Tuesday, August 7, 2007

Looking For News From Home

The Time Warner empire now fully extends from the suburbs of Canton, past the Pro Football Hall of Fame, through Akron and the Inventors Hall of Fame, to the lakefront and the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Why can't northeast Ohio's dominant cable TV system work it out so Summit County residents can watch the local news?

It's not as though we don't have plenty of choices; Fox 8, NewsChannel 5, Channel 3, 19 Action News, CBS, NBC, ABC, both PBS stations, enough cable news to choke a horse, even the TV Guide Channel -- but still no Akron/Canton News.

How long does it take to flip a switch?

Up here, way to the north of Akron (almost as far north as you can go and still be in the county) in Sagamore Hills Township, we have cable channel 23 for Northfield Center and Sagamore Hills Townships (usually text messages and ads with radio playing in the background) and occasionally government meetings. Every once in a while we're graced with a local high school game or drama production. Macedonia, Twinsburg and Aurora all have their own channels, too, a virtual cornucopia of the workings of local government.

But no space to put their own partnership product online?

I know such things are very complicated, but given the advanced state of Time Warner's digital infrastructure and the ability to provide video on demand (VOD) services it is hard to figure out why the Time Warner Akron/Canton News isn't available to all Time Warner customers, at the very least in Summit County.

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