Thursday Collection

Some updates, some speculation, and some mea culpa from your Mighty Blog of Fun(tm)...

SHE'S IN: As reported here late Tuesday night, former local TV anchor Stefani Schaefer is back in Northeast Ohio, taking an apparently new position on WJW/8's FOX 8 News In The
Morning.

UPDATE: The station has posted information about her return, and video from the announcement, here.

It's a return to the area, and a return to the very show she was on in the mid-1990's.

Stefani was the "big announcement at 8 AM" - which, in true TV style, was made in the last 10 minutes of the hour on Wednesday morning (gotta keep those viewers watching!). She told viewers she hadn't even sold her house in Cleveland - where her family has moved in again - while doing "iVillage Live" for NBC's owned-and-operated stations.

Schaefer will be on the air for only two hours of "FOX 8 News In The Morning", in the 7-9 AM segment...the one where WJW's popular local program competes with the three big network morning shows on NBC, ABC and CBS. (OK, maybe two and a half.)

And our "mea culpa".

Our item posted Tuesday night on her return to FOX 8 had a number of errors, which were corrected Wednesday morning.

* No, Stefani wasn't on "Good Morning Cleveland" - as our original item on her departure from WEWS accurately reported, she was on "Live on Five". But we'd tabbed her to "GMC" in at least one other item, which we've also now corrected.

* As far as we know, her first name is NOT spelled "Stephanie", though we have seen Google references to items on her with that spelling as well.

By some of the private brickbats we received from overheated anonymous readers, our "poor reporting" was responsible for mass illness and panic across newsrooms in Northeast Ohio, or something of the sort.

Though we do extend our apologies to the NewsBlues folks, who picked up our item with the above errors just minutes before we made the proper corrections, we do have to make a point here.

This blog is not the Cleveland Plain Dealer. We're not connected to the Akron Beacon Journal, or any other professional publication.

OMW is basically a hobby, as we've said more than once, without benefit of proofreaders or a large editorial staff. We are also free, like good things in life are supposed to be.

We also strive to be as accurate as possible. Please note: "as possible".

If we mess something up, tell us, and we'll fix it at our earliest convenience.

We're not responsible for making you "look bad" by posting our items, or items based on our items, in your newsroom. If you're not happy, please contact OMW's financial office for a full refund of every penny you've paid us.

And we wonder why we even do this...

SHE'S ALSO IN: Like a comfortable blanket on a chilly day (no, not a wet one), WNIR/100.1 morning co-host Maggie Fuller has indeed returned to the show she left in June, the station's morning drive show with Stan Piatt, Steve French and Jim Midock.

And though we don't check in with the WNIR morning crew a lot, we did catch a little of her return on Monday - and it's like she never left. That appeared to be a "good thing" for regular listeners and callers, who were welcoming her back.

Piatt himself welcomed back his once-and-again co-host on his website:

THE GANG IS BACK TOGETHER AGAIN!!!
WNIR Morning Show gang reunited

September 10, 2007

Pick your song:

Reunited - Peaches and Herb
Welcome Back - John Sebastian
Return to Sender - Elvis Presley

After 8 weeks away and multiple "replacement" trials, Maggie Fuller has returned to the WNIR Morning Show.

Maggie, it's great to have you right back where you belong!

OMW hears that at least one of the women who took part in those tryout shows, former Cleveland radio personality Sally Ride (WDOK/Metro Traffic/etc.), is still out there looking for on-air work...

AND IT'S FIXED: OMW reported a while back on a tip from Akron Beacon Journal sportswriter George M. Thomas, a long-time reader of This Space who told us that the new AT&T U-verse system did indeed carry the first week of the Big Ten Network - but not the Ohio State-Youngstown State opening contest.

AT&T's new cable TV competitor had apparently not made arrangements to carry BTN's "overflow" channel. While attempting to record OSU-YSU back home while he covered the game from Ohio Stadium, Mr. Thomas returned home to a DVR with the Michigan-Appalachian State upset instead of Buckeyes-Penguins.

The item George started here ended up finished in his own "Airing It Out" column, which has continued since he started as the Buckeyes beat reporter for the Beacon.

Mr. Thomas confirms something we heard in comments here: The "glitch" was fixed for AT&T U-verse subscribers (George is on a 30 day trial) last weekend, with the OSU-Akron Zips game and other non-primary BTN contests carried on "overflow" channels.

(And another "glitch" has been fixed by the folks at the ABJ's Ohio.com - the link to find George's writing now works! Until recently, it's been bringing up an empty page.)

AND WHILE WE'RE ON THE BTN: The new cable/satellite network's pitch to Big Ten fans hasn't diminished.

We continue to see the custom TV spot for Ohio, with Buckeyes coach Jim Tressel being a "company man", urging viewers to call the BTN toll-free number - where, if it's like the NFL Network, they likely get pitches to sign up for DirecTV and Dish Network. The latter satellite provider also just signed a pact with the Big Ten Network folks.

But, of course, Time Warner Cable hasn't - and that by far covers the largest chunk of Ohio cable subscribers.

Don't expect much change.

For one, the next Ohio State Game, the Big Ten opener with Northwestern on Saturday, will be on ESPN. Even if there are a lot of OSU fans clamoring to see that opener, it'll be on the nation's most widely available sports network - which has been carried on Time Warner Cable and its predecessors since nearly its inception.

Though it would seem possible that one or maybe two Ohio State games may end up being snatched by BTN - if the other networks pass them up - most of them will air on ABC or ESPN.

This, again, reminds of us of the NFL Network urging fans to call a toll-free number to "get" the network...when there weren't any games on the network's schedule at the time of the commercial's airing...

AND ONE FINAL NOTE: This is one that flew up the AllAccess Net News scroll the other day - so fast, that we missed it.

The popular trade website reported that Clear Channel rock WRQK/106.9 Canton, now officially in the company's hands, was one of the latest stations the company applied to put in the "Aloha Station Trust."

That's the resting place for stations Clear Channel is moving off its books, to pave the way for the eventual sale of the company (we THINK that's still in the works) to private equity funds.

"Rock 106.9", known for most of its life as "Rock 107", joins all of the Oak Tree-based Clear Channel Cleveland FMs in the list of stations "flipped" to the secretive trust.

The prevailing opinion in this corner, and among most folks we trust, opinion-wise, is that the move doesn't necessarily mean the stations are tabbed for exit from either Oak Tree or Freedom Avenue, the Jackson Township building now housing WRQK.

We'd still guess that this was a wide shot meant to reduce the overall bulk of Clear Channel, to speed along the deal for federal regulators. Then, we'd assume that the new CC ownership would "keep" as many stations as they could fit, ownership-limit-wise...give or take a new set of "eyes" deciding to cast aside assorted stations for other reasons.

From this vantage point, speculation that stations like WGAR, WMJI, WMMS, WMVX or WRQK are headed out of Clear Channel's domain at ANY point is premature. We'd take the bet that they don't even move one Prophet computer out of their current homes...