Lost the Travel Channel
 

Just as they are showing actual travel programming and less poker, Time Warner has seen fit to take away the Travel Channel and replace it with Noggin or something like that. Apparently the Travel Channel is owned by Time Warner competitor COX so perhaps that figures into it. I'm not pleased.

And you called them and told them, right?

Hi
Have you thought of getting satellite instead of cable?

Okay, stupid question, but what's the difference between satellite and cable?

I have cable and I'm still getting the Travel Channel.

I couldn't survive without Anthony Bourdain.

I have not let them know how I feel. Maybe, maybe not. I am sure they knew exactly what they were doing by attempting to put a knife in their competition. I'm not a fan of dish but haven't ever had it. I've just heard how the weather this and the weather that and so on and so on. And I want cable Internet as my experience with DSL is not all that impressive.

I rarely watch the Travel Station since they take a pedestrian approach to pedestrian places. They are rarely make concessions to the experienced traveller.

The difference between satellite & cable?

In short the former utilizes, no kidding, a satellite in space to beam TV signals to your house. The latter requires a, guess what, cable, that runs either above or below ground from the street to your house.

In the US there are 2 primary satellite TV companies, DirecTV and DishNetwork. One can subscribe to either, or both.

In any one geographic location there tends to be a single cable TV provider. The biggies are TimeWarner and Comcast, with numerous other regional companies likely to be gobbled up over time).

Many teleco's also offer TV service. AT&T and Verizon are both rolling out fiberoptic cable in many areas.

Both satellite and cable offer similar (but not exact) programming options, package bundles, pricing etc.

Whether one is better than the other is always open to debate.

I got tired of constant cable outages and finally had satellite installed about 6 weeks ago. I couldn't be happier. Especially with the "TIVO" thingy! The only problem is that I'm spending too much time watching TV, and recording movies!

Golly, Auduchamp1! Do I detect superciliousness? Or are you trolling?

I, too, have traveled extensively to the kind of pedestrian places featured on the travel channel (Paris, Florence, Rome, Istanbul etc.) I suppose watching the show makes me pedestrian, too.

If this was a troll, Auduchamp1, you got me!

It used to be that satellite TV didn't provide you with your local news stations. Is that still true?

Satelite TV does provide local stations. But it does not provide the "public access" stations which are funded by the cable system which has a monopoly granted by local government.

We switched over to satelite a couple of years ago. It has much better image quality and has a half dozen free movie channels, on one of which I first saw "French Kiss," and saw it a dozen or more times later. The western and mystery channels also have some classics.

The only drawback to satelite is that when a strong storm comes in from the west it blocks the signal. This may last 10 minutes or a half hour, and happens a few times a year.

This concerns me, as I also have Time Warner. If they remove the Travel Channel we will definitely get sattellite. We've been thinking about dumping Time Warner anyway.

St. Cirq, keep your little mitts off Tony Bourdain, he's MINE!! X(

;-)

Fox News is on satellite, but not on cable. I'm so happy to get decent news now that I don't have to rely any longer on the german stations and CNN. Thank you FOX for the unbiased info. Thanks for the O'Reilly factor, finally real news! :D. I missed that so much.

Tony has advertisments in many magzines, he's not leaving us

Ha ha- I assume that the comment about Fox News being unbiased is a joke... right?

I certainly hope TimeWarner isn't taking away the Travel Channel everywhere... they just took away HBO from those of us in my area without digital cable boxes... nice.

I wish that the satellite dish offered better service in our area... they have special packages with Russian channels! I would love that.

%%-

Pedestrian? Hmmmm...I thought after 30 years of traveling abroad at least twice a year I was a fairly experience traveler, but I haven't done half the stuff that Anthony Bourdain and Andrew Zimmern and even Samantha Brown have done....I bow down to Aduchamp1, who is obviously WAY more sophisticated than I am.

And P_M, eat your heart out. My SO looks a LOT like Tony and I get to travel and eat with him in real life - yay! Not that that keeps me from tuning in to Tony every possible minute, to which SO says "what do you see in that guy?" Ummm.....you, maybe?

> joke
I want more high speed chases, the last one was boring and it wasn't even live, but delayed for a few seconds. And it wasn't high speed, but very very! low speed Somewhere in LA, how boring, we need real life action from the US over here in Europe :D.

Geez St. Cirq, you and I have a lot more in common than I thought. We both love Tony but we don't love the Bahamas.

But I could love the Bahamas if Tony invited me to join him there. :-d

Oh GOD, PM, I'd join Tony in the Bahamas in a New York minute!

I'd travel halfway around the world to share worms with him, actually (unfortunately there's no emoticon with worms...);)

I'd even use the Turkish toilet at Robert & Louise, one of his favorite restaurants.

logos999,

The slow speed "chase" in LA was a joke for sure. Have you seen "Do Not Disturb" with William Hurt racing through the streets of Amsterdam. Good action and background.

It looked so real and it was on Fox, you think everything on Fox is fake? Nah, that was a real report. :-) Took about 30 min.
Didn't see "Do not disturb". Should I rent the DVD?

Maybe we are talking about different LA chases. There is only one "slow chase" that I am aware of. Citizens were standing on overpasses cheering for the criminal as if he was running for a touchdown.

If you like Amsterdam rent it. You'll like the scenery.

>Citizens were standing on overpasses cheering for the criminal as if he was running for a touchdown
That was it :-)

Time Warner took away the Travel Channel in my area about a year ago. I called and complained. I doubt they care. When they took over Adelphia they said nothing would change. They also took away the Home Shopping Network. I want to keep cable, but Time Warner has a monopoly here.

Jonespacelink was bought by Adelphia and Adelphia was bought by Time Warner. I hope someone comes along and buys out Time Warner.

To top it off, they've called me a few times trying to get me to switch to their internet service. I give them a piece of my mind every time.

luvtotravel, I'm also in a former Adelphia area so perhaps that is the common thread.

I am obviously looking at the TC at the wrong times; all I ever see showing is haunted places, poker or Las Vegas. Boring, so I never watch them, ciao TC.

Clea

I am not a troll. I love to travel and whenever I turned it on the 10 Best roller coasters, 10 best this or that, reducing the world to a list. I guess I missed the show on Istanbul. I just found the Station disappointing.

Aduchamps1: I would postulate that the last time you tuned into the Travel Channel was about 2 years ago, when it was much as you have described. It has totally refocused itself on (mostly) travel, and NOT to pedestrian places.

I suggest you check it out before you continue with the blanket condemnations. It may not be your cup of tea, but it's been a long time since it's been all about theme parks and poker.

Have Directv installed...they'll do it for free, in up to 4 or 5 rooms. It's head & shoulders above cable, both in quality and programming.

Local channels are now available in most markets, and that includes Public TV stations.

Storm outages are rare and very brief...usually only a few seconds. And it has to be a killer storm to even affect it. If you're having longer outages, your dish isn't pointed properly.

I've had my satellite for about 2 months, and haven't had any outages - maybe once for about 5 minutes. And I live in Miami where we have rain and/or storms most summer afternoons.

Comcast took over from Adelphia and gets constant complaints. What FINALLY got me to switch to satellite was when they switched HBO to a higher channel which required the box. I repeat, satellite is terrific.

> rain and/or storms
Possible reasons for outages are.
- Misaligned (both the dish and the LNB at the dish have to be proplerly aligned
- Dish is to small for the area (A "footprint" with the needed sized is published by the satellite company.
- LNB (LNC) outdoor unit old (high noise level)
- trees (leaves) or other obstacles in the line of sight
- Since most channels went "digital", misalignments due to improper installation are harder to spot for the customer, picture degradation isn't gradually anymore, but it's either on or off.
- Clouds weaken the signal this has to be compensated (bigger dish, better LNB)
- Sun transit outage in spring/autumn (You'll lose the signal for about half an hour twice a year when the sun is "behind" the satellite.
- ...