[GreenKeys] Shouting the weather

Robert Nickels ranickels at gmail.com
Tue Aug 29 11:41:26 EDT 2023


AP and UPI newswire teletype services are mentioned often but many radio 
and television stations and newspapers had the "weather wire" teletype 
machine sitting alongside.   While the news services also carried 
weather information,  many stations felt it was worth the extra expense 
to get the weather straight from the source, and in real time.    Of 
course, showing off a separate machine dedicated to weather info was a 
good bragging point when it came to impressing potential advertisers in 
farm country.

I knew the mechanical TTYs had been replaced at some point by modern 
technology, but having been away from that world for decades I was 
surprised to learn that it took til 2016 for the weather service to 
finally start using lower case, which by then was interpreted as yelling!

https://vlab.noaa.gov/web/nws-heritage/-/stop-shouting-the-forecast

One thing I can say for sure from working part-time at radio stations 
during my college years is that the ALL CAPS format along with the 
yellow paper we kept the weather wire stocked with made life a bit 
easier for us "rip and readers"...

73, Bob W9RAN



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