TV Worth Blogging
by David Thiel, Program Director for WILL-TV
An insider's view of public television programming and the issues that help determine what and how you watch
Update: Cable, Satellite and Program Guide Issues
Over the last few days, we have been deluged with calls and e-mails regarding a variety of problems related to cable, satellite and program guides. We've spent a great deal of time attempting to track down the underlying issues and to contact appropriate staff at these various services.
That’s been more difficult than you might think. One thing that I've learned is that cable companies make it very difficult to reach anyone in charge.
Expand this entry to find our where things stand...
Cable/satellite systems airing the wrong programming. On some services, our regular lineup was replaced by "PBS World." Apparently, these services were using WILL-TV's digital multicast channel 12.2 instead of our primary channel on 12.1 When we switched 12.2 over to PBS World last week, their customers began receiving the wrong program schedule. Here are the ones that we know about:
*** Dish - This was resolved last week. (Their on-screen guide is still wrong; more on that later in this post.)
*** New Wave Communications - Resolved yesterday.
*** Suddenlink - Not resolved. Suddenlink has been unwilling to provide us with phone numbers for any of their technical/management staff. Subscribers will need to call Suddenlink's customer support line and voice their complaint. Call (800) 255-8389.
In addition, Comcast viewers in Covington, Indiana reported that they were receiving WILL-TV 12.3 ("Create") instead of our primary channel. This was a technical gaffe on Comcast’s part, and unrelated to the carriage agreement that took off us the analog service in Bloomington. We believe that this issue has been resolved.
Program guides listing the wrong lineup. Some on-screen guides and newspaper listings are displaying WILL 12.2 ("PBS World") instead of our primary channel. To my knowledge, among those affected are Dish, Replay TV and TiVo, as well as many area papers.
It appears that all of these can be traced back to one of the companies which collect and distribute TV listings to cable, satellite and news services. I've contacted the company in question, and believe that they are addressing the issue. However, it will take some time for the corrections to propagate to end users.
In general, we want viewers to know that we are aware of the problems and doing all we can to resolve them. Unfortunately, none of these matters are under our direct control; all that we can do is call the appropriate parties and encourage them to take action.
Viewers may wish to take the initiative to directly contact their cable and satellite providers and report any ongoing problems.
If your cable/satellite provider is not one of those listed above, please contact us if you are seeing the wrong programming and/or on-screen guide. It's impossible for us to monitor the many services that carry our programming, and we depend upon your help.
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