Very disappointing that only 6 hours per day will be devoted to RTN. Was that the original plan when RTV was announced last month? Seems kind of misleading to me. Was it an RTV decision or WSAH decision? Isn't Multicultural's RTN affiliate in Boston full time? I was really looking forward to catching some episodes of 'Emergency' but I guess that won't be happening.
As I said... if you have problems with the lineup, hit the contact links at Retro's website or contact them on Facebook. If you have trouble with the amount of time, get your feelings to me in some form of printed word (internet forum's do not count). I will gather them up and forward them on to my upper management. USPS mail is preferred, but email works too.
We are not seeing the return on investment in Boston that was promised. Some within the MTBL hierarchy wanted to kill the whole deal, but Sean managed to swing 6p to 12a. Some things need time, and we are hoping that Boston will pick up in the coming months. It's only been about a month and these things take time.
Ron -
I'm glad they didn't kill the whole deal for WSAH, 6 hours is better than nothing! It's kind of strange though, the people more likely to watch and enjoy these shows are the retirees home all day doing nothing. I'm surprised that wasn't considered in deciding the part-time schedule.
It's too bad about what's going on in Boston, but a few things come to mind. I wonder if WMFP has widespread carriage in eastern New England. I also wonder if it has a favorable or unfavorable position on the channel line-up. As a former GemsTV affiliate, I wouldn't be surprised if it's relegated between public access stations and other shopping channels, basically in a "no-man's zone" on cable the line-up that no one bothers to click through. And despite the weather around here lately, during spring and summer many people are outside and not watching a lot of TV. It's very silly (for corporate executives) to say that they're disappointed in the return on investment when it's only been a month or so that they've been carrying RTV in Boston. They need to at least give it a good 6 months to one year. It's not like WMFP has the visibility of a former FOX or ABC affiliate that was swtiched to RTV. Being a former shopping station is a handicap to begin with in and of itself. Anyway, these are just some of my thoughts. You've probably come to similar conclusions yourself.
As for WSAH, I had a good laugh last night. The Multicultural Broadcasting, Inc. station ID came up on the hour (as usual). But RTV also had a station ID for WSAH and it read
WSAH Bridgeport, NY. Now we all know what the folks in Fairfield County think about Bridgeport, but sending kicking Bridgeport out of Connecticut?
You might want to let RTV know it should be Bridgeport, CT/New York or something of that nature.
One last thing, were you aware that WSAH is carried on the
New York City DMA UVerse line-up, but not the
New Haven-Hartford line-up? So the folks in Fairfield County can get WSAH, but the rest of Connecticut cannot. So someone in Seymour, for example, couldn't get WSAH on UVerse even though that's where your transmitter is. It makes sense, but the strange thing is that I didn't think UVerse had to follow the same rules as other cable franchises since it's considered IPTV? Likewise, they seem pretty liberal with the broadcast stations they carry, since they give Hartford-New Haven stations like WNJN and WNJU out of New Jersey. I assume they didn't want to carry WSAH in the Hartford-New Haven market because they didn't have to, and it wasn't worth it. But now, it might be worth their (and your) while to carry them as a RTV affiliate. Has anyone at Multicultural thought about this? I can't tell you how many people I know who switched to UVerse, it's growing in popularity left and right. I think it'd be wise for someone to contact AT&T about getting WSAH on their Hartford-New Haven lineup ASAP. Touting the station as an RTV affiliate might help.
And has anyone called the local newspapers about writing an article on this new affiliation? There was a guy at the New Haven Register who had a column on TV/media news, but I'm not sure if he's there anymore. As one of the other posters wrote, I wouldn't know WSAH was going to be an RTV affiliate if not for this forum. There really wasn't too much publicity on it. Someone should contact the bigger newspapers in the area (Bridgeport, Danbury, Waterbury, New Haven, Meriden) about writing an article. And advertising, sometimes you need to spend a little to make a little. I've been spreading the news to people myself (hence I found out WSAH's omission from UVerse Hartford-New Haven).
Alright, I'm done now... I know you have little control over these things, and I respect your position, you have a fine line to walk here. But we're all rooting for the station! Hopefully you'll be a full-time affiliate soon. I'm going to send you/Multicultural and RTV a letter as soon as I get a chance.
