• Get involved.
    We want your input!
    Apply for Membership and join the conversations about everything related to broadcasting.

    After we receive your registration, a moderator will review it. After your registration is approved, you will be permitted to post.
    If you use a disposable or false email address, your registration will be rejected.

    After your membership is approved, please take a minute to tell us a little bit about yourself.
    https://www.radiodiscussions.com/forums/introduce-yourself.1088/

    Thanks in advance and have fun!
    RadioDiscussions Administrators

Me TV to go national

N

nathannah

Now we can all see what everyone in Chicago and Milwaukee is talking about

Very interesting to take it national. Obviously This TV has worked beyond the wildest dreams of anyone. Since Weigel in Chicago and Milwaukee has rights to most of the NBCU library and a few of the Local TV stations are ending RTV carriage over Antenna TV, we'll have two strong classic TV subnets, This TV, and one weak one stuck with repeat and tech complaints and oddities like WFLA's infomercial show and in (thankfully only a few markets) "Unreliable Sources". Something tells me January 1 and 2 are going to be full of many changes on the subchannel front.
 
SOUNDS GOOD!!!! But with only 3 stations, Antenna TV seems to a have a leg up on
it.

It looks like Weigel and Tribune see where the growth is at in the TV spectrum
right now. If only they can convince the clueless local stations (to carry them)!
 
gregg75 said:
SOUNDS GOOD!!!! But with only 3 stations, Antenna TV seems to a have a leg up on
it.

It looks like Weigel and Tribune see where the growth is at in the TV spectrum
right now. If only they can convince the clueless local stations (to carry them)!
Click to expand...

Please...please...please...my Christmas wish is that we get MeTV here in the Dallas-Ft. Worth market. As a frequent visitor to Chicagoland, my AQH for MeTV and MeToo is incredible (and I don't really watch much TV).

In fact, Mr. Weigel, just expand your horizons beyond the midwest and buy one of the full-power facilities here! :)

(We have a couple of them struggling and I think the WCIU model would work well here in North Texas).
 
I think they'll be plenty of room for both Antenna and Me-TV (as we'll see in Chicago and Milwaukee come January). And Weigel has one advantage in that they've already been up and running for several years. Plus, they've already got ThisTV, which has a lot of affiliates.

Perhaps they see that RTV's days are numbered (it's library and on-air presentation look really chintzy compared to Me, and they're going to lose some affiliates to Antenna), and given that a few other similar services are apparently non-starters. I wish them luck. Me-TV is a nice looking product with a good lineup.

Weigel may not be a big operator, but they certainly have a lot of ambition.
 
I love ME-TV but they are going to lose a boat load of shows to Antenna TV. It will be interesting to see what they replace them with.

I've heard people in Milwaukee say Weigel doens't put the effort into ME-TV up in Milwaukee that they do in Chicago, so I am not sure if Weigel can make this work on a national scale. Still kudos for trying.
 
Lose what shows? These were mentioned in the article to air on MeTV national (I suspect it will replace the local Chicago MeTV):

Initial Me-TV Network offerings are expected to include: "MASH," "Bonanza," "Happy Days," "Laverne & Shirley," "Perry Mason," "The Dick Van Dyke Show," "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," "The Bob Newhart Show," "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis," "Gunsmoke," "Honey West," "The Brady Bunch," "Taxi," "My Three Sons," "Family Affair," "The Honeymooners," "I Love Lucy," "The Odd Couple," "Beverly Hillbillies," "Streets of San Francisco" and "Big Valley"
Click to expand...

Those are plenty of shows, none of them are airing on Antenna TV. Antenna is using the Sony library mainly, MeTV is using CBS Television Distribution and 20th Century, mainly.

I do agree that RTV's days could be numbered with Me and Antenna signing on. Reruns are going to be MUCH better OTA than on cable.
 
Those are decent shows for a sub-channel. What in the world is "Honey West"? Sounds like maybe an old western.

This is really good news for Chicago plus along with Antenna TV it will give them even more viewing choices and reasons to unplug the cable/satellite (more often).
 
I've heard people in Milwaukee say Weigel doens't put the effort into ME-TV up in Milwaukee that they do in Chicago, so I am not sure if Weigel can make this work on a national scale. Still kudos for trying.


[/quote]


From what I've observed in the couple of years ME-TV has been available in Milwaukee, the schedule doesn't change as often as the Chicago stations. And, of course, we don't get as many programs as you Chicagoans since we have only one ME-TV channel. But this much is certain: Channel 49 (where ME-TV airs in the Milwaukee-Racine market) has improved a million times since Weigel purchased the station.
 
mrschimpf said:
Now we can all see what everyone in Chicago and Milwaukee is talking about

Very interesting to take it national. Obviously This TV has worked beyond the wildest dreams of anyone. Since Weigel in Chicago and Milwaukee has rights to most of the NBCU library and a few of the Local TV stations are ending RTV carriage over Antenna TV, we'll have two strong classic TV subnets, This TV, and one weak one stuck with repeat and tech complaints and oddities like WFLA's infomercial show and in (thankfully only a few markets) "Unreliable Sources". Something tells me January 1 and 2 are going to be full of many changes on the subchannel front.
Click to expand...



I might have missed something, but Local TV is indeed ending carriage of RTV? I kind of suspected that might have been the case since Local TV stations, including WITI-TV in Milwaukee, have announced carriage of Antenna TV in January. But I wasn't sure if Antenna TV was going to be added as an additional subchannel or used to replace RTV. I haven't found anything online to confirm this. But again, maybe I missed something!
 
milwaukee_dave said:
mrschimpf said:
Now we can all see what everyone in Chicago and Milwaukee is talking about

Very interesting to take it national. Obviously This TV has worked beyond the wildest dreams of anyone. Since Weigel in Chicago and Milwaukee has rights to most of the NBCU library and a few of the Local TV stations are ending RTV carriage over Antenna TV, we'll have two strong classic TV subnets, This TV, and one weak one stuck with repeat and tech complaints and oddities like WFLA's infomercial show and in (thankfully only a few markets) "Unreliable Sources". Something tells me January 1 and 2 are going to be full of many changes on the subchannel front.
Click to expand...


I might have missed something, but Local TV is indeed ending carriage of RTV? I kind of suspected that might have been the case since Local TV stations, including WITI-TV in Milwaukee, have announced carriage of Antenna TV in January. But I wasn't sure if Antenna TV was going to be added as an additional subchannel or used to replace RTV. I haven't found anything online to confirm this. But again, maybe I missed something!
Click to expand...

RTV is being dropped from the Local TV stations with the addition of Antenna. At least that's the case in Milwaukee, where they issued a press release last week saying so.
 
RTV is being dropped from the Local TV stations with the addition of Antenna. At least that's the case in Milwaukee, where they issued a press release last week saying so.
[/quote]



Ah ... well, I did indeed miss that press release. Thanks for the clarification.
 
Shame on RTV. It's taken them this long to get their act together, and now stations are
leaving them. That will teach them to air the same episode of Adam 12 on Thursday that
they aired on Monday!!!!!!!
 
I think the problem with RTV is that they tried to do too much. I never understood why they tried to do customized schedules and different shows airing in each market. They have been a trainwreck ever since signing on. They lost their NYC affiliate within 2 months because of technical problems last year. Then this fall they signed on with a low-power affiliate in NYC that barely anyone can receive. And from what I've read they still have technical probelms on that station.

Personally I like the shows RTV offers better than what's on Me-TV, but it would still make a good addition if they come to NYC.
 
milwaukee_dave said:
RTV is being dropped from the Local TV stations with the addition of Antenna. At least that's the case in Milwaukee, where they issued a press release last week saying so.
Click to expand...



Ah ... well, I did indeed miss that press release. Thanks for the clarification.

[/quote]

They put a link to it on their Facebook page. Here's the story:

http://www.facebook.com/fox6news/posts/176681112346773

http://northwest.fox6now.com/content/witi-tv-62-announces-launch-new-network-antenna-tv

And Milwaukee TV fans of a certain age will like the new logo for 6.2.
 
ansky212 said:
I think the problem with RTV is that they tried to do too much. I never understood why they tried to do customized schedules and different shows airing in each market. They have been a trainwreck ever since signing on. They lost their NYC affiliate within 2 months because of technical problems last year. Then this fall they signed on with a low-power affiliate in NYC that barely anyone can receive. And from what I've read they still have technical probelms on that station.

Personally I like the shows RTV offers better than what's on Me-TV, but it would still make a good addition if they come to NYC.
Click to expand...

No full power station would pickup RTV in Chicago. Not sure what their reasons were, except that I know Weigel Broadcasting already has MeTV, and wasn't gonna drop that. RTV was lucky to even get on the air in the Chicago market via WPVN-LD. Sad thing is that this station transmits from Schaumburg Illinois (northwest suburb of Chicago) on a short building rather than a taller building in the city of Chicago. So this station doesn't go out far, and mainly covers the northern suburbs & nearby western suburbs, plus the city of Chicago (where the signal can get around the tall buildings). Maybe Polnet was looking at this network as some type of investment for their TV station, as they must get their Polvision network running before WCIU drops FBT in a few weeks. RTV runs on the main channel 24.1, while Polvision (24 hour Polish language programming with some programs with English subtitles) is on 24.4. If RTV goes off the air, then Polnet will probably end up airing infomercials on 24.1 again (last I heard, they're still running 24 hours of infomercials on 24.2 & 24.3).
 
Hmm, wonder who picks it up here.

RTV is on a pair of low-power analog stations (WAOH-LP 29/W35AX 35) and another low-power network (Canton's WIVM/52 and its simulcasters south of Canton). Antenna TV will be on Local TV's Fox affiliate, WJW/8.2.

This might be a nice fit for CW affiliate WBNX/55, which just lit up 55.2 to mostly air the owner's religious TV shows. I hope if Me-TV does show up via 55, it'll be a .3 instead of wrapping around the Rev. Angley fare.
 
Initial Me-TV Network offerings are expected to include: "MASH," "Bonanza," "Happy Days," "Laverne & Shirley," "Perry Mason," "The Dick Van Dyke Show," "The Mary Tyler Moore Show," "The Bob Newhart Show," "The Many Loves of Dobie Gillis," "Gunsmoke," "Honey West," "The Brady Bunch," "Taxi," "My Three Sons," "Family Affair," "The Honeymooners," "I Love Lucy," "The Odd Couple," "Beverly Hillbillies," "Streets of San Francisco" and "Big Valley"
Click to expand...

These shows have been weak when shown on Me-TV in Chicago. Most of the shows Antenna TV is getting from Me-TV are much stronger.

Of the above list, "Perry Mason," "The Dick Van Dyke Show," "Mary Tyler Moore," "Gunsmoke" and "the Honeymooners" have been mainstays. The rest pop up from time to time and last for about three to six months the get replaced or moved to Sunday/Saturday blocks or late night.

Me-TV also benefits greatly by having seperate channels for drama and comedy. This really improved both channel 23 and channel 48 when the seperated the comedy (23) from drama (48)

I love Me-TV without it, I would probably chuck my TV all together, but some of the old shows, are really hard to watch. I remember looking forward to them and then seeing them and saying "Wow this is BAD" ;D

But getting back to the working model, I think it will be an issue as some show will do better in some markets. Me-TV has had enormous successes with "Sanford & Son," "The Jeffersons," and "Good Times" in Chicago among blacks, but not so much among other groups. This is fine in Chicago, 'cause the city is about a third African American so it's great for Chicago, but the shows don't hold up with other races when the demographics break down.

So it becomes harder to program if you don't have some content control. What plays in Chicago won't play in Peoria necessarily.
 
FightingIrish said:
milwaukee_dave said:
RTV is being dropped from the Local TV stations with the addition of Antenna. At least that's the case in Milwaukee, where they issued a press release last week saying so.
Click to expand...



Ah ... well, I did indeed miss that press release. Thanks for the clarification.
Click to expand...

They put a link to it on their Facebook page. Here's the story:

http://www.facebook.com/fox6news/posts/176681112346773

http://northwest.fox6now.com/content/witi-tv-62-announces-launch-new-network-antenna-tv

And Milwaukee TV fans of a certain age will like the new logo for 6.2.


[/quote]



Thanks for the links, FightingIrish. Wow, that new logo really does take me back -- the TV6 (CBS) days before the New World FOX affiliation shake-up in 1994. As I recall, WITI-TV retained that old logo after joining FOX, but it was phased out shortly thereafter when they started that branding that said "FOX is Six" and "Six is News" (while promoting their newscasts).
 
Status
This thread has been closed due to inactivity. You can create a new thread to discuss this topic.


Back
Top Bottom