Although the government makes sure that brodacast network signals are free to the public, it never said everybody gets to see them.
America’s broadcast networks — ABC, CBS, NBC, Fox and CW, plus MyNetworkTV and Ion (formerly Pax) — rely on affiliates to transmit their signals across the country. And while the networks themselves own affiliates in some major markets, most of those affiliates are owned by other media companies, such as Raycom Media, which owns Wilmington’s NBC affiliate WECT and Fox affiliate WSFX.
It is up to those companies to determine the profitability of running an affiliate in a certain market. So if we have no CW affiliate, it means nobody so far has thought we could support one.
It’s actually not unusual for there to be local affiliates missing in certain regions. There wasn’t a CBS affiliate here from 1994 to March 2000, when WILM was launched by Capitol Broadcasting of Raleigh.
The reason Wilmington cable subscribers can see the CW is beacuse of CW Plus, a service in which small markets like ours can show The CW on digital subchannels of other network affiliates or on cable where there is no local affiliate.
For more on the local CW network go to http://www.yourcwwilmington.com.
* This post has been updated to reflect new information about the local CBS affiliate.
Date posted: September 25, 2009
User-contributed question by:
Henry Duncan
I wanted to correct you regarding a CBS affiliate in Wilmington. From Autumn of 1984 until 1994 when CBS lost the rights to broadcast NFL to Fox television, WJKA was Wilmington’s CBS affiliate broadcasting on UHF 26. It was powerful enough to be seen in New Hanover, Brunswick, and Pender counties. I remember this because as a kid we didn’t have cable and there was much excitement in our household that we would get to watch CBS for the first time in our house.