Trib Total Media TV writer Rob Owen answers reader questions every Wednesday at TribLive.com in a column that also appears in the Saturday Tribune-Review.
Q: Whatever happened to Jessica Guay? She went out on maternity leave some time ago and has not returned. Any news?
— Dominic, via email
Rob: Guay posted about the January birth of her son, Mario, on social media earlier this year. My understanding is she’s expected to return to work at KDKA-TV in late May.
Q: I mostly watch WQED through my Fire TV Stick on the TV in my bedroom through the regular PBS app, not the Passport program. Last year, it suddenly thought my location was Detroit and gave me Detroit local programming. Just when I was getting used to that (and I mean weeks, not days), it decided I was in the Washington, D.C., metro area and I got Washington station WETA. The feed went back to WQED one day with no effort from me and has been fine.
I thought this was an Amazon thing — trying to get me to get Prime to make my Fire TV Stick be more beneficial, not a QED thing.
Last month, I wanted to watch the Thoreau program on my laptop in the living room, something I have done in the past without issue. I used the WQED site, yet it came up with not available in your area. I went into the bedroom and it played fine on the Fire TV Stick.
Could this be because my internet is cell-based? I tried Googling the problem last year and got no clues. I don’t know who to complain to — Amazon? T-Mobile? PBS? WQED?
I feel a little stupid asking this, but I thought it might be a nice change for you from questions about weather forecasters …
— Elina, McKeesport
Rob: This is a new one and I suspect it may well have to do with Elina’s cell-based internet.
“This sounds like an IP geolocation issue, which is fairly common, especially with cellular-based internet service,” explained WQED CEO Jason Jedlinski. “It’s frustrating, but it is not something PBS or WQED controls directly. Streaming providers rely on third-party vendors to assign locations to viewers’ IP addresses.
“If Elina’s internet connection is being mapped to different locations, that would explain why she sometimes sees a different station or is told a program is unavailable in her area. PBS offers an explanation on its website.
“The fact that the program plays on her Fire TV Stick but not in a browser on her laptop suggests the two devices may not be getting the same location result at the same time,” Jedlinski continued. “For viewers who are consistently assigned to the wrong designated market area, some support forums suggest submitting location corrections to third-party geolocation providers, such as MaxMind.
Recently PBS added a feature that allows viewers to confirm their location on a smartphone, tablet, laptop or other location-enabled device if their smart TV is picking up the wrong location, but it’s not yet available for Amazon Fire or Android TV.
“In addition to the PBS app and over-the-air reception, live streams of PBS member stations’ linear broadcast channels are also available through Amazon Prime Video under ‘Watch for Free,’” Jedlinski said, “though the same geolocation issues still come into play there.”
Q: For a scripted television show on either network or general cable TV, are there certain times during the shows that they must take a commercial break? For instance, I’ve noticed that whether it’s a sitcom, drama, etc., I don’t believe I’ve ever seen a scripted show go beyond 10-15 minutes without airing a commercial break at least one time.
— Chad, via email
Rob: There is no required time for networks to put in commercial breaks. But the breaks often align for the simple competitive reason that no network wants a viewer to switch to programming on another network, so it’s better to line up the breaks at the same time.