Green Bay FOX affiliate refusing to give HD to TWC
By Darren Murph 
posted Jan 18th 2008 8:48AM
posted Jan 18th 2008 8:48AM
[Thanks David S., image courtesy of Flickr]
posted Jan 18th 2008 8:48AM
The number of televisions estimated that sit unused in closets.
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another excuse to make it out to the Lamb?? Yeah, that is definilty not happening since its pretty impossible to get reasonably priced scalped tix lol...
Good for the local TV channels!! I use an OTA antenna and have no cable... But then again, why did they pick THIS day to ask for some money?? They should have started earlier in the season... Negotiations dont take a couple hours to just magically happen...
Good luck Green Bay with your HD troubles... Be nice for them to watch the Giants lay the smack down on them :-)
Nevermind that fact that is will be bitter cold. I was at the last game of the season vs Detriot (go every year with a large group and I am not even a packer fan) and it was about 25 degrees and I can tell you that is no fun sitting in that stadium in that kind of weather.
Plus, there is no way the Giants can beat the Packers, specially with Eli at the helm.
At least they can see the game in HD. I live in LaCrosse, WI, our local affiliate WLAX FOX 25 is presented amazing 480i.
Most of western wisconsin also won't be getting the game in HD because "fox25/48" isn't even broadcasting with a full strength 480i digital signal yet... or stereo sound.
andyg8180 wrote "They should have started earlier in the season"
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?t=333145&pp=30&highlight=jay+zollar&page=2
Here is a link to the Green Bay, WI thread on AVS forum. There is reference to negotiations with FOX 11 since the summer of '04. Please for our sake hear in Northeast Wisconsin e-mail Jay Zollar (jzollar@wluk.com) and tell him that he should just follow the precedent that has been set by our CBS, NBC, and ABC affiliates. Those 3 are on both TWC and DirecTV. Fox is on neither.
I am going to the game for face value, I know lucky! But none of my buddies have rooftop antennas. So they have to come to my place where I do have a rooftop antenna. Hopefully they don't get too drunk and trash the place.
To make matters worse, the General Manager seems to be completely clueless:
http://community.myfoxnewisconsin.com/blogs/Jay_Zollar/2007/11/21/HD_Programming
It really does seem that WLUK is holding the Packer coverage hostage to extort $$$ out of TW.
This also got picked up in our local Green Bay paper today:
http://www.greenbaypressgazette.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20080118/GPG0101/801180708/1907
WLUK's spokesman says LIN TV expects retransmission agreements with all of its stations by "mid-year." They didn't say WHICH year, though. We've been hearing that kind of rhetoric every few months for the last few years now. Those of us around the area who have been watching this situation have pretty much given up hope a deal will be made. Green Bay got HD locals on DirecTV in November 2006, and WLUK was the only holdout. Since that time, we've heard "any day now" or very soon" every few months, but yet no deal has been struck. WLUK's GM has even told viewers who called him on the situation that they really don't care about making a deal with cable since they're going after satellite. They've supposedly struck a deal with AT&T for U-Verse, but the last we heard, it won't be in the Green Bay area until November 2008 at the earliest.
Meanwhile, WLUK pimps antennas like they're making commission on every unit sold. It's really a shame.
LIN TV will not let Time Warner Cable in Dayton, OH have WDTN (NBC) HD Feed as well... Does LIN have beef with cable and satellite?!
I'm hoping that the sudden surge of bad publicity helps speed things up. I know the chances are really low that WLUK will be on cable before this Sunday but there's still that little thing called the Super Bowl that we all want to see in HD.
I agree with Brian L's comment. Please contact Jay Zollar (jzollar@wluk.com) and complain, even if you aren't in the broadcast area. This greed really needs to stop.
http://www.dstanich.com/2008/01/wluk-green-bay-why-they-are-wrong.php
Just wanted to say for those in the LaCrosse area it sounds like Fox may have the Superbowl in HD. Here's an article with the details.
http://www.lacrossetribune.com/articles/2008/01/18/news/00lead.txt
This problem also persists in East Central Wisconsin where Charter Communications does not have an agreement with Fox 11. I receive NBC, CBS, and ABC in HD, but no Fox.
I emailed Jay a few days ago (see letter below) and basically he expects the consumers to have to purchase an antenna to receive HD services. This won't work unless you are very close to the Green Bay market, but I am almost an hour and a half south. Also, I would have to rewire my cable, and I would not receive the benefit of the DVR services I receive from the cable company.
Fox 11 already has HD services, so they are already covering the costs, but yet he wants to hold out for 2 cents per household per day. I would love to see how many households there are in Green Bay, Appleton, Oshkosh, Fond du Lac, Sheboygan, Manitowoc, and everywhere in between. I am betting this measly two cents would amount to several million dollars per year.
Letter from Fox 11:
I appreciate your frustration in not picking up FOX 11 in high definition on either cable or satellite. We are eager to get an arrangement done with all of them, however we are not going to provide our digital content to 3rd party distributors for absolutely nothing. It costs us hundreds of thousands of dollars each year to provide the quality digital and HD programming that consumers want and we will not let the cable and satellite providers have our content and package it and resell it to you. We are asking for less than 2 cents a day from each digital household and they refuse to discuss it.
I personally just purchased my first HD set with a built in tuner (all newer models have a tuner built in. See if you have a built in digital tuner). I found an old indoor antenna that I purchased at a local electronics store and screwed it into the back of the set. I switched the TV from cable to antenna and turned on Ch 51. There we were! FOX 11 in beautiful HD over the air! You might be able to do the same thing very easily just like me. My antenna was on the floor in the basement and the signal came in great.
In the meantime, we have formed an arrangement with Suess TV and Electronics in Appleton. They have agreed to work with us and with you on finding effective and efficient ways to receive our HD signal over the air. It may be easier and less expensive than you think and the picture even more beautiful. I suggest you contact them at hdhelp@suesselectronics.com Lastly, here is a link that can very nicely explain the transition to digital that we as a society are going through.
http://www.myfoxnewisconsin.com/myfox/pages/ContentDetail?contentId=3854041
Take care.
________________________
Have a Great Day!
Jay T. Zollar
Vice President/General Manager
WLUK-TV FOX 11
920-494-8711
jzollar@wluk.com
fox11online.com
Your Station for Balanced News
and Severe Weather Coverage
Football in SD! Say it isnt so!!
LIN has also held our local NBC station HD feed hostage here in Austin, TX from being rebroadcast in HD over DirecTV. All we get is a crappy SD signal that's barely worth watching. LIN was also responsible for getting their locals kicked off of Georgetown/Pflugerville/etc. ('burbs surrounding Austin that aren't TWC based) cable systems for exactly the same reasoning as is happening in Green Bay. To counter the loss, those towns all get the feed from Temple/Waco instead of from their local stations. What a load of crap that is!!!
LIN is probably the worst affiliate owner in the country but at least they screw all their affiliates equally!
There seems to be a lot of frustration towards LIN/all independent tv station owners in mid to small markets that are faced with the retransmission problem that could be better directed at your cable/satellite company.
The big cable/satellite companies pay the major market tv stations to rebroadcast their digital signals and they pay for packaged deals with corporations who own many tv stations around the same that LIN seems to be asking for. I don't think that it is unfair for LIN to ask for the same/similar deal. You should find out who owns the other stations that are carried before claiming that LIN is asking for special treatment.
Second, don't complain about not being able to use your DVR for the OTA signals. Directv offers a receiver that can accept and record HD OTA transmissions, as do third parties for cable (Tivo). You have a choice. If you're trying to be cheap about HD, you get no sympathy from me, especially since your problems are caused by you and the cable company being cheap.
Third, if you live too far away from the station to get a good digital signal, you should think of the HD local channel as you would any other cable channel. The cable companies pay ESPN and other major cable companies in the range of 5-8 cents a day to broadcast the signal. If the cable company wants the big 4 broadcast stations, they really should pay at least 2 cents a day to rebroadcast. As someone said earlier, this would amount to millions of dollars a year that will hopefully be poured back into the community in the form of increased news budgets and/or better technology for a better signal.
If the cable/satellite company is charging you for local HD channels, then it's pretty clear that they are making money off of a "free" product. Again, maybe you should direct more of your frustration towards them.
"If the cable/satellite company is charging you for local HD channels, then it's pretty clear that they are making money off of a "free" product. Again, maybe you should direct more of your frustration towards them."
Cable companies can't charge extra for HD locals. The FCC requires them to be unscrambled and are available with basic cable for anyone with a QAM tuner.
I'll be at the game! =D
Flight leaves tomorrow morning, here I come cold!
That's crazy. It makes it look like a must provide / must carry system should be mandatory, and that no additional fees change hands between parties, be it TV cable/sat subscribers.
The TV station benefits by the extra reach where a TV signal can't bounce or the signal is weakened by local skyline or geography. If it weren't for the cable service, the TV station wouldn't be able to secure as much ad revenue. If anything, it looks like the TV station should pay for the better reach they get.
The other stations don't charge. So sounds like because they have the NFL they can get Time Warner to pay.
I'm glad we don't have that problem down here in NC. HD within a few years will be the norm.
I'm so disgusted with this greedy power play on the part of Fox and WLUK that I'm simply going to boycott that network and I advise others to do so.
Broadcasting their signal in HD across a wider audience clearly increases viewers/ad revenue so I don't begin to buy the argument by these tyrants that they will "lose money" if they don't charge a surcharge to watch HD programming.
Come to think of it corporate America is completely out of control. I pay almost $150 a month for DircTV to watch (most of it) commercial TV. It's ridiculous that we were scammed into paying for television twice and now WLUK and Fox want for us to pay for it three times to watch in HD. Nothing on Fox is worth this price and especially considering their "news" is really just a partisan info-tainment commercial for neoconservatives and ole' Rupert. Enough is enough... until they offer HD over my satellite I'm not watching it.