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  #1  
Old 01-23-2017, 06:29 PM
crt89 crt89 is offline
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Are TV stations manned?

I always though TV stations would be big and have people monitoring what is being sent for any technical issues, but I do wonder. There aren't any around here to see. I know the big network affiliated news stations probably have people there around the clock of course as far as journalists, meteorologists, etc. But the smaller stations that just air taped stuff or repeat things from satellites?

There is a radio station far out of town here that I pass pretty often, and there is often a car parked outside, sometimes not. I guess it depends if they are doing a live show or not.
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Old 01-23-2017, 06:50 PM
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MIPS MIPS is offline
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CFJC seems to not have a regular group of staff between 12:30AM and 5AM. When they aren't taping, editing or doing one of the half dozen live segments daily the rest of the station is automated these days.
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Old 01-23-2017, 11:45 PM
centralradio centralradio is offline
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Now more likely a skeleton crew these days. If that.Radio now days are robo run with automation and voice tracked jocks.


These pro broadcasting forums have interesting info on Radio/TV broadcasting.

http://radiodiscussions.com/

http://broadcastengineering.info/ind...d00ed7ea0821a9
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Old 02-19-2017, 08:14 PM
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NowhereMan 1966 NowhereMan 1966 is offline
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Sometimes when I get on the local 2 meter repeater here in the Wheeling, WV area, one ham I talk to mans WTRF-TV in Wheeling at night to monitor the satellite feeds and other things for the station and sometimes he chats when there is not much going on. It's a good idea to have someone there in case if something goes wrong or if something happens where they have to cut into a live network feed.
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Old 04-11-2017, 09:36 PM
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In this day and age of digital TV, I think many if not most stations in major cities are almost 100-percent automated, with at most one person overseeing the operation in case something goes awry. The local TV stations in Cleveland will go from local to network programming, or vice-versa, without so much as a pause, the station identifications (station breaks) are often shown long after the top of the hour (the NBC affiliate in Cleveland, however, seems to have remedied the problem, as it now runs its station breaks very close to the top of every hour), and the commercials look as if they are fully automated as well. Most of the time, the stations will run one commercial twice within a 30-second period. I don't know why they do that, unless they want to be absolutely certain the commercial will be seen and heard. However, I can't help wondering why, if they do this with the first commercial in a series, they don't show every commercial at least twice, if the intent is to be positive the things are actually being seen and heard and not being ignored.

Sheeesh! I've heard of aggressive advertising, but this is too much. I am almost tempted to think there is a glitch in the computers that run the TV stations that cause the first commercial in a string to be shown twice. If not, then the problem almost certainly has to be, IMHO, that the stations want to be sure, beyond the shadow of a doubt, that the commercials will be seen and heard by the viewers.

Sheeeesh, again. I always knew digital TV would change the North American television landscape forever (it has, in spades), but good grief, I never thought it would make commercials more annoying than they are. The next thing you know, the networks may come up with a system whereby they will put a signal in the vertical blanking interval of commercials that will jam the mute buttons on TV remotes from coast to coast (and everywhere in between) during commercial breaks--forcing viewers not only to watch the commercials, but to listen to them as well.
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Last edited by Jeffhs; 04-11-2017 at 09:42 PM.
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Old 04-11-2017, 11:27 PM
centralradio centralradio is offline
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Thanks for the info Jeff.Like the radio counterpart. I remember seeing those 10 minute plus nonstop advert meltdowns and ruin the show they were sponsoring.


Atlease so far automated TV stations are keeping their programs on time.Automated Radio is a different story.They never run on time if a syndi show like a countdown show is scheduled to run at a specific time like 9pm .They end up running 5 to 10 minutes early or late.
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Old 04-12-2017, 11:11 AM
WISCOJIM WISCOJIM is offline
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Easy to avoid commercials, never watch TV live! Use a DVR to skip through them.
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Old 04-12-2017, 01:21 PM
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Many TV stations with a common owner are operated from a central hub. For example, 5 years ago I read that 28 Fox owned and operated stations were remotely controlled from a central hub in Las Vegas.

Hubbed stations are likely the most common today, with an occasional "ma and pa" locally owned station likely being a fairly rare occurrence.

Wikipedia article on centralcasting here:
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Centralcasting

I know of a number of local people that lost their jobs in local TV "master control" operations, when their stations were "hubbed".

jr

Last edited by jr_tech; 04-12-2017 at 01:44 PM. Reason: add info
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  #9  
Old 04-12-2017, 02:54 PM
centralradio centralradio is offline
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With years of deregulation and other shenanigans going on behind closed doors. .The medium when down the toilet.As the OTA channel band shrinks .If the wireless industry gets their way.The OTA channels will be the thing of the past.
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Old 04-12-2017, 08:20 PM
WISCOJIM WISCOJIM is offline
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I can't see OTA going away in the near future. More people are coming back to OTA in recent years. Stations and marketers are putting a lot more money into OTA, and they must be doing so to get more revenue back out. Why else would they be adding all the sub-channels and advertising?

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  #11  
Old 04-13-2017, 01:12 AM
centralradio centralradio is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by WISCOJIM View Post
I can't see OTA going away in the near future. More people are coming back to OTA in recent years. Stations and marketers are putting a lot more money into OTA, and they must be doing so to get more revenue back out. Why else would they be adding all the sub-channels and advertising?

.
Thanks .Thats good news.If the reception issues here were no problem.I would cut the cord years ago.Somebody got to come up with better antenna systems or the stations crank up the power.

I'm tempting to check the antennas at BJs.
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Old 04-17-2017, 07:20 PM
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I am pretty much stuck with streaming video and a cable connection (Spectrum, formerly Time Warner Cable), as there are two important network TV channels which don't reach my area OTA. I only have the cable account so my Roku player's Spectrum app will receive my area's local TV stations; I've had basic cable so long I don't miss the other cable channels such as CNN, ESPN, et al. The broadcast channels plus their subchannels are plenty for me. I grew up in the '60s-'70s watching just four channels (NBC, ABC, CBS, PBS) in black and white from Cleveland, so getting just those stations and subchannels these days on streaming video is quite enough.

I live on a fixed income, so I can't afford (and don't want) high cable bills; instead of high-priced pay cable movie channels such as HBO (had it for a month in the '80s, then dropped it because of lack of decent programming and seemingly endless repetition of the same movie every week), I have DVDs and VHS tapes of my favorite shows from the '60s-'70s. I watch them much more than I watch network TV.
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  #13  
Old 04-23-2017, 03:30 PM
crt89 crt89 is offline
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Jeffhs View Post
Most of the time, the stations will run one commercial twice within a 30-second period. I don't know why they do that, unless they want to be absolutely certain the commercial will be seen and heard. However, I can't help wondering why, if they do this with the first commercial in a series, they don't show every commercial at least twice, if the intent is to be positive the things are actually being seen and heard and not being ignored.
I have noticed this, but it most often seems to happen if I remember correctly during the evening news commercials.

Another thing I have noticed in general is that a commercial will start and maybe get one word in, and then it is interrupted by another commercial. I'm not sure if that has to do with local vs network programming or not.
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Old 04-23-2017, 04:11 PM
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Quote:
Originally Posted by crt89 View Post
...
Another thing I have noticed in general is that a commercial will start and maybe get one word in, and then it is interrupted by another commercial. I'm not sure if that has to do with local vs network programming or not.
Yes, it's the local (or cable system) insert not being timed exactly right.
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Old 05-18-2017, 04:09 PM
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If this goes through, local main studios may start to disappear:

http://www.radioworld.com/news-and-b...tations/339706

jr
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