television station
A television station is a set of equipment managed by a business, organisation or other entity, such as an amateur television (ATV) operator, that transmits video content and audio content via radio waves directly from a transmitter on the eart ...
licensed to
Princeton, New Jersey
Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...
, United States, serving the
Philadelphia
Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the List of municipalities in Pennsylvania#Municipalities, largest city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the List of United States cities by population, sixth-largest city i ...
area with programming from
ShopHQ
ShopHQ (formerly ValueVision, ShopNBC, Evine Live, and Evine) is an American cable, satellite and broadcast home shopping television network and multi-channel video retailer owned by iMedia Brands Inc., in which Comcast holds a 12.5% stake in th ...
Willow Grove, Pennsylvania
Willow Grove is a census-designated place (CDP) in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, United States. A community in Philadelphia's northern suburbs, the population was 15,726 at the 2010 census. It is located in Upper Dublin Township, Abington To ...
–licensed
independent
Independent or Independents may refer to:
Arts, entertainment, and media Artist groups
* Independents (artist group), a group of modernist painters based in the New Hope, Pennsylvania, area of the United States during the early 1930s
* Independ ...
Trenton, New Jersey
Trenton is the capital city of the U.S. state of New Jersey and the county seat of Mercer County. It was the capital of the United States from November 1 to December 24, 1784.Class A station WPHY-CD (channel 25). WMCN-TV's studios are located on Dobbs Lane in Cherry Hill, New Jersey. Through a channel sharing agreement with
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...
member station
WHYY-TV
WHYY-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Wilmington, Delaware, United States, serving as the primary PBS member station for the Philadelphia area. It is owned by WHYY, Inc., alongside NPR member station WHYY-FM 90.9. WHYY-TV a ...
(channel 12), WMCN-TV transmits using WHYY-TV's spectrum from an antenna in the
Roxborough Roxborough may refer to:
Places
* Roxborough, Manchester, Jamaica
* Roxborough, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, US, a neighborhood
* Roxborough, Trinidad and Tobago, Tobago Island, Republic of Trinidad and Tobago
* Roxborough Castle, Ireland
* Roxborou ...
section of Philadelphia.
History
The station first signed on the air on May 29, 1981 as WWAC-TV, originally licensed to Atlantic City, New Jersey and broadcasting on UHF channel 53. The station changed its callsign to WMCN-TV in 2003. In 2009, the station was rebranded as "Get It On TV Philadelphia" to reflect its focus on the entire Philadelphia market, not just Atlantic City. Most of the station's programming consisted of infomercials, many of which were produced by WMCN for local companies. The remainder of WMCN's schedule was filled with several hours per week of regional faith-based telecasts as well as
children's
A child ( : children) is a human being between the stages of birth and puberty, or between the developmental period of infancy and puberty. The legal definition of ''child'' generally refers to a minor, otherwise known as a person young ...
and community interest programming.
In 2011, WMCN obtained rights to broadcast games from the
Arena Football League
The Arena Football League (AFL) was a professional arena football league in the United States. It was founded in 1986, but played its first official games in the 1987 season, making it the third longest-running professional football league in ...
's
Philadelphia Soul
Philadelphia soul, sometimes called Philly soul, the Philadelphia sound, Phillysound, or The Sound of Philadelphia TSOP, is a genre of late 1960s–1970s soul music characterized by funk influences and lush instrumental arrangements, often featu ...
, broadcasting a majority of their regular season games on the station.
In 2012, the station was once again rebranded as "WMCN44," signaling a shift towards a more traditional independent station. WMCN also added several syndicated programs to its schedule, including ''
Cold Case Files
''Cold Case Files'' is a reality legal show/ documentary on the cable channel A&E Network and the rebooted series on Netflix. It is hosted by Bill Kurtis and the original series produced by Tom Golden. The show documents the investigation o ...
Punk'd
''Punk'd'' is an American hidden camera– practical joke reality television series that first aired on MTV in 2003. It was created by Ashton Kutcher and Jason Goldberg, with Kutcher serving as producer and host. It bears a resemblance to both t ...
''. On September 10 of that year, WMCN announced that it would produce three new original weekly series: ''A New View'', an issues-oriented show hosted by former
WTXF-TV
WTXF-TV (channel 29) is a television station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, airing programming from the Fox network. Owned and operated by the network's Fox Television Stations division, the station maintains studios on Mark ...
(channel 29) personality Dawn Stensland, ''Tolly's Awesome Friends'', a series centered on noteworthy locals hosted by ex-WTXF sports director Don Tollefson, and ''Philly Sports Spotlight'', a locally focused series hosted by former
WPVI-TV
WPVI-TV (channel 6), branded on-air as 6 ABC, is a television station in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States, airing programming from the ABC network. Owned and operated by the network's ABC Owned Television Stations division, the stati ...
(channel 6) sports anchor Phil Andrews.
On December 4, 2014, voluntary assignment of the station's license was changed from Lenfest Broadcasting, LLC to WMCN License Holdings, LLC, which will have exactly the same ownership structure as Lenfest.
In the fall of 2016, WMCN added programming from
Newsmax TV
Newsmax TV is an American conservative television channel owned by Newsmax. The network primarily focuses on opinion-based talk shows. It carries a news/talk format throughout the day and night, with documentaries and films on weekends. During ...
during the 4–6 p.m. and 8–9 p.m. hours, as well as nightly broadcasts of the Cowtown Rodeo and motorsports newsmagazine ''Raceline TV'', plus the weekly ''
Ring of Honor Wrestling
''Ring of Honor Wrestling'', often shortened as ''ROH Wrestling TV'' or ''ROH TV'', is an American professional wrestling television series produced by Ring of Honor (ROH). The series featured professional wrestlers competing in matches and condu ...
'' series.
In the
Federal Communications Commission
The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) is an independent agency of the United States federal government that regulates communications by radio, television, wire, satellite, and cable across the United States. The FCC maintains jurisdicti ...
(FCC)'s incentive auction, WMCN-TV sold its spectrum for $63,144,027 and indicated that it would enter into a post-auction channel sharing agreement. On July 14, 2017, NRJ TV, owner of WPHY-CD, agreed to purchase WMCN for $6 million; on July 24, 2017, it assigned its right to acquire the station to WRNN-TV Associates in a deal not filed with the FCC until December. On February 14, 2018, WMCN entered into a channel sharing agreement with
PBS
The Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) is an American public broadcaster and non-commercial, free-to-air television network based in Arlington, Virginia. PBS is a publicly funded nonprofit organization and the most prominent provider of educat ...
WHYY-TV
WHYY-TV (channel 12) is a television station licensed to Wilmington, Delaware, United States, serving as the primary PBS member station for the Philadelphia area. It is owned by WHYY, Inc., alongside NPR member station WHYY-FM 90.9. WHYY-TV a ...
(channel 12); as the WHYY-TV signal does not reach Atlantic City, WMCN has changed its city of license to
Princeton, New Jersey
Princeton is a municipality with a borough form of government in Mercer County, in the U.S. state of New Jersey. It was established on January 1, 2013, through the consolidation of the Borough of Princeton and Princeton Township, both of whi ...
.
As a result of the 2017 RNN acquisition, WMCN began simulcasting the programming of its parent company's primary station, New York-based WRNN, thus extending its coverage into the Delaware Valley.
On May 20, 2021, RNN and iMedia Brands announced an agreement to affiliate most of RNN's television stations (including WMCN) with
home shopping Home shopping is the electronic retailing and home shopping channels industry, which includes such billion dollar television-based and e-commerce companies as Shop LC, HSN, Gemporia, TJC, QVC, eBay, ShopHQ, Buy.com and Amazon.com, as well as ...
network
ShopHQ
ShopHQ (formerly ValueVision, ShopNBC, Evine Live, and Evine) is an American cable, satellite and broadcast home shopping television network and multi-channel video retailer owned by iMedia Brands Inc., in which Comcast holds a 12.5% stake in th ...
. WMCN began carrying ShopHQ programming on June 28, 2021.
Technical information
Subchannels
The station's digital signal is
multiplexed
In telecommunications and computer networking, multiplexing (sometimes contracted to muxing) is a method by which multiple analog or digital signals are combined into one signal over a shared medium. The aim is to share a scarce resource - a ...
:
On August 22, 2011, WMCN announced that it would carry Bounce TV on digital subchannel 44.2 starting on September 26, 2011.
On December 15, 2014, WMCN-TV lost its affiliation with Bounce TV; sub-channel 44.2 was temporarily replaced with SMPTE color bars. Just over two weeks later, on
December 31
It is known by a collection of names including: Saint Sylvester's Day, New Year's Eve or Old Years Day/Night, as the following day is New Year's Day. It is the last day of the year; the following day is January 1, the first day of the following ...
,
Soul of the South Network
Soul of the South Television (sometimes referred to as SSN TV) is an African-American-focused regional broadcast network owned by SSN Media Group, LP. It primarily broadcasts in the Southern United States and secondarily in other high African-Ame ...
took over the frequency.
Analog-to-digital conversion
WMCN discontinued regular programming on its analog signal, over UHF channel 53, in October 2002. The station's digital signal began operating on UHF channel 44, instead of its former UHF analog channel 53, which was among the high band UHF channels (52-69) that were removed from broadcasting use as a result of the digital television transition in 2009. WMCN was the first television station in the United States to receive permission from the FCC to discontinue its analog signal. The move to digital channel 44 was intended to provide better signal coverage of the Philadelphia market from a new transmitter location which would qualify for
must-carry
In cable television, governments apply a must-carry regulation stating that locally licensed television stations must be carried on a cable provider's system.
North America Canada
Under current CRTC regulations, the lowest tier of service on ...
status on
cable television
Cable television is a system of delivering television programming to consumers via radio frequency (RF) signals transmitted through coaxial cables, or in more recent systems, light pulses through fibre-optic cables. This contrasts with bro ...