Weather Bozos at the Wiz pissing away sweeps ratings at our expense

[Mark Strube]

Right now...it has NOTHING to do with ecomonic interest, since they arent makin a dime off HD....

Really... nothing at all? So it doesn't look good to consumers that it's THEIR channel that has HD? There's absolutely no future money making prospects to this new fangled thing called Hi-def? I suppose the Target commercials are some of the few actually in HD just for the fun of it? Sorry but even if they're making a donation to a charity, its for their own economic interests. (Tax cut, good image, etc)

[jpfieber]

Right now...it has NOTHING to do with ecomonic interest, since they arent makin a dime off HD....

That's not entirely true. Some of us HD enthusiasts watch shows just because they are in HD, for the WOW factor I guess. This season I was more likely to give a new show available in HD a chance than I was to give a chance to new SD shows (just like not listening to tapes once CD's became available, or not wanting to watch VHS once I was used to DVD). I'm sure that some shows that are available in HD get higher overall viewership then they would if the HD version wasn't available. This increase in viewership (if it can be measured or not) would lead to better ratings for a show, which of course leads to more money from sponsors. If I (and others like me) stop watching a show because of the poor quality of the broadcast (annoying graphics on the screen, screwed up sound, constantly switching back to SD), then ratings fall, and so do sponsors.

If it's the beginning of the season, and two new shows that I have equal interest in are coming on two different networks, and I can only watch one, I'm gonna pick the one on the channel I find least annoying...

[techguy1975]

. This increase in viewership (if it can be measured or not) would lead to better ratings for a show...

If viewship is not measured how can that affect ratings?   The HD channel is considered seperately of the SD channel..  This will change eventually, and once there is more of a focus (ratings wise) on HD content, then the cause and effect laws will definately come into play.   Not to say that the stations dont care now, but...it is not their primary concern.  The primary concern is on analog still, since that is where their bread and butter come from.   It is slowly changing, advertisers doing ads in HD are mainly for show and to create a buzz, it has little it anything to do with the still relatively low and unmeasured viewship of HD

[Gilbert]

I see your point, and I don't see how we, or at least I personally, haven't been civil. Constant problems that don't get improved and an annoying unneeded logo... your little example is nice but if you hung around here more you'd see that problem-fixing behavior happens quite a bit at this forum too, but this is different... channel 12's problems hardly ever seem to get fixed, no matter how much we point them out.

We have been quite understanding... but when the engineer comes on here, with the majority of their technical problems unfixed, and then defends their horrible logo... I'm going to call him on it.



That is a completely moot point and I'm tired of hearing it. Who cares what the useless government agencies & worthless beurocrats have "mandated"? Despite the FCC's rules & regulations, in the end the free market determines what programs and what picture resolutions these stations will use (you said it yourself... they're not required to transmit HD). If it was not in their best economic interest to be transmitting HD, believe me, they would not be doing it.

We don't know what's behind the technical problems. You had a signal with
12. We didn't have anything for 6 months on 2 stations in Chicago! A lot more can go wrong with the signal, including things that no one has even thought about.
This is unchartered territory! As for the flames, I wasn't necessarily singling you out, but others on here, in other posts and topics, have really let the flames fly. That doesn't do anyone any good.

Finally, it absolutely matters what the FCC mandates and as others have
pointed out much better than I, it makes them zero bucks right now.
As for the useless weather bulletins, again, I can't comment because I
can't see them, but yes, if they wreck a program for a wind advisory,
that's one thing. But even for a fog advisory...you guys get fog and I
swear you get the most hellacious vehicle wrecks that make national
news. Yes, you can look outside to see if it's foggy, but what about
elsewhere around the area? Nice to know before I drive into a 25
car pileup on I-94...

[Joseph S]

You had a signal with 12. We didn't have anything for 6 months on 2 stations in Chicago!

Which 6 months? WISN didn't meet the deadline in May and didn't come on the air until well into the Fall. Same with Sinclair and Fox. PBS, CBS, NBC and that religious station were the only ones to meet the deadline.

[GBK]

Right now...it has NOTHING to do with ecomonic interest, since they arent makin a dime off HD....

Just another example of their incompentance this time at marketing to advertisers.

[Mark Strube]

Just another example of their incompentance this time at marketing to advertisers.

Oh you know there's gotta be a way we can blame the FCC. That's always good fun.

[GBK]

Oh you know there's gotta be a way we can blame the FCC. That's always good fun.

Yep FCC/Homeland Security issues a terrorist warning for the parade so they had to drop it to SD.. you wouln't want to damage all those expansive HD trucks.

[John L]

It wouldn't surprise me if one or both of the 3 stations WTMJ, WITI, or WISN offer a weather channel of their own as a second channel on their DTV.  A couple of Chicago stations do that WMAQ-DT and I think WLS-DT too.  I've even received WNDU-DT from South Bend and having NBC on 16-1, 24/7 weather on 16-2.  I believe WZZM-DT does it to with network program on 13-1 and weather on 13-2.

If anything,  I would expect someday WTMJ to add 4-2 and have Paul Joseph & Jim Ott provide us minute by minute forecast and weather details.

-John L.

[GBK]

It wouldn't surprise me if one or both of the 3 stations WTMJ, WITI, or WISN offer a weather channel of their own as a second channel on their DTV.  A couple of Chicago stations do that WMAQ-DT and I think WLS-DT too.  I've even received WNDU-DT from South Bend and having NBC on 16-1, 24/7 weather on 16-2.  I believe WZZM-DT does it to with network program on 13-1 and weather on 13-2.

If anything,  I would expect someday WTMJ to add 4-2 and have Paul Joseph & Jim Ott provide us minute by minute forecast and weather details.

-John L.

Channel 2 Green Bay has a 24 weather channel on 2-2

[Joseph S]

The weather sub channels are the single reason for each and every call to NBC for signal problems with HD sports such as ND Saturday Football and the upcoming NFL Season broadcasts on NBC. You can read all the comments their about just how bad the ND football games are compared to what they see on the Universal HD re-broadcasts. They are a terrible idea and serve no purpose that a window or the SD weather channel can't provide. 1080i requires all the allotted bandwidth. Maybe the locals in 720crappy could get away with it, but NBC and CBS cannot.

[GBK]

The weather sub channels are the single reason for each and every call to NBC for signal problems with HD sports such as ND Saturday Football and the upcoming NFL Season broadcasts on NBC. You can read all the comments their about just how bad the ND football games are compared to what they see on the Universal HD re-broadcasts. They are a terrible idea and serve no purpose that a window or the SD weather channel can't provide. 1080i requires all the allotted bandwidth. Maybe the locals in 720crappy could get away with it, but NBC and CBS cannot.

I agree with some of your point.. there is a definite difference.  however CBS 58 is quite good even with their subchannel (WMLW) they do have some pixalation issues during football games but they are relatively minor. I don't know how much bandwidth such a weather channel would take if was was audio and just a radar like the pbs versions... but it couldn't be that much.. think of all the useless weather crawls and graphics dumped over to that sub channel..  I'll put up with it much easier then with the crap they keep putting over 30% of HD programming now.

[Joseph S]

I don't know how much bandwidth such a weather channel would take if was was audio and just a radar like the pbs versions... but it couldn't be that much..

It doesn't matter. In real world situations it has proven to fail. That 3Mbps is needed. The NBC football games run at the peak bandwidth all game long. I don't see any pixelation. On CBS it's another story. Any movement = pixels. Sure, it looks sharp when there's no action, but that's not what we're watching for. The extra bandwidth is needed because the source is using it all and optimized for it and expecting it on the other end. There's not any free bandwidth available on these 1080i broadcasts to play with. Any sub channels guarantees pixelation and degradation. They're running 3.2Mpbs approx on 58.2 now. PBS' lowest is barely below 2Mbps, but not on their 1080i feed.

think of all the useless weather crawls and graphics dumped over to that sub channel.. I'll put up with it much easier then with the crap they keep putting over 30% of HD programming now.

You think a weather sub channel would end this? I don't. These weather fools think the TV world revolves around their incorrect forecasts. A sub channel kills their ego.

[GBK]

You think a weather sub channel would end this? I don't. These weather fools think the TV world revolves around their incorrect forecasts. A sub channel kills their ego.

One can only hope    and I'd rather lose 2mbps for that (subchannel) then drop the whole thing to SD and cover the 30% of the remaining screen with radar crap like WISN does.

[Mark Strube]

How about all the channels stopped competing with their jank weather reporting and combine it all into one ultra mega super local weather channel (in STEREO!!), that actually gets things right a few times a week. Then there's no need to suck bandwidth away from every single HD station in the market.

Yeah, right... like that's ever gonna happen.