GreenTeaMoxie

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Please remember to sign your messages on talk pages by typing four tildes (~~~~); this will automatically insert your username and the date. If you need help, check out Wikipedia:Questions, ask me on my talk page, or , and a volunteer should respond shortly. Again, welcome! Mvcg66b3r (talk) 18:25, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

About your edits

You edited the first sentence at TV station articles to be more "formal"; when they're not really necessary. I know you're new at Wikipedia. I think you should talk to my friend @Sammi Brie: about this. Mvcg66b3r (talk) 21:25, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

If the extra word isn't really necessary, then I don't see how removing it is either. I think we should be striving for language that is as objective and uninterpretable as possible, and the word "based" makes the meaning of these introductory sentences that much clearer. GreenTeaMoxie (talk) 21:34, 17 September 2024 (UTC)

Dealing with cities of license in wording is definitely a toughie, and in the last couple of years we have spent quite a bit of time wrangling the content of standard leads in TV station articles to remove tendencies toward jargon.

The wording of the articles you hit is deliberate. For instance, in KTAB-TV, the station has its physical studio facility in the same place as its community of license. The only one that really doesn't is KXVA, because it is run from San Angelo.

This is not always the case. KAAL, for instance, is licensed to Austin, Minnesota, but its studios are in Rochester, Minnesota, and the article actually covers this. Its beginning reads: KAAL (channel 6) is a television station licensed to Austin, Minnesota, United States (note the bolded emphasis). Sometimes, the studios are in a suburb, in which case this doesn't tend to apply, e.g. WWJ-TV.

There are some television stations (such as Ion stations) that make this tough, because they have no physical presence even in the area of the station. These tend to simply follow the rule of "in" in the main city, "licensed to" in another city: WBPX-TV (channel 68) is a television station in Boston, Massachusetts, United States, but KPXG-TV (channel 22) is a television station licensed to Salem, Oregon, United States (the market city is Portland, Oregon).

I wrote some further comments on this in 2022 when this came up with WWJ (licensed to Detroit but physically in a suburb thereof):

Unlike most businesses, broadcast stations in the U.S. (and some other countries) are identified with certain communities not by the location of their physical plant (studios or transmitter) but by a formal community of license designation. Legally and in station IDs, the station is licensed to Detroit, though its facilities may be elsewhere. Sometimes, the inverse happens: a station is licensed to a nearby suburb and has its studios and/or transmitter in the largest city in the area (e.g. KCPQ, which has not had studios in Tacoma, Washington, since 1997, or KPNX, which has not had studios in Mesa, Arizona, since 1953 or so).

Ever since the abolition of the FCC's main studio rule, some stations—primarily minor broadcasters of satellite-fed national commercial or religious programming—do not have a studio facility in the area where they broadcast. WPXG-TV (covered in WBPX-TV) is a good example. Its transmitter is in Epsom, New Hampshire. Its city of license is Concord, New Hampshire. Its main studio on paper? 312 Walnut Street, Suite 2800, Cincinnati, Ohio. Yet calling WPXG-TV, or WBPX-TV, or any Ion Media station a "Cincinnati station" would be contrary to anyone's expectations.

This is my topic specialty, and I would welcome comments. Also pinging Mvcg66b3r. Sammi Brie (she/her • t • c) 23:26, 17 September 2024 (UTC)