SACRAMENTO, Calif. — Today's Why Guy question comes from Linda Brown who asks, "I have a Why Guy question. Why do news stations send reporters out to stand in front of businesses or government offices that aren't open to report on those places? Seems it would be more cost effective to do their reporting at the station."
Ok, Linda here's why we go live. We have the discussion every day at 2 a.m., debating whether we need to do this live or stay back at the station. There are many big stories that occurred hours earlier that still have or may have activity still going on so that's where we need to be.
A social media post from a TV engineer at KRON4 in San Francisco, Vince Barma, explains it best:
"Because a lot of times, anchors back at the station want to be able to talk to somebody who's on scene, to ask about the story and maybe have the reporter point out particular details that they wouldn't be able to do if they weren't live."
So, Linda, to your point, it may seem at times we're live in the field for the sake of being live. We'll usually go back live to the scene of the crime hours later or the next day because that's where the story happened.
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