On June 8, 1998 at 6:00 a.m., channel 69 became an independent station; the station also changed its call letters to WAMI-TV. The relaunch of channel 69 was known as the "Birth of a Station", where a soon-to-be mother was giving birth to the "Miami" thought-bubble station logo (the entire day before, the channel stunted with the picture of a sonogram of the new logo as a lead into the introduction). Immediately after that sketch, real-time traffic and weather reports were shown. The revamped station adopted a general entertainment format with a strong focus on locally produced programs including a daily news program called "The Times"; the sports discussion show "SportsTown"; "Generation ñ", a program targeted at bilingual, 2nd generation Latinos in the U.S.; the lifestyle programs "Ocean Drive" (which was based on the magazine of the same name) and "Ten's" (which was also broadcast on Dallas sister station KSTR-TV from 1999 to 2001); the dance program "Barcode"; an alternative lifestyle program called "Kenneth's Frequency"; and the talk show "Out Loud", which was hosted by Bill Teck and produced by Miami producer and media personality Paul Bouche. The station's programming was mostly aimed at teenagers and young adults between the ages of 16 and 34. The format heavily took after the groundbreaking CITY-TV in Toronto, which carried a similar mix of syndicated shows and movies with locally-produced programming.