TWC vs. WeatherPlus...WeatherPlus Wins

[genius]

If you hadn't heard, that major storm that plagued the Northwest last week moved down into to the Southwest and now has become the largest snowstorm in the Southwest since at least March of '05. Areas down hear are getting anywhere from 6-20 inches and major Interstate highways in NM are closed statewide. Yet watching the Weather Channel you wouldn't know that. I noticed they would only give the storm only 15 seconds of their time before going off about warm weather in the East, thurderstorm safety tips then off to a if tomorrow never comes program or whatever. : Although now that the storm is affecting Denver, they are giving it 45 seconds airtime.

NBC WeatherPlus, which my local Comcast provider has finally put on the system, however seems to cover every area in equal time and in equal time. Instead of focusing on where nothing was happening, they did focus on the storm quite well. Not to mention it's all weather on WeatherPlus.

Let's face it, The Weather Channel's policy is this: IF IT DOESN"T HAPPEN EAST OF THE MISSISSIPPI OR IN A MAJOR CITY, IT DOESN'T HAPPEN!!!

 

[easttxtv]

...if tomorrow never comes...

The WC slide into reality is more than a bit much. DirecTV doesn't have a WPlus dedicated channel but I can watch it online. I have noticed some skipping around/glossing over with some WC segments...kinda irritating if I want to find out something developing. The online WPlus gives me the local NBC station inserts with their meterologists, besides what the national feed does. Great way for me to get their coverage without having to wade through Ron Burgundy and Chewbacca and their parade of so-called news (scary stuff/car wrecks/robberies/shootouts) first.

 

[formeraa]

I also liked the "if tomorrow never comes..." comment! ;D

Generally, I like WeatherPlus as well. The local cut-ins are great, although KPNX here in Phoenix doesn't update them very frequently on the weekends. Their weekend weather person reports live in the field and doesn't get up early enough to update WeatherPlus before going out. Honestly, I don't blame her since she does both weekend am's and pm's.

My only complaint about WeatherPlus is that their national forecasts for the deserts of Arizona are way off -- sometimes up to 10 degrees. So, you have the local cut-ins saying that it will be, say, 90 degrees but the national graphics saying that it will be 82 degrees. I don't mind a 2 or 3 degree difference but 8 or 10 degrees seems a bit much. Are the computer systems really that inaccurate??? ??? ???

 

[genius]

Right now Abrams&Bettes is on, and since they are nothing but eye-candy as far as I can see and unbelieveable as meteorologists, Weather Plus wins again.

Thanks for the agreement on my little snide comment there. Nothing but pure doom and gloom reported these days. With Yellowstone going to erupt, the ice caps melting, the Sun turning into a red giant and swallowing the Earth, asteroids, black holes, pandemics, World ending in 2012, 10.5 earthquakes and catergory 7 hurricanes who in the world has time to worry about silly things like mortgage payments, debt issues, feeding the kids etc? : ;D

 

[BDBopper]

I don't like Weather Plus. I want up-to-date local information. Weather Plus gives me recorded local segemnts that sometimes are hours old and out of date most of the time. I prefer the local on the 8's much better. Also WeatherPlus only updates 5 cities in my area (Atlanta, Rome, Gainesville, Athens, and Peachtree City) and none of them are within 45 minutes of my location. Weather channel lets me see updated info for at least 15 different locations in the Atlanta area including my town of Lawrenceville every 8 minutes. My cable system replaced a local weather channel with the audio from the NWS for this and I am more than disappointed.

 

[oldschooltv]

Over the last five years, the Weather Channel has embarked on a downward spiral. The music, the set, the graphics, the programming and the personalities... it went from all weather, all the time, to some kind of Home & Garden Channel, a little bit of Discovery Channel crossed with the Today show. I don't turn on the Weather Channel to see storm stories, or people from a town in Kentucky who lost their homes to a tornado in '94. It's not that I don't care, but the Weather Channel seems to thrive off of the weather related suffering of others. I also don't care what events are occurring in Minneapolis or San Diego this weekend, nor do I care to see Jim Cantore on the sidelines of the stadium where the NFL game of the week is being played. And their weekend and morning shows - I don't watch the weather channel for comic relief, where once respected, veteran meteorologists are now telling corny jokes while sitting on a stool in front of a cheesey set sipping on their coffee. It's as if the weather channel is marketing to the soccer mom most of the day, and the storm chaser during primetime. The worst thing about it all is that you hardly get live weather anymore. It's either a commercial, one of their documentary programs, or what I call soft segments where they do those little skits on winterizing your vehicle or home. It's a shame. The Weather Channel of the 80s and 90s was much better - they actually focused on the weather. I guess they've never heard of Keep It Simple Stupid!

 

[formeraa]

I don't like Weather Plus. I want up-to-date local information. Weather Plus gives me recorded local segemnts that sometimes are hours old and out of date most of the time. I prefer the local on the 8's much better. Also WeatherPlus only updates 5 cities in my area (Atlanta, Rome, Gainesville, Athens, and Peachtree City) and none of them are within 45 minutes of my location. Weather channel lets me see updated info for at least 15 different locations in the Atlanta area including my town of Lawrenceville every 8 minutes. My cable system replaced a local weather channel with the audio from the NWS for this and I am more than disappointed.

Wow, only 5 cities! Our WeatherPlus here in Phoenix gives us about 20-25 cities located throughout the whole state of Arizona. Sound like your WeatherPlus team is lazy.

 

[BDBopper]

Oh so things are much better in other markets. I stand corrected.

 

[PaulBWalkerJr]

This is probably a stupid question, and I'm having a brain fart...........but who owns the Weather Channel...???

 

[genius]

This is probably a stupid question, and I'm having a brain ------...........but who owns the Weather Channel...???

Landmark Communications. They own several newspapers as well as WTVF in Nashville and KLAS in Las Vegas, but I think The Weather Channel is their crown jewel...which it seems like we've all to come agree that it no longer shines... ;D

 

[Mediafrog+]

The "WeatherScan" channel (sometimes jokingly referred to as TWC2) is in many ways a lot more useful than big sister TWC. Local info all the time, repeated every 3-4 minutes. Unfortunately it is only available on a relatively small number of systems.

 

[dhett]

Seems like a trend, doesn't it?

Remember when TWC was The Weather Channel and used to show weather?
Remember when MTV was Music TeleVision and was all about music videos?
Remember when CNN was Cable News Network and reported the news?

 

[Baldecki]

I still like the Weather Channel. WeatherPlus is very boring, and sometimes isnt even LIVE.

 

[formeraa]

I thought that TWC also repeated some of their overnight weather segments???

 

[tenchances]

The "WeatherScan" channel (sometimes jokingly referred to as TWC2) is in many ways a lot more useful than big sister TWC. Local info all the time, repeated every 3-4 minutes. Unfortunately it is only available on a relatively small number of systems.

Agreed. When I need a weather report, I find myself tuning to WeatherScan first...and I get the info I need right away. I can't remember the last time I tuned to TWC for that purpose...