It all started the other night when I tuned in at 9 PM to watch "Emergency" and was greeted with "Law and Order".

Than tonight, I tuned in at 6 PM to watch "Knight Rider" and was greeted with "Deal or no Deal"!

Hell, I can get the above crap on 80% of the other cable channels. I guess RTN is starting to do what TV Land did; and, you see what happened there.

I have been recording "Knight Rider" (1982 version, not the 2009 version that does nothing for me) onto VHS tape because I'm too cheap to buy or rent the series on DVD. I guess I'd better record the other old shows that I like before they yank them! It's going to get to the point where the only source we have for older decent programming is to buy/rent the DVD's or watch home recorded tapes (like I do) of the old stuff.

I don't even get RTN where I live. The nearest television station in Ohio that has this network on one of its subchannels is in Toledo, over 100 miles away (I'm near Cleveland). I have a subscription to Netflix and a few of my own DVDs, so I do have ways of getting my favorite old shows from the 1970s without cable. I may well eventually downgrade my cable eventually to bare-bones basic (local channels only) and use my DVD player and VCR for other programming.

I don't know why RTN is doing what you say it is, unless it's doing the same thing (or something similar to it) as TV Land the last couple of years. Television networks do this all the time; witness how the commercial broadcast networks copy one another in technology, stories covered, etc. RTN seems to be copying TV Land's way of doing things (without the movies and original programming, for the time being anyhow), but that's how it goes in the television industry these days. No originality anymore, just every network doing what everyone else is doing. I watch very little broadcast TV these days for just that reason; the programming outside the news on every network is just as unimaginative, IMHO.

The cable system here hasn't carried Emergency! in years; the last time I saw it in reruns was last year, when I rented the DVDs of a couple of its seasons from Netflix. I remember Emergency! when the series was new on NBC in the '70s (almost all of my favorite shows are from that decade, as that was when I was growing up).

The television landscape is changing, and the TV networks know it. They put shows on that draw decent ratings; I guess in RTN's case, Emergency! wasn't drawing quite the ratings the network had expected, so the program was canceled. Many of today's TV viewers are far too young to have remembered Emergency's first run on NBC, and wouldn't understand the program today--another reason RTN canceled it. People acted, spoke, and thought differently 30+ years ago; this all but baffles today's young people because that kind of lifestyle is foreign to them. The TV networks and Hollywood realize this all too well, which is why their shows must keep up with the times in which we are currently living.

Remakes of 20-30-year-old series such as Knight Rider fail for the same reasons. I saw a couple of episodes of the new KR when the series began its ill-fated run on NBC and was disappointed. It was nothing like the original Knight Rider, which was science fiction but still drew decent ratings in prime time. The ill-fated new Knight Rider, which ran on NBC for only one season, IIRC, obviously wasn't drawing the same ratings for NBC Universal (the original Knight Rider was on the old RCA-owned and operated NBC television network) as the original did, so.....after one season, poof. The show was canceled and probably will never be seen again on broadcast television, although it may be available on DVD eventually; that seems to be how a lot of prime-time shows are going these days, even programs that are still running on their networks.

I'm not sure, but I think Emergency! may be available on the Internet through Hulu, veoh and other online video services. I haven't looked at Hulu lately and veoh won't run on my nine-year-old Windows 98SE computer, so I don't really know what's on these services today. I'll take a look after I finish this post; I might be surprised and could wind up eating my words.

"Lawn Order" is the most bestest show on TV ever-unless you wanna talk about "CSI"- Why would you wanna watch some dangfool junk about a poppinjay & a 1982 Firebird ?!?


I hope you can detect the sarcasm-I cannot abide "Lawn Order" in any of its 13K iterations, either.

"Lawn Order" is the most bestest show on TV ever-unless you wanna talk about "CSI"- Why would you wanna watch some dangfool junk about a poppinjay & a 1982 Firebird ?!?


I hope you can detect the sarcasm-I cannot abide "Lawn Order" in any of its 13K iterations, either.

I hear they are coming out with a new "yard rolling division" of "law and order".

Seriously, I can get that show on just about any cable channel at any time of the day I choose. I think RTN could have been more original and added something different. But, like has already been said, there is no originality anymore. I wish they would air "Quincy" and "Trapper John". The local fox affiliate (back when DTV was just a whisper) aired those shows every afternoon for 2 or 3 years and I tuned in quite often. Then, one afternoon, I turned on the boob tube just to see the same talk show and courtroom TV crap that everyone else has in the afternoon. I also remember rushing home from school, back around '83 or '84, to watch "Scooby Doo" and "He Man". I think somewhere around '86, Oprah came on the scene and it wasn't long before talk shows took over afternoon TV.

It's really strange that I'm 32 and like the old shows. My Mother is 53 and likes more of the new crap. She will watch "Gunsmoke" and "Bonanza" when there's nothing else on. You'd think that the rolls would be reversed.

Someone on another forum just brought it to my attention that this may not be RTN's doing and, the more I think of it, he could be correct. In my area, RTN and FOX share the same subchannel. Normally, the FOX programming starts at 7 PM and ends at 9 PM. It could very well be possible that the FOX programming is now taking over at 6 PM and ending at 10 PM. It really would be nice if FOX and RTN was on a different channel, as there are many programs that I'm missing out on since FOX programming is the number one priority.

I don't even get RTN where I live. The nearest television station in Ohio that has this network on one of its subchannels is in Toledo, over 100 miles away (I'm near Cleveland). I have a subscription to Netflix and a few of my own DVDs, so I do have ways of getting my favorite old shows from the 1970s without cable. I may well eventually downgrade my cable eventually to bare-bones basic (local channels only) and use my DVD player and VCR for other programming.

I don't know why RTN is doing what you say it is, unless it's doing the same thing (or something similar to it) as TV Land the last couple of years. Television networks do this all the time; witness how the commercial broadcast networks copy one another in technology, stories covered, etc. RTN seems to be copying TV Land's way of doing things (without the movies and original programming, for the time being anyhow), but that's how it goes in the television industry these days. No originality anymore, just every network doing what everyone else is doing. I watch very little broadcast TV these days for just that reason; the programming outside the news on every network is just as unimaginative, IMHO.

The cable system here hasn't carried Emergency! in years; the last time I saw it in reruns was last year, when I rented the DVDs of a couple of its seasons from Netflix. I remember Emergency! when the series was new on NBC in the '70s (almost all of my favorite shows are from that decade, as that was when I was growing up).

The television landscape is changing, and the TV networks know it. They put shows on that draw decent ratings; I guess in RTN's case, Emergency! wasn't drawing quite the ratings the network had expected, so the program was canceled. Many of today's TV viewers are far too young to have remembered Emergency's first run on NBC, and wouldn't understand the program today--another reason RTN canceled it. People acted, spoke, and thought differently 30+ years ago; this all but baffles today's young people because that kind of lifestyle is foreign to them. The TV networks and Hollywood realize this all too well, which is why their shows must keep up with the times in which we are currently living.

Remakes of 20-30-year-old series such as Knight Rider fail for the same reasons. I saw a couple of episodes of the new KR when the series began its ill-fated run on NBC and was disappointed. It was nothing like the original Knight Rider, which was science fiction but still drew decent ratings in prime time. The ill-fated new Knight Rider, which ran on NBC for only one season, IIRC, obviously wasn't drawing the same ratings for NBC Universal (the original Knight Rider was on the old RCA-owned and operated NBC television network) as the original did, so.....after one season, poof. The show was canceled and probably will never be seen again on broadcast television, although it may be available on DVD eventually; that seems to be how a lot of prime-time shows are going these days, even programs that are still running on their networks.

I'm not sure, but I think Emergency! may be available on the Internet through Hulu, veoh and other online video services. I haven't looked at Hulu lately and veoh won't run on my nine-year-old Windows 98SE computer, so I don't really know what's on these services today. I'll take a look after I finish this post; I might be surprised and could wind up eating my words.

We still get Emergency here in Pittsburgh so maybe there are some leeway on what the local areas put on their RTN affiliates. I also like the old GeorgE Peppard show, Banacek, where he is a freelance insurance investigator or private detective. He was on a tennis court in one scene and a waiter was looking for him with a telephone since Banacek had a call. He found his chaffeur and plugged the phone in. Had it been filmed now, Banacek would simply have a cellphone. You're right, things are so different now than 30 or even 20 years ago. BTW, I watched Emergency when it was on prime time and I'll be 43 in July.

I hear they are coming out with a new "yard rolling division" of "law and order".

Seriously, I can get that show on just about any cable channel at any time of the day I choose. I think RTN could have been more original and added something different. But, like has already been said, there is no originality anymore. I wish they would air "Quincy" and "Trapper John". The local fox affiliate (back when DTV was just a whisper) aired those shows every afternoon for 2 or 3 years and I tuned in quite often. Then, one afternoon, I turned on the boob tube just to see the same talk show and courtroom TV crap that everyone else has in the afternoon. I also remember rushing home from school, back around '83 or '84, to watch "Scooby Doo" and "He Man". I think somewhere around '86, Oprah came on the scene and it wasn't long before talk shows took over afternoon TV.

It's really strange that I'm 32 and like the old shows. My Mother is 53 and likes more of the new crap. She will watch "Gunsmoke" and "Bonanza" when there's nothing else on. You'd think that the rolls would be reversed.

Well, again, here in Pittsburgh, we have "Quincy" on RTN so I think there is some local control of programming although I think there is a master list where they can choose from. Yuck, don't get me started on Oprah, you're right, she destroyed afternoon TV. I wish Fox still ran cartoons in the afternoons, Mom and I always enjoyed "Big Guy and Rusty." :P

I remember in the 1980's, Mom liked the Gobots and I went for the Transformers. Mom will be 71 this year and I'll be 43.

One more thing, this was from the mid 1990's but I miss "The Tick" cartoon.

I watched that show "Law and Order SUV" and the whole time they were driving a Crown Vic! What gives?

I've figured out that the trouble is happening because FOX and RTN share the same channel and FOX programming is top priority. In the past, FOX programming started at 7 PM and ended at 9 PM. The other night, I tuned in at 6 PM just to see what would happen. The opening theme to "Knight Rider" came on, I hit the record button on the VCR, then paused the VCR while I waited on the commercials to end, and then "Deal or No Deal" pops on in front of me. I got so irritated that I almost threw the VCR remote across the room. The least they could do is have everything in sync so I won't think I'm watching something just to have some crappy show that I couldn't care less about pop up in my face. So, I guess FOX programming is from 6-10 at present. We probably wouldn't have these problems if RTN and FOX were on different channels.

The opening theme to "Knight Rider" came on, I hit the record button on the VCR, then paused the VCR while I waited on the commercials to end, and then "Deal or No Deal" pops on in front of me. I got so irritated that I almost threw the VCR remote across the room. The least they could do is have everything in sync so I won't think I'm watching something just to have some crappy show that I couldn't care less about pop up in my face.

Sloppiness like this is not uncommon now since so many television and radio stations have become automated - a computer, rather than a live board-op, is the one manning the controls. From what I remember, there used to be an FCC law about stations being manned by a live human while broadcasting; if that still holds true I'm sure the station management is paying someone $6 an hour to hang around and "put another coat of polish on the floor while you're at it."

I've wondered about that old rule; there is a radio station near here, an AM daytimer, that plays pretty much just recorded religious programming. Their office/studios/transmitter are right on the highway. Most of the time when I ride by there is no car up there.

Another station was running a syndicated show on Saturday night. Something wasn't set up right because every commercial break was screwed up, with local ads running overtop of the "network" ads, and then overlapping the program when it came back on. It did this the same way, week in and week out, for several years. I wrote the station manager about it once but never got a reply. Nobody cared? I guess with budget cuts they got rid of the show.

The cable station that is in the school I work at is a real cable station, not just for the school like some are. It is two channels actually. They have mac computers running everything too. At night windows pop up warning of different things and no one is there to click them off. If I'm in there at the time I'll do it. Just drives me nuts to leave it. Sometimes the stations are run like this during the day too. Sloppy work indeed.

I sort of wish TV stations would sign off at night like they used to. End the day with the National Anthem and go to snow or colorbars. Kind of a nice sentiment.

I sort of wish TV stations would sign off at night like they used to. End the day with the National Anthem and go to snow or colorbars. Kind of a nice sentiment.

Me too. I used to stay up as a kid and watch it.

That's ho you can tell a TV enthusiast from a 'normal person' :D We like seeing the station sign off, we tape DTV conversions, dead-air is a magic thing to us too, even if it only lasts 15 seconds once a month or year. :thmbsp:

We like seeing the station sign off, we tape DTV conversions, dead-air is a magic thing to us too, even if it only lasts 15 seconds once a month or year. :thmbsp:

Don't forget the test patterns :thmbsp:

Oh test patterns are the real treat---I like leaving 2 or 3 old TVs running all displaying a test pattern when it's being broadcast (which is rare!) Gives the TV studio feel.

So, do you guys think any analog-TV pirate stations will start to show up after June 12th? I'll be tuning in periodically to check, you can be sure of that! May even be armed with a VHS deck in case something really cool happens...

It's funny you guy's are talking about that.. Right before WBFF signed off and showed the DTV infomercial, they ended by playing the National Anthem followed by the indian test card. The video looked like they were just playing back an old VHS tape...

Man, wish we had RTN here.

LAO and CSI (and the rest of them).. Honest if I really need to see hacked up people week in and week out, I just watch the news from the left coast.

Geeezz. Guys this can't be doing us any good....

I loved Emergency. Basides Julie still give my blue jeans a rise...

site123a, sorry I missed that! I hadn't been able to pull them in here with my current antenna. Warm memories of WBFF as a kid, Captain Chesapeake, etc.

Some of the stations had great sign-offs, well worth me staying up for. When I was around 8-12 years old I did a lot of that, and getting up early to watch sign-ons. On rare occasions I'd stay up until 3am when pretty much the only thing on TV was WMAR running episodes of Private Secretary. I've often wondered how they came to pick that show to run-maybe they had a stash of them in the film library?

I sort of wish TV stations would sign off at night like they used to. End the day with the National Anthem and go to snow or colorbars. Kind of a nice sentiment.

Those were the days, I remember when most TV stations signed off. The one exception was KDKA-TV here in Pittsburgh. Even in the late 1940's, they were 24 hours, they had a program called "Swing Shift Theatre" where they would broadcast movies all night since Pittsburgh was a heavily industrial area. I remember when TV stations signed off, they would invite people to tune into the radio station that was associated with the TV station so they can keep up with news and so on.

That's ho you can tell a TV enthusiast from a 'normal person' :D We like seeing the station sign off, we tape DTV conversions, dead-air is a magic thing to us too, even if it only lasts 15 seconds once a month or year. :thmbsp:

I know what you mean. I used to watch Cleveland's TV stations sign off, then I'd get up at 5:30 the next morning to see them sign on. I snagged some interesting TV DX on channel 5 early in the morning, before the Cleveland ABC affiliate on that channel signed on; the DX station was WNEM-TV in Saginaw, Michigan. One summer about 15-20 years ago, I even saw stations coming in from Cheyenne, Wyoming, Oklahoma, Texas, Miami, et al on channel 2--sometimes one on top of the other. One summer about 20-25 years ago, before I had cable, I was able to get Miami's PBS channel, WPBT-TV channel 2, five days straight, with a picture good enough to watch--and I was only using a 12" portable TV with rabbit ears at the time. Being an amateur radio operator, seeing DX like this on television excites me plenty (just as it does on the ham bands), but as we all know, most ordinary people are aghast or think there is something wrong with their television if their local channels get trampled by co-channel interference from stations hundreds of miles away.

Most people don't bother with the channels between their area's local stations anyway; today's TV sets are designed with programmable scan lists that can be set to scan only the channels in the viewer's local area, with an option available as well to delete from the scanning list channels the viewer does not watch.

It is questionable, however, how many people actually bother to actually go through the scan list, channel by channel, to delete the ones they don't want; my best guess is most people just accept the default settings on their TV which cause the remote or local channel up/down control buttons to scan the entire list of stations available. This list can be very long; Time-Warner analog expanded basic, for instance, has some 70 channels, including subscription movie channels. The digital service has 200 channels or more, so rescanning the TV or cable box, then going through the list to delete unwanted channels, could be a long process. Many people today can't or do not want to be bothered with this procedure (if they can figure it out in the first place--many ordinary, non-technical TV set owners don't know much more than how to turn the set on and off, change channels, turn the volume up or down and mute the sound) so they just accept whatever the TV's default settings give them, even if it means having to wait seemingly forever for the set or the cable box to scan through the list to find the station they want. Many people just use the keypad on the remote or on the set to go directly to the channel they want to watch and do not use the scan buttons.

I have cable service from Time-Warner (bare-bones basic, local channels only) that also offers several religious, home shopping and other special-interest stations that do not particularly interest me, so I went through the scan list and deleted the channels I do not care for. Now the channel up/down buttons on my remote cause my TV to scan through only the major network stations in my area, which is why I got bare-bones basic cable in the first place--to save money and to get the local network affiliates (in that order), not home shopping and these other channels that run seemingly endless strings of infomercials. There is a former home-shopping channel on my cable from Canton, Ohio (60 miles or so southwest of Cleveland) that runs infomercials almost 24/7; good thing it it fully digital now, having shut down its analog transmitter a short time ago, or else the electric bill for operating two transmitters could have bankrupted the station several times over. The station would have been better off, IMHO, to continue to sign off at 2 a.m., as I am sure it did when it was a general entertainment station back in the late '60s through the eighties.

The religious station (WDLI-TV, channel 17, also in Canton, Ohio) will sign off permanently on April 16, so that the Cleveland NBC affiliate (WKYC-TV) can put its digital transmitter on the air on that channel, as they have been planning for some time. The station's pre-transition digital cable position is channel 2.