NBC Universal buying The Weather Channel for $3.5 billion

Does that mean that NBC is going to combine The Weather Channel into their Weather Plus sub-channel?

Say goodbye to The Weather Channel in it's current form. After NBC Universal takes control, they probably go against the old saying "If it ain't broke, don't fix it", and change it. It will shock me if they leave it the way it is now.

This will likely have an impact on one of my local stations, WCBS I think, which has on-screen tie-ins to the Weather Channel and uses them for weather information. I can see NBC instead wanting to all of their affiliate stations to help promote The Weather Channel for "brand synergy", so I expect to see cross-overs with WNBC and Weather Channel as soon as the WCBS deal is done ...

Maybe they'll bring Willard Scott out of retirement to anchor Evening Edition. :eek2:

Bye Bye weather channel.

Randal Graves said:

Say goodbye to The Weather Channel in it's current form. After NBC Universal takes control, they probably go against the old saying "If it ain't broke, don't fix it", and change it. It will shock me if they leave it the way it is now.

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Well I personally hope they do change it. I tuned in 5 times yesterday to check on the weather and guess what, all 5 times it was some WW2 weather show. They need to can all that stuff and get back to actual *weather*. Amazing.

No wonder I just use the Internet for my weather...

$3.2B for the Weather Channel. whew...that's about 300,000,000 per viewer.

:thats: !rolling :lol:.

Ken S said:

$3.2B for the Weather Channel. whew...that's about 300,000,000 per viewer.

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Funny but the weather channel has quite a presence in many venues. It is huge on the internet and mobile devices. Most cable systems have a localized Weatherscan channel in addition to the main Weather Channel with its local data. It is all over airports and used by many travel devices.

Coming soon to The Weather Channel: Locals on the 8's, ECW on the 3's.

bonscott87 said:

Well I personally hope they do change it. I tuned in 5 times yesterday to check on the weather and guess what, all 5 times it was some WW2 weather show. They need to can all that stuff and get back to actual *weather*. Amazing.

No wonder I just use the Internet for my weather...

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I always see my weather when I check. You're probably not checking at the right time. I meant they'll change it to where there are weather shows or something instead of weather forecasting.

Every other cable channel NBC Universal owns shows Law & Order marathons all the time. Surely they wouldn't do that to this one too.

I've had locals on the 8s for years, doesn't everyone?

I think most of the shows on TWC belong on Discovery, TLC, Science Channel, or some other network. TWC should not go the way of MTV which has almost totally void of music videos.

Yeah, every time I tune to the Weather Channel there is some program on, not the up to the minute weather. Its like MTV.. used to be music, now dumb programs... and TWC used to be weather, now dumb programs.

Stick to telling us the weather.

n3ntj said:

Yeah, every time I tune to the Weather Channel there is some program on, not the up to the minute weather. Its like MTV.. used to be music, now dumb programs... and TWC used to be weather, now dumb programs.

Stick to telling us the weather.

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I agree! The Weather Channel is probably my least watched channel.

I also long for the good old days when TWC stuck to national and local weather. I would hazard a guess that the reason for all the weather oriented entertainment was to bring in more advertising dollars. They still do a great job of storm reporting and forecasting, though.

tonyd79 said:

Funny but the weather channel has quite a presence in many venues. It is huge on the internet and mobile devices. Most cable systems have a localized Weatherscan channel in addition to the main Weather Channel with its local data. It is all over airports and used by many travel devices.

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I was being unfair. The Weather Channel has become a pretty good brand. I think more than 50% of their revenue comes from their website. They're available on the lowest tier of just about every cable and satellite system.

Unfortunately, The Weather Channel doesn't broadcast a lot of weather anymore...they've slipped into Discovery Channel/Fox Reality light mode in search of viewers.

For me...I never watch it anymore because I can get better local weather from other sources and when it comes to hurricane reporting the weather channel just doesn't have the local coverage and information we require.

It must be worth $3.5B though...because someone paid it.

I too wish they go back to focus on current and future weather including more radar of areas currently under severe weather.. Seems like they are always in a hurry to scan through the radar.. To me the most important part is seeing when rain is in the area...

They need to turn the weather plus station into almost constant local radar with brief forecast updates for the whole nation..

For someome like me who spends a lot of time working on my property, i like to quickly look to see what the current radar looks like.. Of course weather.com is now good for that..

They do cover Hurricanes well, as we know down here.. You know they get excited in the storm center when a tropical storm develops!:lol:

Ken S said:

I was being unfair. The Weather Channel has become a pretty good brand. I think more than 50% of their revenue comes from their website. They're available on the lowest tier of just about every cable and satellite system.

Unfortunately, The Weather Channel doesn't broadcast a lot of weather anymore...they've slipped into Discovery Channel/Fox Reality light mode in search of viewers.

For me...I never watch it anymore because I can get better local weather from other sources and when it comes to hurricane reporting the weather channel just doesn't have the local coverage and information we require.

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You were being funny, though, and I enjoyed the joke.

As for the channel itself, right on. It is pretty useless as a source of weather. But the Weatherscan channel they have on most digital cable systems is 24/7 loop of "weather on the 8's" and is useful. In fact, I usually have one of my Tivo tuners on it at all times when not recording something so I can pull it up and have radar and stuff in the buffer. (This is what happens when you have 8 tuners and 5 live buffers.)

Also, my main weather source on line is weather.com either on a computer or on my Blackberry.

Now, when I want to know the local weather, I check out NBC Weather Plus so I can see the local live radar.