computer science

WCTV

WCTV is a computer science topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand WCTV rather than just read about it. In short: WCTV (channel 6) is a television station licensed to Thomasville, Georgia, United States, serving as the CBS affiliate for the Tallahassee, Florida, market. It is owned by Gray Media alongside Live Oak, Florida–licensed WFXU (channel 57), an independent station with MyNetworkTV.

Key takeaways

WCTV belongs to computer science; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect WCTV to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of WCTV from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

WCTV (channel 6) is a television station licensed to Thomasville, Georgia, United States, serving as the CBS affiliate for the Tallahassee, Florida, market. It is owned by Gray Media alongside Live Oak, Florida–licensed WFXU (channel 57), an independent station with MyNetworkTV. The two stations share studios on Halstead Boulevard in Tallahassee (along I-10); WCTV's transmitter is located in unincorporated Thomas County, Georgia, southeast of Metcalf, along the Florida state line.

History WCTV was Tallahassee and southwest Georgia's first television station. On October 13, 1954, the Tallahassee Democrat first reported on plans for the new station. On August 29, 1955, the station began airing a test pattern. It signed on for the first time on September 15, 1955, from studios on North Monroe Street in Tallahassee. WCTV was originally owned by John H. Phipps. Although it has always considered itself a Tallahassee station, it was licensed to Thomasville because the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) had allocated only one VHF channel to Tallahassee, channel 11. Florida State University had managed to have the FCC reserve channel 11 for noncommercial use so it could put WFSU-TV on the air. UHF was not considered viable at the time. Until the 1964 FCC requirement that all new sets have all-channel capability, UHF stations were unviewable without a converter, and even with one, the picture quality was marginal at best. Additionally, the FCC had just collapsed a large portion of southwest Georgia into the Tallahassee market, and UHF stations have never carried well across large areas. Hoyt Wimpy, owner and founder of WPAX radio in Thomasville, persuaded the FCC to grant the Phipps family a license for channel 6 in Thomasville, the nearest city to Tallahassee that had a VHF allocation available. This could provide city-grade coverage of Tallahassee and north central Florida as well as southwestern Georgia. By this time, the FCC had changed its regulations to allow a station to operate its main studio outside its city of license. As a result, WCTV has been a Tallahassee station from the very beginning. However, it has always identified as serving "Thomasville–Tallahassee", and has operated a live studio, news bureau and advertising sales office in Thomasville for many years. The station originally carried programming from all three networks, but was a primarily an NBC affiliate. This resulted in duplication with WALB-TV in nearby Albany, Georgia, which was also a primary NBC affiliate; any time either station wanted to carry a CBS program, both stations had to agree to it. As a result, WCTV was forced to air some CBS programs on as much as a two-week delay, while some shows, including popular ones like I Love Lucy, were not seen at all. To resolve this issue, WCTV switched its primary affiliation to CBS on September 20, 1959; however, it continued to carry a secondary ABC affiliation while airing some NBC shows on a per-program basis. It was still the only commercial VHF station in the market (the only other VHF stations were PBS members WFSU-TV on channel 11, and Georgia Public Broadcasting's WXGA-TV on channel 8). It was the only commercial station in the area until WECA-TV (channel 27, now WTXL-TV) began operations in 1976 and took the ABC affiliation. The Phipps family sold channel 6 to Gray Communications, now Gray Television, in 1996. Gray's purchase of WCTV forced the company to sell WALB, its flagship station in Albany, because WALB's signal has city-grade quality in most of the Georgia side of the market (including Thomasville and Valdosta). WALB had served as one of the default NBC affiliates for Tallahassee for many years until WTWC-TV (channel 40) signed on in April 1983. In 2004, Gray purchased WSWG in Valdosta, a UPN affiliate for the Albany market. The station joined CBS in 2005 as a semi-satellite of WCTV (see below). The acquisition created a strong combined signal with just under 50% overlap. WCTV had been the default CBS affiliate for Albany for many years. In March 2006, WCTV moved from its longtime studios on County Road 12 in northern Leon County (approximately midway between Tallahassee and Thomasville) to new facilities on Halstead Boulevard in Tallahassee. The location formerly housed the now-defunct Florida's News Channel, a cable-only operation. On February 17, 2009, WCTV shut off its analog signal on channel 6, and became digital-exclusive on UHF channel 46. On June 25, 2018, Gray Television announced that it would acquire Raycom Media, who had owned ABC affiliate WTXL-TV since 2017. Because the FCC prohibits a direct duopoly between two of the top four stations in the same market, Gray opted to retain ownership of WCTV and sell WTXL to a third party. On August 20, 2018, Gray announced that they would sell both WTXL-TV and KXXV (along with semi-satellite KRHD-CD in Bryan) to the E. W. Scripps Company for $55 million. The deal was completed on January 2, 2019.

Former semi-satellite From 2005 until 2019, WSWG operated as a semi-satellite of WCTV. As such, that station cleared all network programming as provided through its parent and simulcast most of WCTV's local newscasts (see below), but aired a separate offering of syndicated programming; there were also separate station identifications and commercial inserts. Although master control and most internal operations of WSWG were based within WCTV's facilities, that outlet does currently maintains offices on Pine Avenue in Albany; it previously maintained a news bureau and advertising sales office on 2nd Avenue Southwest in Moultrie, Georgia. Even though WSWG technically serves as the CBS affiliate for the Albany market, its over-the-air broadcasting radius falls just short of Albany proper. This forces the station to rely on cable and satellite for most of its viewership. However, WCTV's more powerful digital signal reaches into Albany. Despite WSWG once being a semi-satellite of WCTV, it operates two digital subchannels (serving as the MyNetworkTV/MeTV and CW affiliates for the Albany market) that are programmed separately. With the sale of WSWG to Marquee Broadcasting (enabling Gray to re-acquire WALB as part of its buyout of Raycom Media), that arrangement was formally broken in April 2019 after a transitional period.

News operation

… excerpt ends here. Continue reading the full article.

Illustrations

Logo for WCTV-DT2

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with WCTV

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what WCTV claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In computer science, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to WCTV before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about WCTV ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of WCTV

In research: WCTV appears in computer science research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses WCTV in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: WCTV is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1955 establishments in Georgia (U.S. state), CBS affiliates, Gray Media, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for WCTV outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study WCTV in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what WCTV means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain WCTV out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is WCTV in simple terms?

Why does WCTV matter?

Because it connects several computer science ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study WCTV?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on WCTV.