New digital subchannels in Northeast Wisconsin?

Anonymous's picture
Previously posted as a comment under an unrelated article by an unregistered user:

Are any of the Green Bay TV stations going to add digital subchannels soon? Even station in Northern Wisconsin have them.
Posted January 18, 2010 11:44am in
Mark's picture
 #

 Haven't heard anything about

 Haven't heard anything about any N.E. Wisconsin stations adding subchannels in the near future. There are certainly options for programming, as we're seeing in other markets like Milwaukee. I thought the best shot we'd have at a new subchannel would be NBC26 adding Universal Sports around the time of the Olympics. But if you've watched their newscasts lately, they have bigger problems to work out than adding a subchannel.
WBAY is stocked up with subchannels for now. Any more and they'd degrade their HD quality on 2.1. WFRV may be a possibility, as they've certainly been the most progressive in expanding HD into non-network hours. Not sure what would be on their radar as far as programming, would they opt to do one. WLUK has been getting into more non-network HD with the addition of HD syndicated programming, but it doesn't look like they're doing much more than that, at least the way WFRV is. (By that I mean, WFRV not only can run non-network HD but they shoot and produce promos, commercials and such in HD now too, whereas WLUK does not) I don't think WIWB has the capability or the resources to do much more than they're doing now, so I wouldn't guess they'd jump at a subchannel offering.
WACY is under the same umbrella as WGBA, so I doubt we'd see something happen on WACY before it would happen on WGBA. I think Journal (the owners of WGBA) has been doing subchannels in other markets. They do a weather subchannel and one that's a music-themed offering, but I don't know too much about it. In other markets I think they had signed on to offer Spanish-language subchannels too but I don't think that made it to Milwaukee, so I doubt it'd fly here just yet.
As far as WPNE, they had previously tried a five-subchannel arrangement, with some going dark at different times of day. Their current 24-hour, 3-channel offering is very good, and I doubt they'd have the room for more.

 
Jeff Last's picture
 #

Great summary! Thanks, Mark.

Great summary! Thanks, Mark.

 
Andy's picture
 #

I was talking to a friend in

I was talking to a friend in Madison who told me that FOX 47 in Madison recently added TheCoolTV as a subchannel. When looking at TheCoolTV's website, I noticed that WACY (channel 32) is listed as an affiliate of theirs. I would hope this means that we'll be seeing it sometime soon if there's an agreement in place.

I've seen TheCoolTV on WTMJ Milwaukee channel 4.3. It's a music video channel with a wide variety of music. There were a lot of commercials, though. Regardless, it would be great to see something new on local TV.

 
depereguy's picture
 #

Nice catch. theCoolTV is

Nice catch. theCoolTV is also listed as a substation on www.rabbitears.info for WACY with a note "(Soon)". When I cut the cord about 18 months ago, I was all pumped about subchannels, but they never came (other than what ABC and PBS already had). It's nice to see that one of the stations is adding one. I'd like to see the other stations (that currently don't have one) add some too.

 

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