Template talk:American broadcast television (English)

What to list here?
So since the proposal to delete the template was turned down we have some decisions to make. It was suggested that we move the defunct networks off of the template. It was also suggested that we remove the regional networks. So what is regional? The educational networks? The sports networks? Also how I understand it, this template is for Over The Air broadcasters. I'm trying to confirm if ALN is broadcast OTA. Someone just added BET. Can anyone confirm if this is OTA or just on cable? CKStark (talk) 01:14, 1 October 2009 (UTC)

Can we establish a policy...
That if something is not a television network (television being primarily a visual medium), that regardless of whether it's occasionally broadcast using an ATSC subchannel, it shouldn't be listed here? Someone insists on repeatedly adding a list of religious radio stations on the grounds that some ATSC multiplexes carry the channels. Myself and others keep removing them, but obviously we're going to get into 3RR territory soon and it's going to be hard to prevent the template from looking ridiculous if we can't point at a consensus. 66.149.58.8 (talk) 14:05, 16 July 2009 (UTC)
 * Agree. Some stations have been commenced simulcasting co-owned, in-market terrestrial radio stations on audio-only subchannels. A current example: After the Houston PBS and NPR station mergers, KUHT has relayed KUHF HD Radio channels and subcarrier program on its subchannels. On the commercial TV side, Liberman Broadcasting relayed their Dallas radio stations on the KMPX subchannels for a few years. I would not list the terrestrial radio (and Franken-FM) stations on this template; keep them in their local radio templates. But the community might have to revisit the issue if audio-only Diginets start appearing across the U.S. SirChan (talk) 18:23, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Please don't respond to eight year-old topics. That IP is long gone and probably hasn't checked this page since August 2009.  Nate  • ( chatter ) 23:27, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

The "Other" Section
The "Other" section is becoming large and unwieldy. It might be time to overhaul the list. I tried to add more categories, but another user complained about the template becoming too large. Sorting by ownership group is one way to reduce the size of the "Other" list. SirChan (talk) 04:47, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
 * Oppose As I've argued before, we don't like to group by company because it's WP:PROMO against certain companies (and nobody outside the industry knows about Tribune and Weigel, and virtually no one knows Luken; they just see the networks the company brands as), and the template has no space restrictions on names. Nobody calls it just 'CW' alone. You've had three editors revert you on this, so at this point you need to build a consensus before you make further changes; until then the template should remain unchanged.  Nate  • ( chatter ) 05:01, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
 * These categories are too subjective and vague and prone to misclassification and arbitrary decisions. What does Major mean? Most people would definitely say Big 4, but The CW is there. What does Minor mean? Ion and MyNetworkTV have major national coverage on full-power stations, but what is AMG and Youtoo America doing there? Should they not be listed under Specialty instead? But that is a Fossilized category that should be renamed Diginets. Many Diginets do not fit in a neat "box", but cross-over into a few categories. Instead, I proposed and implemented something more objective and smaller with sorting by ownership/distributor. Mrschimpf presumptuously conflated their personal preferences (prefixed by the royal "We") with the comment: "We know networks by genre, not parent company." Nate's WP:PROMO argument would also invalidate many templates related to commercial broadcasting with the networks, affiliates, DMAs, etc. Despite concerns of "commercialization" (Ironically, the topic is about Commercial Television!) and (Dumb) consumer-orientism, sorting by distributor is also useful to the Public Interest in light of the current concerns stemming from Media Consolidation and "Fake News"/propaganda and presents this information in a transparent manner. If your opposition stems from an agenda that might be compromised with this transparency, it might be wise to disclose now! Does anybody else have another solution besides the status-quo/atrophy? SirChan (talk) 16:28, 21 November 2017 (UTC)


 * The template is fine as it is. It's not broken, so let's not screw with it. Making impassioned please with italics and boldface doesn't change that. Might be time to leave this alone and find other areas to edit in. oknazevad (talk) 16:38, 21 November 2017 (UTC)
 * I understand where you're coming from--it's natural for Humans to be averse to change. I noticed an improvement in clarity and size if listed by ownership/distributor. I wanted to share my observation that the diginets share a common thread through ownership rather than by genre. I only posted the overhauled version so everyone can see what this concept looks like. After the reversions, I even made modest improvements on the status quo with better labeling. (I suspect my modest edits are being reverted, which would have usually been accepted, due to ad hominem retaliation in this debate.) But the opposition's reasons center on keeping the status-quo (very flimsy reason due to the nature of Wikipedia) and fixation on not overcoming the psychological/marketing trick of branding (but ironically complain about WP:Promo). SirChan (talk) 18:04, 21 November 2017 (UTC)

Some housekeeping
My Network TV isn't even considered a network anymore - it's a programming service. Ion is not a major network - it just carries reruns like the 97 other diginets out there Vjmlhds (talk) 18:54, 1 January 2024 (UTC)