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WCTX-TV in CT now "UPN 9"? What about NYC?

K

KML0224

Guest
kms575 brought up a good point on the New England TV Board recently. WCTX-TV (UPN) channel 59 of New Haven, CT, just started calling themselves "UPN 9." This is irritating to say the least. What's the problem?

1- You already have the much bigger and more established WWOR-TV (UPN) channel 9 of Secaucus, NJ/New York City an hour down I-95 to the south and west. They truly are "UPN 9."

2- In between New Haven and New York City lies Fairfield County, CT, which includes Bridgeport, Norwalk, Stamford and Danbury. Fairfield County is a portion of the New York City TV market. Bridgeport, as the best example, is closer to New Haven than New York City.

3- Do any cable systems in Fairfield County carry both WCTX-TV and WWOR-TV? We here in New Britain, CT (southwest of Hartford) only get WCTX-TV (yes, on cable channel 9). I think Comcast's Middletown, CT branch still carries WWOR-TV. Seeing as Comcast made major lineup changes here in Connecticut this morning, I wonder if WWOR-TV will get dropped as a result?
 
> kms575 brought up a good point on the New England TV Board
> recently. WCTX-TV (UPN) channel 59 of New Haven, CT, just
> started calling themselves "UPN 9." This is irritating to
> say the least. What's the problem?
>
> 1- You already have the much bigger and more established
> WWOR-TV (UPN) channel 9 of Secaucus, NJ/New York City an
> hour down I-95 to the south and west. They truly are "UPN
> 9."
>
> 2- In between New Haven and New York City lies Fairfield
> County, CT, which includes Bridgeport, Norwalk, Stamford and
> Danbury. Fairfield County is a portion of the New York City
> TV market. Bridgeport, as the best example, is closer to New
> Haven than New York City.
>
> 3- Do any cable systems in Fairfield County carry both
> WCTX-TV and WWOR-TV? We here in New Britain, CT (southwest
> of Hartford) only get WCTX-TV (yes, on cable channel 9). I
> think Comcast's Middletown, CT branch still carries WWOR-TV.
> Seeing as Comcast made major lineup changes here in
> Connecticut this morning, I wonder if WWOR-TV will get
> dropped as a result?
>

What's so special about WWOR? If anything, WCTX is using the UPN 9 branding wisely, a familiar associated channel with benefit of low cable number positioning. They maybe able to bump WWOR off any system in that DMA.

It's possible WWOR could be dropped, especially if WCTX is paying exclusivity for UPN and Yankees. Comcast Cable, in all counties surrounding Baltimore MD, dropped WBDC 50 (WB), after WNUV54 became Baltimore's WB, even though WBDC is still City Grade in lot of areas. WB charges its affiliates for programming, and Sinclair didn't want their affiliation diluted with WBDC overlapping everywhere. 4, 5, 7 and 9, all newschannels, are still carried though lot of places around Baltimore, though WTTG 5 (FOX) was moved out of the low dial area.

Comcast might see no need to carry WWOR anymore. Not a great use of bandwidth, where space could be used for home shopping channels that pay for carriage or High Def channels, to keep the high paying subscribers from defecting to satellite.

Prime time is not different, pro-sports programming (Yankees) is not different, syndicated shows are available elswehere, so it's duplicative. The UPN 9 News maybe nice, but Comcast isn't going to carry the channel where not needed, just for an hour of local news, that isn't very Connecticut centric anyways.

Then again, some of the Central NJ cable systems carry both Philly and NY sets still, but pro-sports is different, for UPN9 and WB11, and UPN57, and Philly is still closer or equidistant in some parts, though NY DMA, or vice versa for Princeton to NY. Things are more lax there, anyways, where the stations are owned by the same broadcasting groups, and neither care particularly about the Central NJ area anyways.

New Haven is different with LIN right there. I don't believe Secaucus is closer to any portions of Hartford-New Haven DMA, than the LIN's stations.
 
> I think Comcast's Middletown, CT branch still carries WWOR-TV.
> Seeing as Comcast made major lineup changes here in
> Connecticut this morning, I wonder if WWOR-TV will get
> dropped as a result?
>

We haven't had WWOR for a few months now in Middletown, instead on Ch 13 we have had several different types of test patterns, first standard color bars, then all green color bars and now some odd speckled screen with a scolling bar at the bottom.
 
And what is National about this?

> kms575 brought up a good point on the New England TV Board
> recently. WCTX-TV (UPN) channel 59 of New Haven, CT, just
> started calling themselves "UPN 9." This is irritating to
> say the least. What's the problem?

Speaking of irritating, what is the reason for not keeping this discussion on the New England board, where it belongs? I don't see a national implication to this.<P ID="signature">______________


</P>
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> Speaking of irritating, what is the reason for not keeping
> this discussion on the New England board, where it belongs?
> I don't see a national implication to this.
>

Sorry to bother ya. I've seen people complain about cable branding happening in other markets and found it odd to have a real "UPN 9" (WWOR) and a phony "UPN 9" (WCTX) so close to one another. Perhaps somebody reading these comments visits Connecticut or lived here in the past and would like to know about it. I, myself, have lived in Maine and still very much care about the Portland/Poland Spring market. I visit Philadelphia every month and am just as familiar with their "CBS 3" (KYW) and our "Channel 3 Eyewitness News" (WFSB), also a CBS affilate.
 
> kms575 brought up a good point on the New England TV Board
> recently. WCTX-TV (UPN) channel 59 of New Haven, CT, just
> started calling themselves "UPN 9." This is irritating to
> say the least. What's the problem?
>
> 1- You already have the much bigger and more established
> WWOR-TV (UPN) channel 9 of Secaucus, NJ/New York City an
> hour down I-95 to the south and west. They truly are "UPN
> 9."

If you live in Connecticut and can get both stations over the air, you're right, but I'm willing to bet that everyone that uses an antenna knows to tune to Channel 59 to watch UPN in New Haven. But if you have cable and both stations are carried (and I'm guessing since I'm not there), then UPN 9 is WCTX, and WWOR is on another channel on that system.

There is nothing whatsoever that's unusual about UHF stations using their cable channel instead of the broadcast channel number. It's common in parts of California and Florida. KASW Ch. 61 in Phoenix does it too, as "WB 6."

With more viewership now on cable than over the air, I'm surprised more stations don't do this, with their cable channel in their logo and a small legal ID with their callsign, OTA channel, and city of license underneath.
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> I've seen people complain about cable
> branding happening in other markets and found it odd to have
> a real "UPN 9" (WWOR) and a phony "UPN 9" (WCTX) so close to
> one another.

Could've been worse -- in southwest Florida, there are two phony ABC 7s -- WWSB ch.40 in Sarasota and WZVN ch.26 in Fort Myers. Both channels generally seen on cable 7, though I wonder about the few cable systems that offer both, especially in Charlotte and Desoto Counties.

And in San Diego, there's Tijuana's XHUPN ch.49, which bills itself as "UPN 13", just like Los Angeles' KCOP ch.13. The latter has since been replaced with the former on most cable systems in San Diego County. However, at a Motel 6 in Chula Vista (where I stayed recently during Comic Con), the in-house system offered KCOP (the real UPN 13) instead of XHUPN (the fake UPN 13); at first, I thought it was XHUPN, until I noticed it has ads for LA-area merchants.<P ID="edit"><FONT class="small">Edited by rugrats1 on 09/21/05 02:50 AM.</FONT></P>
 
Re: And what is National about this?

Ok...
Let's not use the words "Real" and "Phoney" to label these. Where was it written that a tv station had to identify themselves using the broadcast channel?
In San Diego, more people have cable than don't, since, because of the topography, you can not get regular channels with an antenna.

Instead, let's use the terms "Traditional" and "Cable-designate."
I hate to sound politically correct, but using the term "real" is not accurate, since in a few years, all channels will be broadcasting using their digital designated frequency anyway, so the VHF/UHF designation will not matter. And more importantly, saying "real" and "phoney" places and unfair negative connotation on the station's choice. You wouldn't say ABC Family is a "Phoney" name, just because it is on cable, would you?

> > I've seen people complain about cable
> > branding happening in other markets and found it odd to
> have
> > a real "UPN 9" (WWOR) and a phony "UPN 9" (WCTX) so close
> to
> > one another.
>
> Could've been worse -- in southwest Florida, there are two
> phony ABC 7s -- WWSB ch.40 in Sarasota and WZVN ch.26 in
> Fort Myers. Both channels generally seen on cable 7, though
> I wonder about the few cable systems that offer both,
> especially in Charlotte and Desoto Counties.
>
> And in San Diego, there's Tijuana's XHUPN ch.49, which bills
> itself as "UPN 13", just like Los Angeles' KCOP ch.13. The
> latter has since been replaced with the former on most cable
> systems in San Diego County. However, at a Motel 6 in Chula
> Vista (where I stayed recently during Comic Con), the
> in-house system offered KCOP (the real UPN 13) instead of
> XHUPN (the fake UPN 13); at first, I thought it was XHUPN,
> until I noticed it has ads for LA-area merchants.
>
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> Ok...
> Let's not use the words "Real" and "Phoney" to label these.
> Where was it written that a tv station had to identify
> themselves using the broadcast channel?
> In San Diego, more people have cable than don't, since,
> because of the topography, you can not get regular channels
> with an antenna.

In the LA/SD example, doesn't Fox operate both XHUPN and KCOP? They do own WWOR, but I'm not sure if they own WCTX. Both carry the Yankees and UPN network programming, and I'd bet that they're substantially similar with other programming aside from local news (does WCTX have any) as well.

Sounds more like shared branding than leeching to me. . .
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> In the LA/SD example, doesn't Fox operate both XHUPN and
> KCOP?
>
> Sounds more like shared branding than leeching to me. . .
>
Actually, Entrevision (which also owns XETV, KBNT and XHAS) owns XHUPN's studios, with a Mexican company owning the license and tranny.
 
Other WCTX-TV Stuff

LIN Broadcasting owns WCTX-TV. Their 10 PM news is produced by sister station WTNH-TV (ABC) channel 8 of New Haven. It's called "NewsChannel 8 at 10 on WCTX." (Or at least it was until this past weekend.)
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> Ok...
> Let's not use the words "Real" and "Phoney" to label these.
> Where was it written that a tv station had to identify
> themselves using the broadcast channel?
> In San Diego, more people have cable than don't, since,
> because of the topography, you can not get regular channels
> with an antenna.

True, and with cable and satellite reaching 85% of the US, the off-air channel is mattering less and less.

Has any station gotten DirecTV and Dish to use the cable channel numbering? I know the satellite services usually map channels to the off-air channel number, but there's no rule saying they have to.

> Instead, let's use the terms "Traditional" and
> "Cable-designate."
> I hate to sound politically correct, but using the term
> "real" is not accurate, since in a few years, all channels
> will be broadcasting using their digital designated
> frequency anyway, so the VHF/UHF designation will not
> matter.

This is an interesting point. When the switchover comes, will WCTX want to be 9.1 instead of 59.1? Of course, then for many people there would be two 9.1's because WWOR does get into Connecticut.
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> > In the LA/SD example, doesn't Fox operate both XHUPN and
> > KCOP?
> >
> > Sounds more like shared branding than leeching to me. . .
> >
> Actually, Entrevision (which also owns XETV, KBNT and XHAS)
> owns XHUPN's studios, with a Mexican company owning the
> license and tranny.
>
Right, Bay City Television is the licensee of both XETV (Fox) and XHUPN (UPN), but Entravision holds the ownership. What's ironic about the KTTV-KCOP and XETV-XHUPN combos is they both carry same syndicated programming in their respective markets, with a few exceptions (in other words, you can see The Simpsons and King of the Hill reruns on both KTTV and XETV, in some cases at the same time).
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> Has any station gotten DirecTV and Dish to use the cable
> channel numbering? I know the satellite services usually
> map channels to the off-air channel number, but there's no
> rule saying they have to.

I'm not sure if it was at the station's request but in Gainesville (FL) DISH Network carries WGFL TV 53 "CBS 4" on channel 4.

Personally, I believe it's the only way DISH could get cable subscribers accustomed to watching CBS on channel 4 (back from the days of WJXT TV 4 Jax) to switch to DBS.
 
Re: And what is National about this?

> > > In the LA/SD example, doesn't Fox operate both XHUPN and
>
> > > KCOP?
> > >
> > > Sounds more like shared branding than leeching to me. .
> .
> > >
> > Actually, Entrevision (which also owns XETV, KBNT and
> XHAS)
> > owns XHUPN's studios, with a Mexican company owning the
> > license and tranny.
> >
> Right, Bay City Television is the licensee of both XETV
> (Fox) and XHUPN (UPN), but Entravision holds the ownership.
> What's ironic about the KTTV-KCOP and XETV-XHUPN combos is
> they both carry same syndicated programming in their
> respective markets, with a few exceptions (in other words,
> you can see The Simpsons and King of the Hill reruns on both
> KTTV and XETV, in some cases at the same time).

Actually, Entravision doesn't <u>own</u> the stations, but they operate them under a JSA, which under Mexican law amounts to a LMA.<P ID="signature">______________


</P>
 
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