History
RabbitEars was created to replace 100000watts.com, a site started by Chip Kelley around 1998. Originally listing every TV station in the US, 100000watts expanded to include AM and FM radio information. Due to time constraints, Kelley sold the site to Clear Channel/M Street Publications in late 2002, [1] which made it subscription-only. In response, Trip Ericson developed RabbitEars as a free alternative. [2]
After the digital television transition started in 2008, RabbitEars began tracking digital subchannels, digital transition reports, and analog termination requests made to the FCC. These pages were attached to an incomplete design that Ericson had begun to implement in 2004, but that had never been finished due to lack of coding knowledge. As the transition-related pages in particular received attention, corrections were sent to add to and correct the incomplete data that was kept on the rest of the site, and a notice was posted asking for additional assistance. On March 14, 2008, Bruce Myers joined the effort by creating an updated website design, and on April 14, 2008, RabbitEars launched in its current form. [2] Because of these circumstances, while the web address was registered in 2004, the 2008 date is considered to be the beginning of the organization.
Data
RabbitEars maintains a spreadsheet of DTV channels that includes information about stations such as their locations, call signs, network affiliations, channel, ERP, HAAT, and more for full-service DTV stations. [2]
RabbitEars tracks stations that use descriptive video service, TVGOS, UpdateTV, mobile TV, Sezmi, and individual datacasts provided by local television stations in addition to providing lists of television station ownership, network affiliations, and some other miscellaneous information. It covered the digital television transition extensively, and maintains a history of the transition. Also provided is continuing documentation of stations requesting different channels, as well as stations having problems with VHF transmission.
At the end of October 2009, the site added listings for Qualcomm's MediaFLO service, which has since gone defunct. In December 2009, the site also added listings for high powered transmitters Echostar would be using to launch its own mobile video service. [3]
Rankings
The RabbitEars Area Designation System (READS) was created in 2008 to rank markets based on OTA signal coverage without using proprietary data from Nielsen Media Research. [4] [2] READS ranks are based solely on signal coverage and do not consider demographic data. Consequently, major Canadian markets like Toronto and Montreal are included but rank low, while other Canadian markets like Edmonton are excluded due to the lack of OTA American channels.
The READS list has been made available for use by anyone who wants to use them, with the only condition being that the ranks are not modified and still listed with the name "READS".
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