TWC has had the move to HD in their sights for years now. We've been hearing since 2006 that TWC will be going HD, and now that it is a reality, the final piece of the puzzle is the HD STAR. Now, I realize that creating a new piece of hardware capable of outputting HD graphics isn't something that can be created overnight, but they've had at least two years to work on it, and there are still no signs of it anywhere.
At this rate, I'd expect not to see the HD STAR to be released until 2009, at the earliest. Because, even if we do see a beta released to select cable headends today, there needs to be at least a few months of beta testing until it is ready to be released to all.
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My friend, we are in the middle of the longest Trammell Starks outage in years. The outage first occurred Wednesday morning at 10:18 AM ET and has been happening ever since.
Basically, the SD satellite local forecast feed is broken so to compensate for that, TWC has estated the "emergency feed" which is basically a looping satellite local forecast and a loop of 20 Trammell Starks songs.
At this point, we don't know any details as to what is wrong, but hopefully we'll learn something as time passes. But for now, sit back and enjoy the Trammell Starks music!
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Well, now that Hurricane Dolly has made landfall and will continue to dissipate over southern Texas, TWC missed a golden opportunity to go into the much-hyped Storm Alert mode.
Surely, Hurricane Dolly was a much bigger event than the wimpy storms of Alberto and Ernesto of 2006, yet they go into Storm Alert for Alberto and Ernesto (twice, in fact, for the latter). Why didn't they go into Storm Alert for Dolly? Have they gone back to the 2005 criteria for Storm Alert where the storm has to be a category 3 or greater? Sure, Dolly was a category 2 at landfall, but maybe the winds were just a few mines per hours too weak?
We may never know.
Well in any case, we did get to see Day Planner go HD for storm coverage about a week or so early, so I guess that is a plus. Also, we did get some nice HD shots (when the satellite transmission worked) of Jim, Mike, Mike, and Julie getting blown around in the rain, so I guess that is a plus.
Also while we're on the topic, I'd like to take this opportunity to send out my well wishes out to anyone effected by Dolly in northern Mexico and southern Texas. I hope for a speedy recovery for all those in the effected areas.
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From press.weather.com:
ATLANTA – July 21, 2008 -- The Weather Channel announced today that Marshall Seese, co-anchor of Your Weather Today, will be retiring from the network in November. His replacement on the all weather network’s morning show has not been named.
Seese, a 20-year veteran of The Weather Channel, has been co-host with Heather Tesch of the popular morning program Your Weather Today since its launch in January of 2000. The program airs Monday through Friday from 7-10 a.m. and was the first TWC program to launch from the network’s new HD studio on June 2. Prior to that, Seese was an on-camera meteorologist at The Weather Channel.
He was hired more than twenty years ago by Ray Ban, executive vice president of programming and meteorology, who says of Seese -- "We appreciate the many years of service Marshall has provided in his always-professional manner, both on and off the air. He has been an important part of the growth of The Weather Channel and I join everyone here in wishing him well."
Among the weather events that Seese most remembers covering is Hurricane Hugo. As the correspondent on Force Four, The Weather Channel show nominated for a CableACE Award, he interviewed a variety of people including Marilyn Quayle, wife of then Vice President Daniel Quayle, and residents who were personally devastated by the hurricane.
Prior to joining The Weather Channel, Seese was seen on WGNX-TV in Atlanta and KENS-TV in San Antonio, TX. A native of Park Ridge, IL a suburb of Chicago, Seese graduated from the University of Illinois at Champaign-Urbana.
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The news came as quite a shock to me. Marshall was a great OCM and will certainly be missed on-air. I just hope he can enjoy his last months on air and the beginning of his new life being retired.
Now the nagging question will be who is going to replace Marshall on "Your Weather today"?
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Well, Weekend View is the latest show on TWC to go HD. I must say, I'm not that impressed. What was once a unique, laid-back weekend take on the weather has turned into another four hours of generic TWC. The whole "we're doing the weather from a couch and without a tie" approach is out the window, so-to-speak.
Weekend View is using the same "set" as PM Edition uses with the fake windows background.
And then there is the other part of this studio with the out-of-place gray TWC logos plastered on the wall and the portrait-oriented LCD display.
Honestly, I was expecting more from Weekend View. Whatever happened to the couch in the HD studio which was labeled as the "interview corner" in the studio tour?
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