Jterry 43 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 TWC Producer... Shawn Reynolds @WCL_Shawn 51s Was this created on Windows 3.0 MS Paint? Wow. Looks like attack mode is on. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asomrjsurf 6 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Accuwesther 3 Quarter 2014 going national 24/7. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Losing a network from a cable provider is never a good thing. But the hypocrisy of the last several days has disgusted me like nothing else. You can't suddenly decide your mission is to inform the public about the weather when you've been promoting the opposite. It doesn't work that way. Up until Saturday, I could understand the network's position. I could understand the reality shows. But once they went 24/7 clearly in response to DirecTV and began touting its weather coverage, its importance to the public, and its mission, I lost my respect. If you're that important, Weather Channel, then you need to show it. You cannot go back to what you were doing prior to Saturday. You cannot go back and air the reality shows like nothing happened. DirecTV, you have done the right thing. May this fight last for several months. Hell, I want it off FiOS now. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrtraveler01 737 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Losing a network from a cable provider is never a good thing. But the hypocrisy of the last several days has disgusted me like nothing else. You can't suddenly decide your mission is to inform the public about the weather when you've been promoting the opposite. It doesn't work that way. Up until Saturday, I could understand the network's position. I could understand the reality shows. But once they went 24/7 clearly in response to DirecTV and began touting its weather coverage, its importance to the public, and its mission, I lost my respect. If you're that important, Weather Channel, then you need to show it. You cannot go back to what you were doing prior to Saturday. You cannot go back and air the reality shows like nothing happened. DirecTV, you have done the right thing. May this fight last for several months. Hell, I want it off FiOS now. A naive part of me wants to think that the Weather Channel had an epiphany and realized that they need to dump the reality programs and stick to just doing the weather. But the realist in me thinks otherwise. Do these reality shows actually bring more viewers to The Weather Channel? So far this seems like a failed experiment to me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
d247 43 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Freaks of Nature is on now Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Freaks of Nature is on now I know it's 2am but.... oh fuck it. I'm off to bed. Hopefully DirecTV viewers realize that they have a more credible source providing weather service that's needed. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
24994J 5276 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Well, 2 hours past midnight is longer than I thought they'd go. And frankly, even if the DirecTV thing wasn't going on, it would seem kinda unnecessary to be rolling overnight when there's nothing major going on, anyway. Oh, how I've missed Facepalm JimTM. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jterry 43 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Freaks of Nature is on now DirecTV can't see us anymore so we can go back to taped programming now! Funny because they claimed on twitter just a couple of hours ago they would be staying live all night. Ooops... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 The signoff seemed very abrupt, as if it wasn't planned, and this is the new episode that was planned for last night. Maybe they're just dumping it on now so that it aired and they resume at 3? (This is not unusual, as Adult Swim has done this in the past.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Weeters 1811 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 I actually have to wonder if the powers that be were even aware/didn't care of The Weather Channel's present state, and once precious ad revenue and retransmission payments were threatened, finally leaped into action. I feel bad for all the staff that was called up and told "Hey! We're going into 24-hour mode for no real reason. Hope you like working at 3AM!" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 I actually have to wonder if the powers that be were even aware/didn't care of The Weather Channel's present state, and once precious ad revenue and retransmission payments were threatened, finally leaped into action. I feel bad for all the staff that was called up and told "Hey! We're going into 24-hour mode for no real reason. Hope you like working at 3AM!" You might be right on that one. Brian Kenny, the president of The Weather Company (the parent company of Weather Channel) is based out of Boston. The Weather Company is based out of Atlanta. According to Wikipedia, he only visits the campus several times a year. (Take this for what you will as it is Wikipedia) It's possible that upper management wasn't in the loop on all of this. I feel bad for all of the staff at The Weather Channel, period. From Cantore, who unfortunately became the face of this disaster, to everyone working on or behind the camera. There are good people working there, and it sucks that they have to be put in the middle of this. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asomrjsurf 6 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Brian Kenny works for MLB Network. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 14, 2014 Share Posted January 14, 2014 Here's an image. Here's my reaction. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Big Country News 435 Posted January 15, 2014 Share Posted January 15, 2014 I fixed it for them. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
sanewsguy 509 Posted January 15, 2014 Share Posted January 15, 2014 I decided to watch The Weather Channel today for the first time in over five years. I have not watched it since NBC and the private equity firms bought it from Landmark and for good reason. Now mind you, the product they put out during Weather Center Live is pretty good and superior to that of WeatherNation. I have nothing against their live product or their meteorologists, as they are pretty solid. If they want to name winter storms let them. But that's beside the point. Sorry but the Weather Channel is irrelevant now, especially in the age of Internet and smartphones. I stopped watching after NBC thought it was a good idea to add movies and MSNBC news updates to the channel. They are basically beating a dead horse with this. Jim Cantore comes on and begs us to call Direct TV and tell them to save this life-saving resource. Which I don't know anybody who watches The Weather Channel during severe weather. They usually watch the local stations with LOCAL meteorologists updating us. The National Weather Service and the local broadcasters are far more life saving than the weather channel. Oh, and they have viewers tweets running at the bottom of the screen. The choice of tweets were laughable. One said something like "Shame on @DirecTV for not letting me be able to see @SamChampion" while another one said "I do not have local tv and rely on @weatherchannel for the weather". Which I don't know how you don't get local channels if you have Direct TV. And if you live somewhere where you cannot receive locals, well the person managed to tweet that out, so I'm sure they have internet. They can just get it online. Sorry but I honestly don't see the point of the Weather Channel. Just get it online. I get all my weather from the local stations or accuweather.com. No need for the "Weather" channel. They are trying to be a half-assed version of Discovery if anything. Their slogan, "It's Amazing Out There", sends that message. Nobody put this better than our buddy Scott Jones at FTVLive: As someone that had DirecTV for years I can assure you that when nasty weather hits your area, you're not going to be watch The Weather Channel or anyone else. DirecTV's single drops when the rain gets to be more than a few drops. Lastly, Cantore writes in bold letters "Nobody can do weather like we do. Nobody." Really? Let's take a look at The Weather Channel's line-up for Today. At 2:00 we have 'Highway thru Hell' a show that does not seem to be anything about weather. The episode says that is about "Recovering a severely damaged trailer loaded with millions of plastic beads. At 3PM if you're looking for weather coverage, you're out of luck. It's another episode of 'Highway thru Hell.' In this edition "Jamie and his crew wrestle to recover a trailer off a dangerous bridge; a multi-vehicle wreck turns deadly for a good Samaritan." Well, at 4PM you can finally get your weather information you were looking for. Right? Nope, it's another episode of....you guessed it....'Highway thru Hell.' We're guessing that the drive thru Hell is much longer than we all thought. This show has "Adam and Jamie employ some fancy rigging to try to save a wreck on Highway 1." How about prime time? I'm sure we'll get some weather coverage then. Let's check 9PM. Damn! No weather coverage, it's a show called 'Prospectors' How about 10PM? Back into Hell with another episode of 'Highway thru Hell. But don't bother watching it is the same episode that aired at 2PM. At 11PM, you might want to forget the local news and turn on TWC to get the forecast for tomorrow. Don't bother because it is another episode of 'Highway thru Hell. A repeat of the 3PM show. Cantore says that nobody covers weather like him and The Weather Channel. I'm inclined to just tell him to go to Hell. And tell Jamie I said "hello" when you get there Jim. If I had Direct TV, I couldn't care less if they had Weather Channel or Weather Nation or anything as I said you can get it online or on the local news. It would be nice if they went back to their pre-NBC format of continuous weather but that's not going to happen. I bet John Coleman of KUSI is cringing and Frank Batten is rolling in his grave at what The Weather Channel has become... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Conan did this bit about The Weather Channel last night. The Weather Channel aired the first half of this bit (it cut off before the really cutting attacks on their advertisers and weather disasters set to elevator music). That's right. AN NBC OWNED PROPERTY ACKNOWLEDGED THE EXISTENCE OF CONAN O'BRIEN. THAT'S how insane this has gotten! ...okay, I will give them credit. Their coverage of the LA wildfire today was pretty good and balanced from what I could see. At least at that level, TWC has been proving its worth relative to WeatherNation. WN is good, but they don't have access to the resources that Weather Channel has. Weather Channel can pull video from NBC News and use their reporters for stuff like this. Anyway, starting at some point yesterday, Tivo and other online guides began listing an additional three hour block of "Weather Center Live" from 2-5pm at least through Friday, which means that at least until Friday TWC is live from 4am-8pm. Which is a start. Though why Vivian Brown was calling the regularly scheduled 11am hour "an expanded edition of Weather Center Live" is beyond me. I'm certain at this point The Weather Channel is just looking to make any deal it can; despite the spin this has been nothing but a pure fiasco from the start, and they've looked really really bad. Reportedly they're conceding that the reality shows are too dominant on the schedule and they may have promised to scale that back - which would be a reversal as huge as Cartoon Network's quick dumping of their own reality block. That would lend some credence to Weeters' idea that ownership has been disengaged - which I agree with. NBCUniversal networks, as a whole, are pretty well-targeted and not nearly as scattered as TWC has been, and this might have been a wakeup call to 30 Rockefeller Center (or even One Comcast Center). Regardless, I went ahead and purchased droptheweatherchannel.com the other night and I've started adding content to the site. It's rare for me to do things like this but I wanted to get something out there, even something small, that could counter their spin. Taking the public safety route really bothered me. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Samantha 2878 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 Yesterday I saw WeatherNation in a place it's probably never been prior to this dispute... An airport television. *That* is the real uphill battle that any challenger will face: public mindshare against the established TWC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 17, 2014 Share Posted January 17, 2014 That is very likely only because they have D*. Many airports and rest areas get those feeds through satellite. Listings starting from Monday, January 27th show that at least the 10pm and 1am hours of Weather Center Live are restored. If that's not a concession I don't know what is. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Asomrjsurf 6 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 Program Guides are jousting predicting what could be on and where did you see then back? They should go to 9pm so Warren can work 3 hours straight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jess 1110 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 So there are a couple of articles out about this. This one's probably the most interesting: But TWC had better watch out. Its debt burden sharply increased last year when it borrowed $600M to pay a dividend to its owners — NBCUniversal, Bain Capital Partners, and Blackstone Management Partners. Moody’s said at the time that the borrowing seemed to indicate that “NBCU is comfortable with high leverage at [TWC], and signals that it does not view [TWC] as a strategic core-asset, but as an opportunistic investment.” Although it said that TWC generates enough cash to pay down the debt quickly, it expected the company to “either make acquisitions or build capacity for future dividend payments.” That’s why the DirecTV dispute is worrisome. Revenues from TV ad sales and distributor fees account for as much as 60% of TWC’s sales, Moody’s estimates — and without DirecTV the top line number could decline “in the mid single to low double digit range.” That could trouble debt owners: TWC is “weakly positioned” in Moody’s rating of B1, which indicates its belief that its debt too risky for many investors. Emphasis mine. That basically backs up my belief that Comcast/NBCU haven't really been paying attention to the company. It's pretty divorced from the corporate structure to begin with, and probably more actively followed by Bain and/or Blackstone. I'm pretty sure that's not the case anymore and that the top men have certainly heard from 30 Rock or 1 Comcast. (Probably 1 Comcast (Brian Roberts) through 30 Rock (Steve Burke).) The Capital Weather Gang at Washington Post calls this some soul-searching time for the channel, and has an idea for how the channel can expand its audience while staying truer to its roots: If I were running The Weather Channel, I’d also consider broadening the scope of its weather and environmental reporting rather than just replacing one long-form show with another. When the weather is quiet domestically, cover international weather, focus on astronomy and the night sky, discuss solar flares, leverage stunning visuals of awesome weather and environmental phenomena, feature climate change debates, and run environmental stories. In short, mainstream geeky topics and focus on building back a solid core audience – including but extending beyond simply weather fans. I’ve seen the The Weather Channel do some of this, but it could certainly do more. Climate Change is going to be a touchy subject and people are going to accuse the channel of having an agenda because of the connections to MSNBC. But I would move towards a science and astronomy focus. Another good one from TVNewser sampling NewsBlues: The company, the brainchild of former WCCO-4-CBS Chief Meteorologist Paul Douglas, originates from a small studio in Excelsior, MN, a southwestern suburb of Minneapolis. The studio is tiny, made to look larger by occasional drop-in shots of a larger “virtual studio,” which exists only on a computer hard drive...WeatherNation does indeed seem to operate on 15-minute programming loops, some of which appear to be pre-taped and repeated during the day. On-camera talent, all of whom are degreed and highly qualified meteorologists, rotate in and out on staggered eight-hour shifts. Talent appears to control the switching of graphics and studio cameras, which are locked down. Not quoted in the actual NewsBlues report is a vital statistic: that the 15 minute loops are actually a good idea, because the average person tends to linger on The Weather Channel for about 7-8 minutes. That's part of the reason they moved from pretty much non-stop weather forecasting to having WeatherScope/WeatherCenter at :00 and :30, and eventually having "shows" during different dayparts - Your Weather Today, Day Planner, PM Edition, etc. It's also probably the reason behind long-form. They want viewers watching longer, rather than only watching it a few minutes at a time. Program Guides are jousting predicting what could be on and where did you see then back? They should go to 9pm so Warren can work 3 hours straight. Zap2it is showing a 10pm and a 1am Weather Center Live beginning the 27th. Additionally, Kelly Cass noted on her Facebook page that the 2-5 Weather Center Live block will also return for all of next week. Guides aren't showing it, but then again they only began showing the additional WCL midway through Wednesday's edition. If they stay live from 4am to 8pm, and add the extra hours at 10pm and 1am, then reality programming will only account for six hours of the Monday-Friday schedule - 25%. If you only count 6am-11pm like TWC wants you to do, then it's nearly 90% live weather coverage to a bit over 10% reality. --- Anyway, what's becoming increasingly clear is that, when The Weather Channel returns to DirecTV (and yes, it's when, not if - they simply cannot afford to drag this out), there will certainly be more weather coverage. Possibly it just gets restored to the primetime slots it had prior to November, but it's also likely they keep going until 8 and then have primetime hours at 10 and 1. Regardless of what happens, I think you should note how significant this really would be. Channel drift happens, but this is literally one of the few times a network is forced to reverse that drift. The only other time I can think of is Cartoon Network's numerous attempts to add live-action to its schedule, all of which have been universally rejected. The nadir, of course, was their reality show block called "CN REAL". That crashed and burned in spectacular fashion. We're never going to go back to what the network was in the 90s. But there will be a significant shift back towards the original mission, and I think that's a victory for everyone. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrknowitall526 108 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 I'm a Directv customer and I could probably count on one hand the number of times I've actually watched TWC since we started service last August - moved to a house where cable isn't available. To say TWC is life-saving local information is a joke - TWC on Directv shows NO local LDL's and the weather app was extremely lame. I don't miss it in the least! For anyone in the Philly market, with cable, have you ever watched the WFMZ Accuweather Channel? It's a GREAT channel! We used to have it on our cable at the old house (Blue Ridge Communications), but it's not offered by Directv, even though we get channel 69. (I live in the Lehigh Valley). I've contacted Directv several times about it and they don't really have much of a solution. I don't understand why they don't offer all of the digital subchannels that go along with a channel. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Action Newsroom 1150 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 I'm a Directv customer and I could probably count on one hand the number of times I've actually watched TWC since we started service last August - moved to a house where cable isn't available. To say TWC is life-saving local information is a joke - TWC on Directv shows NO local LDL's and the weather app was extremely lame. I don't miss it in the least! For anyone in the Philly market, with cable, have you ever watched the WFMZ Accuweather Channel? It's a GREAT channel! We used to have it on our cable at the old house (Blue Ridge Communications), but it's not offered by Directv, even though we get channel 69. (I live in the Lehigh Valley). I've contacted Directv several times about it and they don't really have much of a solution. I don't understand why they don't offer all of the digital subchannels that go along with a channel. It's satellite. It NEVER airs subchannels like cable does. At all. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TVIntheDesert 183 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 I'm a Directv customer and I could probably count on one hand the number of times I've actually watched TWC since we started service last August - moved to a house where cable isn't available. To say TWC is life-saving local information is a joke - TWC on Directv shows NO local LDL's and the weather app was extremely lame. I don't miss it in the least! For anyone in the Philly market, with cable, have you ever watched the WFMZ Accuweather Channel? It's a GREAT channel! We used to have it on our cable at the old house (Blue Ridge Communications), but it's not offered by Directv, even though we get channel 69. (I live in the Lehigh Valley). I've contacted Directv several times about it and they don't really have much of a solution. I don't understand why they don't offer all of the digital subchannels that go along with a channel. KPNX in Phoenix has a similar service which mixes local forecasts with AccuWeather's national content on its subchannel. KPHO has a locally programmed weather subchannel, but it's as good as worthless on Sunday afternoons (thanks FCC and the Children's Programming Act!), and that's why I prefer KPNX's and would rather see KPHO go to a national entertainment subchannel programming service. Older DirecTV HD recievers (pre-2008) have built-in ATSC tuners, but most need an add-on tuner module, which costs about $100. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tvjay 6 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 I don't understand why they don't offer all of the digital subchannels that go along with a channel. Bandwidth....simply put, bandwidth. They can't broadcast via satellite all of the subchannels for all 210 markets. You can get an add-on for over-the-air television that will add them, via an antenna, to your DirecTV. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mrknowitall526 108 Posted January 18, 2014 Share Posted January 18, 2014 Bandwidth....simply put, bandwidth. They can't broadcast via satellite all of the subchannels for all 210 markets. You can get an add-on for over-the-air television that will add them, via an antenna, to your DirecTV. That's interesting. Because there is 1 subchannel that they do broadcast, for only 1 of the channels. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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