will report to George Cheeks, president and chief executive officer of the CBS Entertainment Group.

“This is an opportunity to create a news and information structure that positions CBS for the future,” said Cheeks in a company statement. “It speaks to our ability to scale newsgathering, production, technical and operational resources to serve both national and local, linear and digital, with the agility to deliver trusted information to every platform. Wendy and Neeraj have the leadership background and cross-platform accomplishments that cover all these important areas, and they share our commitment for supporting superior journalism, optimal delivery platforms and the strongest of organizational cultures.”

McMahon and Khemlani will partner on managing all aspects of the division, marking a homecoming to CBS for both executives—Khemlani as a producer on “60 Minutes” and “60 Minutes II” for eight years while McMahon served seven years at WBZ Boston and WCCO Minneapolis.

The unified division will bring under one management structure the broadcast resources of CBS News, the 24/7 streaming news service CBSN, 10 CBSN Local platforms, cbsnews.com and 28 CBS-owned stations in 17 major U.S. markets. It will maximize the power of CBS’ newsgathering and production operations to serve audiences across all national, digital, local and global platforms.

Susan Zirinsky will continue as president of CBS News until the new leadership has started and will assist with the transition. The company is in discussions with Zirinsky for a significant role at a new CBS News Content Studio to be launched later this year.

Khemlani was most recently executive vice president and deputy group head at Hearst Newspapers, overseeing 3,000 employees who publish print and digital subscription products for 24 dailies and 52 weeklies in cities across the country.

Prior to this position, McMahon was president of the ABC Owned Stations with direct responsibility for the Walt Disney Co.’s eight broadcast stations, local newsrooms and streaming assets, as well as oversight of the 1,500 team members who collectively achieved their 12th consecutive year of local television news leadership in 2020.

Much like everything else that has transpired in 2020, election-night coverage promises to test news organizations as they have never been tested before. 

“I’ve been part of election teams since the 1980s,” said David Bohrman, executive producer of CBS News’s 2020 election-night coverage. “I’ve run election coverage at CNN and NBC, and now here at CBS, and this is the most complicated election I’ve ever been part of.” 

Marc Burstein, senior executive producer of ABC News Special Events, agreed, citing the difficulties of producing a major election-night special in the middle of a major pandemic: “We are having to prepare for anything and everything. It could be the longest night or it may not be. No one knows and we have to prepare for every possible contingency.” (NBC News, the other Big Three broadcast network news arm, did not provide executives to be interviewed.)

Or, as "PBS NewsHour" executive producer Sara Just observed: “It’s like trying to tie your shoes while riding a bicycle. We are confident we have a good plan for keeping everyone safe, but it is challenging. This is going to be a night like none other.”

Much of this reflects a 2020 news cycle that has produced a slew of once-in-a-lifetime stories and tragedies. “I’ve been at CNN for almost 30 years and this is the most intense news environment I’ve ever seen,” Sam Feist, senior VP and Washington bureau chief at CNN, said during B+C’s News Technology Summit. “We are covering an election, maybe the most anticipated election in our lifetime, along with a pandemic and a national reckoning over race.”

“When we look back on 2020 we will think, ‘Wow, that was the most extraordinary news year ever,’ and we did it with an arm and a half tied behind our back,” Feist added.

These national calamities and controversies have also spiked viewer interest in the results and significantly raised the competitive stakes for news organizations. 

“There are more eyes on this election than we’ve had in our lifetimes,” Cherie Grzech, VP of politics and the Washington bureau at Fox News, said. 

THE MOST UNUSUAL ELECTION NIGHT

The heightened scrutiny comes as news organizations are grappling with what might on Nov. 3 be the most unusual election night in television history.  

Unlike other presidential elections, where networks covered voters casting ballots and reported the results the same day, early voting this year is hitting record levels. Mail-in voting is also expected to hit record levels, and many votes might not be counted until after Nov. 3. That, in turn, could delay results and make the process of reporting and calling races a much more complex and uncertain process. 

Technology and production plans have also been upended by a pandemic that has killed more than 220,000 people. In addition to having many people work from home, networks are using more studios and control rooms to spread out employees and are revising coverage plans by recruiting additional legal experts to explain potential voting irregularities and rethinking how to deploy journalists. Many typical election-night gatherings are likely to be canceled and travel restrictions will make it more difficult to get boots on the ground. 

One thing that hasn’t changed is election night’s importance. All the major commercial TV news organizations are investing millions of dollars in new sets and technology to stand out from the competition and attract new viewers.

“Election night, for us and for all the news networks, is our Super Bowl,” Fox News senior VP of news and politics Alan Komissaroff said. “It is our biggest night and we are determined to put our best foot forward. There isn’t a nook and cranny of the building that we are not using. We’ll be using every piece of technology we have been using in the past and a few new ones as well.”

As in earlier years, many networks will broadcast their coverage from new sets, studios or facilities that feature the glitziest graphics and massive, high-resolution, floor-to-ceiling walls and screens for data and results. 

Coverage will include big touch screens where correspondents and anchors take deep dives into results and augmented reality systems. Some networks, such as Fox News, will even be debuting virtual reality systems. 

The challenges facing news organizations this year may also improve the quality of coverage. For example, COVID-19 restrictions limiting in-studio guests will result in using a much wider array of sources and voices from remote locations, network executives said. “This has been kind of a breakthrough moment this year in terms of adding more people to the conversation,” Fox News’s Grzech said. 

Another positive development is the rapid expansion of streaming services. Their growing availability means viewers will be able to easily access a much wider array of stories and coverage, both on digital media and on broadcast networks, where TV anchors can draw on the expertise of digital teams.

The difficulties of election coverage during the COVID-19 pandemic have also forced news organizations to integrate their operations more tightly with local stations, digital outlets and even radio organizations rather than fly reporters into key battleground states. This reporting from seasoned local journalists could provide national audiences with a better understanding of the results in those locales. 

CBS, for one, will add extensive coverage to CBSN by streaming 10 local feeds, while Newsy will draw on coverage from parent company Scripps’s 60 TV stations. 

“We have a team of four or five people who will be monitoring the local stations and we’ll be able to carry their feeds at key times,” said Matt Simon, supervising producer for PM content at Newsy, who is also overseeing election-night initiatives.

"PBS NewsHour" will also be drawing on the expertise of local reporters. “One of the great advantages of public broadcasting is that there are over 350 stations across the country that we work with,” Just said. “They know their communities best, and throughout our programming we will be turning to a lot of those reporters for their expertise.”

BUILT FOR PRIMETIME

The complexity of predicting races and explaining voting trends is likely to make networks even more cautious and thoughtful when providing context or caveats in their reporting. 

“Transparency is the watchword for us,” ABC’s Burstein said. He said coverage will explain what is known as well as what isn’t known, so viewers understand why certain information or vote totals aren’t available. “The decision desk [which calls races] is always careful and conservative, but this year we will be more conservative than ever.” 

For its election-night coverage, ABC News will use a renovated studio that has been expanded to 5,500 square feet. It features 28 new video screens with about 35 million pixels, including a high-resolution video floor. 

A variety of features that enables moving video walls and screens will provide more flexibility to tell the story from different angles. Enhanced capabilities for augmented reality and other graphics are also part of the mix. 

“We will have tools to tell the story in ways we’ve never had before,” Zach Toback, VP of news and nonfiction production and studio operations at ABC News, said. “There is video everywhere, there is video on the ceilings, all across the walls, that creates a very immersive space. It is the largest renovation that we’ve done in any facility since the early 1980s.”

"PBS NewsHour" will be upping its production values with new LED walls that allow anchors and reporters to better display graphics and analyze results, VP of operations Matt Speiser said.

Univision will show off a new set that improves its graphics capabilities and helps it follow COVID-19 restrictions. “We are trying to simulate as much as possible the expansiveness of the coverage we’ve had in the past and do an even better job this year,” said Lourdes Torres, senior VP of political coverage and special projects for the Spanish-language broadcaster. “We have a huge newsroom and the idea is to expand the set into the newsroom and basically have all the elements—video walls, touch screens—embedded in the newsroom.” 

Due to COVID-19 restrictions, many Univision staffers have been working from home, with only about 25% of the typical newsroom staff on-site. For election night, though, Univision will be bringing more people into the building to supplement the remote workers. 

To keep staff safe, Univision will place staff in additional control rooms and spaces to maintain social distancing, a strategy many other networks and news organizations are adopting. “We will have training, special cleaning teams, security to remind people about masks to keep people safe,” Torres said. “It is really a pretty elaborate plan.”

SAFETY MUST COME FIRST

Since the start of the pandemic, the Associated Press has decentralized video production operations and set up systems for people to work at home, AP deputy managing editor for visual and digital journalism Derl McCrudden said. But for the final days of election coverage, AP will be bringing a small video production crew back into the New York and London hubs. 

That will allow AP to provide live election coverage for customers with the curated AP Direct channel and four other live channels that provide outlets with HD-quality video. “Many broadcasters air these feeds live around the world,” McCrudden said. 

ABC will be spreading out staff over four control rooms and three studios. “We are being very careful with our COVID protocols,” Katie den Daas, executive producer at the streaming service ABC News Live, said. “We will have more control rooms than we’ve ever had, so we can be socially distant. We have added HEPA filters to our control rooms. Everyone wears a mask and some people in the control rooms will be getting the N95 masks of the sort used by medical professionals,” she said.

Said CBS’s Bohrman: “Everyone involved is being tested every day, everyone in the studio, everyone in the control room.” Network coverage will originate in a new high tech set at the ViacomCBS headquarters in Times Square, a first for the news division on election night. “The studio is zoned off to separate people and to make sure there is not any movement between the zones,” Bohrman said. “This is the biggest team effort in broadcast news, but we are finding ways to do it in a COVID-safe way.”

All of these efforts, executives said, will help to keep staff members safe as they report on the most unusual election of our lifetimes. Bohrman stressed the importance of overcoming obstacles and getting the story right—both for the networks and for the country. 

“We and all the broadcast networks know that we need to help restore the faith in the electoral system,” he said. “It has been put under a lot of doubt by a lot of people and we need to be open and above board and clear as to the numbers to provide viewers with information they can trust.”

“This is our night,” den Daas at ABC News Live said. “That night might drag on for a while, but that’s OK, because this is what we do. This is why we got into journalism: To make sure we are here when Americans need someone to bring them the big story.” 

COSTA MESA, Calif.—Veritone and CBS News will continue its decade-long partnership as the two sides have announced a multi-year agreement that extends their content licensing deal.

Veritone is a provider of digital content licensing services, and for the last ten-plus years has helped TV producers, filmmakers and content creators have access to archival and breaking news content from CBS News.

With this new deal, Veritone is set to increase the amount of CBS News footage available for creators to license and leverage. It will also apply its own proprietary AI technology, aiWARE, to assist with the content search and delivery process.

CBS News content can be found at the Veritone Content Licensing site, which features more than 2.5 million hours of programming from “60 Minutes,” “CBS Evening News” and more. 

PHILADELPHIA—With CBSN Philly, Philadelphia becomes the sixth market in the U.S. to have its own local direct-to-consumer streaming news service from CBS Television and CBS Interactive. CBSN Philly officially launched on Jan. 30.

The CBSN streaming service offers viewers anchored programming, coverage of live breaking news events in the region from local station KYW-TV and a library of local news content available for on-demand viewing. CBSN Philly is available through CBSN, on CBSNews.com and on the CBS News apps for mobile and connected TV devices, as well as on CBSPhilly.com and the CBS Local mobile app.

CBS began these local news streaming services with CBSN New York in December 2018. Since then, CBSN Los Angeles, CBSN Boston, CBSN San Francisco Bay Area and CBSN Minnesota all launched. CBSN Pittsburgh is the next local streaming service scheduled to launch, doing so in February. Other markets expected to receive its own CBSN stream are Chicago, Dallas-Ft. Worth, Denver, Miami, Sacramento and Baltimore.

“It is very exciting to reach the midpoint of the rollout for our CBSN Local services with today’s launch of CBSN Philly,” said Peter Dunn, president of CBS Television Studios. “We have learned so much during our five previous launches and now have the structure in place to accelerate our rollout plan and go live in all of our markets within the next few months.”

NEW YORK—A new portfolio of destinations for streaming local news –both anchor-presented stories and live breaking news—will soon be available on connected TVs, computers, tablets and smartphones.

CBS Television Stations and CBS Interactive Aug 1 went public with plans for the new online, direct-to-consumer streaming news service. CBSN Local services will be available via the 24/7 CBSN streaming news service of CBS News and CBS Interactive, CBS said.

“CBSN Local is the exciting next chapter in how our stations will serve audiences seeking local news on all of the most popular content consumption platforms,” said Peter Dunn, President, CBS Television Stations.

First up for CBSN Local will be New York City. WCBS, the broadcaster’s flagship station, and sister WLNY, will launch in Q4 2018. Next will be KCBS and KCAL in Los Angeles with other major market CBS O&Os to follow.

[Read: CBS, Nielsen Team Up On National Dynamic Ad Insertion Over Live Linear TV]

“The addition of CBSN Local services delivering high-quality coverage from our stations around the country will bring a new level of depth to CBSN’s 24/7 original reporting,” said Jim Lanzone, CEO, CBS Interactive and Chief Digital Officer, CBS Corp.

Each CBSN Local service will offer live streams of CBS Television Stations’ regularly scheduled early morning, daytime and evening newscasts. Other daily newscasts will be produced exclusively for CBSN Local, CBS said.

Breaking live news coverage and a library of on-demand content will also be available from each CBSN Local service.

The ad-supported CBSN Local services will be led by anchors and reporters at local CBS Television Stations.

The new local streaming services will complement the network’s other streaming services, including CBSN and CBS Sports HQ. Ultimately, they will be included as live channels in CBS All Access in their local markets.

DENVER—CBS News is sticking with Wazee Digital to handle the licensing and distribution for its archived content, announcing that it has officially renewed its deal with the cloud-based video management and licensing services provider.

Wazee Digital handles the CBS New archive of footage through its Wazee Digital Commerce, a portal that connects rights holders with customers. Through Wazee Digital Commerce, customers can research the CBS News archive—which dates back to the 1950s—gain access to film/tape screeners and license the content.

Commerce is powered by Wazee Digital Core, a media asset management system built for the cloud.

No specific details were provided on the length of the new deal between CBS and Wazee.

NEW YORK—The newly announced TV Everywhere apps for Amazon Fire TV and Android TV will both offer 360-degree video playback. The first 360 video that is available through the app is a behind-the-scenes look at a gorillas in Africa segment from “60 Minutes.”

To read the full story, check out TVT’s sister publication B&C.

NEW YORK—There’s a new release for the Xbox 360, but it’s not a game, it’s a digital streaming news service. CBS News has announced that its CBSN streaming service will now be available in the CBS News app on Xbox 360 consoles.

CBSN features all resources of CBS News and is free to access with no authentication required. The app allows viewers to access live, anchored coverage and original reporting of breaking news, current events, and political, entertainment and sports news.

In addition to now being available on the Xbox 360, CBSN is also available on Xbox One, Amazon Fire TV, Android TV, Apple TV, Roku, CBS News apps on iOS, Android and Windows 8.1, and CBSNews.com.