NBC Weather Plus:
NBC Weather Plus was a 24-hour, commercially-sponsored, weather-oriented broadcast/cable television network jointly owned by NBC Universal and the local affiliates of the NBC network. It debuted on November 15, 2004 and is scheduled to shut down by the end of the year [1]. The network's headquarters was initially located at the MSNBC World Headquarters in Secaucus, New Jersey, and then CNBC Global Headquarters in Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey after MSNBC's move to 30 Rockefeller Plaza with the broadcast side of NBC News, where Weather Plus staff also appeared within the new MSNBC studios to deliver forecasts and interact with NBC News personalities in person. The service is broadcast on digital subchannels of certain NBC affiliates in the United States, and is available on digital cable systems in Standard Definition (SD) format.
Prior to 2008, NBC Weather Plus competed with The Weather Channel, which was itself acquired by a consortium led by NBC Universal in September 2008, as well as a similar digital service offered by AccuWeather, The Local AccuWeather Channel. Shortly after the acquisition of The Weather Channel on October 8, 2008, NBC announced that Weather Plus would be shut down by the end of 2008. The remaining on-camera meteorologists from Weather Plus are now referred to as "NBC meteorologists" during their NBC and MSNBC appearances, while The Weather Channel's staff has began to appear more on NBC News programs, either from TWC's Atlanta headquarters, New York, or on location from a weather event.
The service effectively shut down operations on December 1, 2008. What few affiliates remain are currently receiving a computer-updated loop of satellite/radar images, current weather conditions and temperatures, and daily forecasts for major regions of the country.
[edit] Programming
[edit] Local forecasts
The local forecasts were the part of NBC Weather Plus' programming schedule which viewers saw the current conditions and local forecast for their respective area. These forecasts were usually shown after most national forecast segments. Pre-recorded weather segments featuring local weather information from meteorologists of local NBC affiliates were shown proceeding weather information.
Viewers could see current weather conditions for their location and surrounding areas, weather forecasts, doppler radars of the region, and the day's actual high and low temperatures.
Local version of NBC Weather Plus from Milwaukee's WTMJ, showing an ad in the top-left corner, local branding above the Weather Plus logo, and time in the bottom-left.
Internet viewers who saw the national feed, including those areas where the network's website did not supply a certain city's Weather Plus feed, instead saw a segment including daily forecasts for each region of the United States and satellite loops and Doppler radars of the Northeast, Southeast, Midwest, Northwest, and Southwest, respectively. Unlike The Weather Channel, however, NBC Weather Plus did not carry the national feed on DirecTV, Dish Network, or C band satellite.
Music for the local forecasts came mostly from commercially available music, including those composed by 615 Music, who composed the music package used by NBC Weather Plus.
For the most part, the local stations labeled the NBC Weather Plus service as "Weather Plus" with the station branding before it, often being used in unison as the NBC station's on-air weather branding during newscasts. Many NBC affiliates continued to use the "Weather Plus" branding for their on-air weather branding, though some did not.
WNBC in New York was the test station for NBC Weather Plus.
[edit] National programming
NBC Weather Plus did not air its programming entirely live, and it used a digital video jukebox system to shuffle certain segments of the weathercasts unless severe weather breaks. This system was especially true with the seasonal outlooks, weather news segments at :24 and :54 minutes past the hour, and with late night programming. If one watched NBC Weather Plus closely in any given day, one might have found the same weather news segment that originally aired in the morning repeated long into the night, the same weather information airing at 11:00 p.m. airing at 4:00 a.m., and the same seasonal outlook (severe weather, tropical weather, or winter weather) segment that originally aired in the morning repeating long into the late afternoon. In the latter case, this is problematic due to the fact that if severe weather of either category occured (unless it is very significant), updated information may not have been available.
[edit] Appearance on other networks
The channel's staff also provided weather updates for fellow NBC Universal cable channels CNBC and MSNBC, and MSNBC aired 'sample' hours of the channel in holiday periods during the morning hours. In addition, Weather Plus was promoted during Football Night in America, and was used to provide gametime temperature and conditions for the later NBC Sunday Night Football game. Increasingly during times of significant national weather events (such as a major winter storm system), Weather Plus meteorologists have appeared live on NBC Nightly News to provide analysis. The Weather Channel now provides these services.
[edit] The "L" Bar
NBC Weather Plus used an "L-Bar" across the left side third and bottom third of the screen to continuously air local weather information, even during commercial breaks, national weather, and Weather Plus University.
The left side of the bar was reserved for sponsorship of Weather Plus programming on the top left (sponsors of NBC Weather Plus' programming was more often seen on local feeds), the middle left displayed the sky condition, temperature, wind speed/direction and humidity for each city and the bottom left was reserved for station identification (on local feeds, featuring the NBC affiliate's logo augmented above the Weather Plus portion of the logo) and current time was on the lower left, along with permanent text for station identification on some stations. (During Weather Plus University, the sponsorship tag was removed.)
The cycle for each city's weather information display was as follows:
- The current condition display cycle for one city ran for 20 seconds.
- The 24-hour forecast cycle ran 10 seconds.
- The five-day forecast cycle ran 10 seconds.
However, the above did not hold true for the left side of the L-Bar on Sacramento NBC affiliate KCRA. Instead, the current conditions cycled continuously and the time was on the right-hand side in the lower-third.
The bottom of the bar to the right of the time and station ID displayed the forecast for the next 24 hours featuring sky condition, temperature and estimated precipitation, followed by the five day forecast showing sky condition and predicted high and low temperatures. Occasionally, the current conditions display showed the icons telling the sky condition with the icon displaying sun despite it being nighttime. This also occurs on The Weather Channel but usually only in the hour following sunset. Not all cities where the current conditions were displayed on the left side of the "L" bar featured that city's forecast and may instead have used the conditions of the closest reporting station to that community. Example: Dallas NBC affiliate KXAS' Weather Plus feed displayed the current conditions for Alliance Airport but showed the forecast for Dallas-Fort Worth.
Digital television and cable viewers were able to see current weather conditions and weather forecasts for their location and surrounding areas, while internet viewers who watched the national feed instead of a local feed saw current conditions and daily forecasts for 50 U.S. cities.
[edit] NBC Weather Plus Personalities
Some personalities remain with NBC and The Weather Channel.
- Gary Archibald (seen on MSNBC weekends)
- Jeff Ranieri (seen on MSNBC weekday afternoons)
- Bill Karins (seen on MSNBC weekday mornings)
- Jackie Meretsky (maternity leave, expected to return to MSNBC Morning Joe)
- Todd Santos (Seen on NBC Early Today and MSNBC First Look)
- Raphael Miranda
- Samantha Davies
- Britta Merwin
- Jim Nichols
- Ibby Carothers
- Kristen Cornett now with St. Louis CBS affiliate KMOV-TV
- Elise Finch now with New York City CBS affiliate WCBS-TV
- Michelle Grossman now with Philadelphia NBC affiliate WCAU
- Sean McLaughlin
- Byron Miranda now freelancing at KTVU and KIRO-TV
[edit] Programming schedule
The following list was the channel's programming wheel (until October 2008).[2] Note that some network segments had a different title at times due to a sponsor for the forecast such as State Farm Road Coverage, which replaced Coast To Coast Forecast.
| Time |
Show |
| Top of hour-:04 past the half-hour |
Local Weather |
| :04-:06 past the half-hour |
Coast To Coast Forecast |
| :07.30-:09.30 past the half-hour |
Local Weather |
| :09.30-:13.30 past the half-hour |
Severe Weather Outlook |
| :15-:19 past the half-hour |
Local Weather |
| :19-:21 past the half-hour |
Plus Five Forecast |
| :22.30-:24.30: past the half-hour |
Local Weather |
| :25.00-bottom of half-hour |
National feature segment or affiliate report spotlight |
During severe weather, stations can choose to drop the national segments in favor of local coverage; the NBC Weather Plus control room can then choose to show that feed nationally during the Coast To Coast Forecast or the Plus Five Forecast, depending on what part of the programming cycle the network is in. The local broadcast is shown live if possible.
NBC Weather Plus also aired the "NBC Weather Plus Weather Alert," which interrupted regular programming when a breaking weather story occurs. Breaking severe weather news and images from a particular NBC affilate may be shown.
To fulfill FCC E/I requirements, NBC Weather Plus showed Weather Plus University on Saturday and Sunday afternoons.
In late October 2008, the national OCM segments were phased out, as well as some of the local Weather Plus systems. This leaves only six-minute music forecast segments and commercial breaks. With this, the remaining OCM staff of the channel are now referred to on other NBC News programs as only "NBC meteorologists".
[edit] Closure
NBC announced on October 7, 2008 that Weather Plus would be phased out by the end of the year, after the NBC affiliates expressed a desire to shut the service down.[3] Though NBC cited its purchase of The Weather Channel as a factor in the shutdown,[4] it has been stated that the closure would have happened even if the acquisition had not happened.[3]
Weather Plus began its phase-out in November 2008.
[edit] Affiliates
[edit] References
[edit] External links
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