Low Down: WFXT's Downfall

And welcome to The Chronicles of Trevor, the only blog that can tell the difference between Fox Television Stations and the Fox News Channel

Fox traded WFXT 25 to Cox Media Group, in order to get KTVU channel 2, which serves the Bay Area of San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose. This makes me laugh even harder at the wrong cake joke from the Sonic movie

If you don't know what I'm talking about as to how Cox has been running WFXT in the ground, Here's a little low-down as to how they've been doing so.

1. Changing the logo.

Back before Cox took over channel 25, they had this nostalgic logo, dubbed the "Boxkite". This logo design was used by the stations owned by Fox themselves, and a handful of the network's affiliates.

The logo as used in newscasts

The logo used for generic programming and PSA's

This logo was used one year into Cox ownership. In 2015, they changed the logo to 

,

which looks like a logo for a market 209 station, rather than a station in TV market 9. The FOX logo has been replaced by FOX in an italic Helvetica font! I think that a station must use the actual logo of their network they're affiliated with.

Cox also owned a station in Syracuse, NY, called WSYT FOX68, that also changed its logo in a similar way.

This makes me think that Cox can't run a Fox affiliate correctly.

Nowadays, WSYT is owned by Imagicomm Communications. I think that they should change the logo to have the actual Fox logo.

Turning back to WFXT, Cox also blundered by

2. Pulling a Disney before it was cool.

2 years before The Mickey Corporation changed 

 into

,

Cox changed FOX 25, a brand that was used since 1987, to

, 

which sounds like an independent station, rather than a Fox affiliate. This tells me that Cox can't run a Fox affiliate at all! There's a reason why so many people I know still refer to the station as "Fox 25". It's because it's been called that since '87, and since it's more memorable than "bOstON 25". It's also disgraceful to the station's legacy, being owned by Fox TWICE in its history! Other than that, when the Boston Celtics owned 25 in the early 90s, They kept the Fox 25 name, because they knew that it was important to the station's identity.

3. Changing Tunes

When Cox introduced Fox 25's barf-inducing 2015 logo, they changed the iconic news music that they used under Fox, the Fox Affiliate News Theme, by OSI Music, to Impact V6 from 615 Music. 

Listen to a sample here: 

http://beta.newsmusicsearcharchive.com/index.php#3,1,12

This theme is ok, but not as memorable as the OSI theme. The OSI theme had a few bad themes, like the cut of the Morning News theme, with the main guitar replaced by a saxophone. Sax hasn't been a staple in news music since the mid 90's, and as such, makes that cut extremely cheesy. What's awful though, is that 25 used to use that theme as the closing theme to the morning news, when the "©FOX TELEVISION STATIONS INC." banner appears at the end of the show. It makes a godly-produced newscast end on a cheesy note.

If I were in charge of the music I'd use the Morning Promo cut that's basically the main version of the Morning theme, with the brass section from the Primary news theme used for the afternoon newscasts, since that would be a good segue to the later newscasts.

But I digress. When Boston 25 (UGH) introduced the "Your Local Station" tagline, they changed their theme to a station-commissioned track from Stephen Arnold Music called "Stream". 

Listen here:

http://beta.newsmusicsearcharchive.com/index.php#3,1,2445

It sounds like the apocalyptic rave that is the BBC News theme, bought off Temu. I'd rather shove the contents of a molten trashcan in my ears than listen to that hot garbage. That's the same as listening to that theme.

4. Local Steals & Deals, or as I call it:

This has been on WFXT and other Cox-owned stations since the health event we shall not speak of, alongside stations formerly owned by Meredith Corporation, now owned by Gray Television. I have a whole post dedicated to this and CBS Deals, a segment on CBS's owned-and-operated stations, produced by the same company! Former QVC host Lisa Robertson used to host these cash grabs, and is now hosted by random nobodies. They shill products like Amazon Alexa devices and Sharper Image-esque products. Products that are NOT LOCAL, STEALing time that should be used for news, at DEALS that you could see at Walmart (which is funny, since Cox Media Group's parent, Apollo Global Management, a hedge fund, owns Walmart as well).

These are the biggest reasons as to how Cox has been running a once iconic station into the ground.

I think that Fox should've either sold KRIV in Houston or KTBC in Austin, since those stations are one of THREE Fox-owned Fox network stations in Texas. Don't get me wrong, Texas is a big state and I like it, since my cousin Kaylee (she's getting married in less than a week, I'm going!) is from there! But I think that 3 stations is just overkill. But seeing how KRIV has Caroline Collins, a TikToker as a "jOuRNaLiST", makes me want to see Fox sell the Houston station, along with Collins, to Cox.

5. Changes in the Morning News

When Fox owned WFXT, you'd find their morning newscasts to be a good time. One time, they threw a pie in the face of one of their guests, alongside the playing of the Spanish Flea!

Under Cox ownership, though, the morning news is now a conventional newscast where no fun is allowed. RIP.

Nowadays, I watch WCVB, channel 5, since most of the personalities on there are former FOX 25 employees. Maria Stephanos, former weekday afternoon and late anchor at 25, now does the same thing at NewsCenter 5.

Other than that, These are the reasons why WFXT has gone so downhill thanks to the business decisions of Cox Media Group.

Thanks for reading The Chronicles of Trevor!