Today is June 1st 2023 and it is the second anniversary of i-Notify going live on Weatheradio Canada. This post will look back from 2021 to today and there will be some of the same opinions, hopes, dreams, wishes, wants and needs. This will be a review with much the same text, but since last year, there have been developments, both good and bad. I am not going to talk about any decommissioned stations, rather talking about the opposite and any modifications which have taken place with a configurations of some WXRs.

On June 1st of 2021, i-Notify first went live as Weatheradio Canada had begun the transformation from the old AVIPAD’s software, to i-Notify. This came a week after a message which was played during the RWT over the entire network on May 26th. The transformation from old to newer technology and voices, was advertised as a gentle reminder, rather than inserting it into the sequence as a public service announcement. From that, I was excited and so were others, because we would Potentially get to hear all four voices as I had described them in a post from August 2018. We eventually heard all 4 voices on the network in Quebec, after a few days of the initial migration. I was able to listen to the stream of the Montréal WXR, via a Weather Radio streaming app. I had heard about the switch from AVIPADs to i-Notify on a Facebook group I co-administrate and when it had been revealed in the post, I immediately went to my phone and the app in question.

My first impressions were initial disappointment, only for the lack of voices that I heard on the broadcast. Don’t forget, that we had known about all 4 voices and I expected more than just a boring and dull broadcast, which is what it currently is now. I have always expressed my opinions as to which voice should do what and when I found out that the male voices were doing all the talking (during the regular cycle) I was not happy. I had emailed Weatheradio Canada, with my June 2nd blog post expressing how I felt and letting them know how I feel in separate emails, about what voices should have been speaking certain things such as the station ID and marine forecast. Which I will get to later on!

On Saturday June 5th, there were severe thunderstorm watches and warnings for parts of Quebec (including Montréal) and only the male voices were doing all of the yacking, including weather alerts. Before then, I had emailed Weatheradio Canada, asking why weren’t the female voices doing any of the talking and I was told that they were supposed to be doing any and all alerts. When I had heard only Tom and Nicolas speaking everything (including the severe weather alerts) I emailed Weatheradio Canada and told them what I had heard. It was eventually taken care of and shortly, we heard all 4 voices on the network, as i-Notify had begun to spread.

On June 15th, it was Atlantic Canada’s turn and it was a more bumpy transition, as with Quebec it just changed without warning and everything on the network was new. When Atlantic Canada began to use i-Notify, it was a different situation, where it went back and forth, between the new and the older AVIPAD’s, with one or two of the bins remaining and as of now, the new station ID plays, complete with the time announcements. At first, the older ID had played and eventually, it was removed, as i-Notify had become more common throughout Atlantic Canada. One of the main problems with i-Notify was a lack of SAME alerts to radios and that was fixed, dew to many emails and phone calls. As of now, things seem to be going well on that front, with SAME and the 1050 Hz tone inside severe thunderstorm and tornado warnings, along with the RMT alerts. One of the stranger things about the spread of i-Notify was the inclusion of Chantal doing the French translation of everything for a time, except for the station ID. This was switched back to Nicolas as the French counterpart to Tom (throughout the network by late summer) when Ontario had migrated and I had expressed my feelings on this as well. The response was no specific response except that things will stay as they are at the moment, as they have.

On June 9th 2022, Winnipeg had migrated and I had posted the Youtube video in the August 2022 newsletter and as I had said, the upgrade had gone much like it had done with Toronto in November 2019. The difference being that Toronto was still on AVIPADs and i-Notify hadn’t gone live as yet. Of course, we would have to deal with a pandemic and any plans being scuttled because of public health rules and I hope we don’t have to socially distance again, for a long time.

Another development is with what I am going to call editing of the configuration. In some cases, there are WXRs with 6 or 7 regions which are covered, while others have 3 or 4. This obviously makes the broadcast cycle long, in both English and French and Toronto is among those with the long cycles. To counter this, a few regions were taken out of the public forecast boxes and I thought then and still think that was a foolish idea. The only thing which saves this idea from being totally stupid is that we hear the seven day forecasts. However, that should be gone from the broadcast in time too, as the short term forecasts are set to return, for all but the main. For example: Toronto will still hear the seven day forecast. Inuktitut! Will either be coming to, or is already back on the network for those areas with people who speak the language. I had talked about that in the May 2023 newsletter and I wonder if we will hear it on Hello Weather!, as it will be interesting if and how it will be fit into the phone line.

Today, i-Notify covers Weatheradio Canada from coast to coast. Ontario had taken their seat on the train, on September 8th 2021, throughout selected parts of the province. The WXR’s selected for migration were those which had been upgraded and even some which were slated to be turned off. This includes, Toronto and Collingwood and both had been upgraded prier to the switch. Toronto was of course, upgraded in November 2019 and Collingwood had its own upgrade in one day, as apposed to Toronto, which took 2 days to complete.

For those who speak and understand French, the French programming hasn’t changed all that much. A stuttering issue has been an occurrence on Stations outside of Ontario, namely the french words for “probability of precipitation”, which has removed the stutter for Ontario. If you live outside of Canada’s most populated province, you hear “Pro……..babilité” as apposed to “probabilité spoken by Nicolas. I noticed this also on the Edmonton WXR too, so Quebec is not alone in this.

Another issue I keep going back to is the station ID and unfortunately, I am partly to blame fir this. For my part, I was asked which voices I think should be doing the ID (back in 2019) and I had suggested Tom and Nicolas. I had no idea that they would become the selected voices for this function on the broadcast and my thought was, that they would only be the ID voices during the testing period. You can imagine how I felt after hearing what I had heard and my hope is that the station ID voices will change, from male to female tones.

As I had said, the broadcast is rather dull and there is no variety, when it comes to the voice selections for different parts of the broadcast. Right now, the male voices do all the heavy lifting except for alerts and if you are listening to find out what is going on, you need a voice which provides some urgency. The point is not to scare people, but to get listeners to take precautions against severe weather which is imminent or occurring at the moment. You see, Ava and Chantal sound way too relaxed and friendly, where as Tom and Nicolas provide that urgent thrust we need to hear, in order to wake up and get the hell a move on, in order to save your life and those of others too. We need the male voices for alerts and the females for something else, which I will get into below. By the way, Tom and Nicolas sound friendly too, but as male voices they are kinda commanding and get your attention, while Ava and Chantal sound rather laid-back and calm, which is what we don’t need in order to alert us of severe weather. No, we obviously can’t have any bad words on the network, but having 2 female voices which are more emotionless than the males alert us to possible dangerous weather, is just plain wrong.

As for forecasts and weather conditions, that can be interchangeable and I would be happy, with Tom and Nicolas doing any and all forecasts, with Ava and Chantal speaking weather conditions and station ID messages. I would even be happy if they had switched to doing the AQI forecasts too, as there isn’t all that much to them, compared to the public or marine forecasts which consists of a lot of words and phrases. Or, get rid of the Air quality index forecast entirely from the broadcast, in order to shorten the cycle, along with only letting the extended forecasts play for the main, with short term forecasts for everywhere else in the listening area. If people wish to get the 7 DAY forecasts, that is where WeatherCAN comes in handy and believe me when I tell you, people really want to hear the 48 hour forecasts the most, out of anything to do with the public forecast.

As for the voices, I have had enough of complaints and complaining about the French voices because I know how bad they are. I’m used to all of the voices because I have them on my iPhone and I also sleep with my WX radio on at night. I don’t like the French voices all that much either, but these are the voices which were licensed to Weatheradio Canada and that’s what we get. It’s a shame that other voices weren’t allowed to be used, because they have more expression than Tom or Ava at times. For example: Samantha would have been good, or even a British voice like Daniel would’ve provided a change. Even an Australian voice like Karyn would’ve been nice to hear , but we don’t have any of those voices. We are stuck with the voices we were given so, let’s learn to live with them, like we are learning to live with Covid.

Something else which needs to be addressed is the weekly tests. During the tests, where the voice says something to the affect of “this is provincial short-form (i-e) ON and a 3 numerical digits, such as 004. What does this mean and why are they mention on the broadcast? We should be hearing that this is a weekly test of our Weatheradio equipment and a reminder of when it is conducted every Wednesday, as we had heard this for years and years. This kinda reminds me of the CBC’s time announcement at 1:00 PM ET every day, with the National Time Signal, with a specific preamble which is read out on the air and as we hear it, beeps play in the background, until seconds before the top of the hour and the long dash. If we had the regular scripted preamble during the RWT and RMT I had mentioned above, it would give all WX radios time to fully alert us during the test. The main reason this needs to be addressed is because the way it is now, it is too short and sometimes, some radios don’t turn off and go back to standby mode, like they should. Case in point, during yesterday’s RWT, my scanner which I use to listen to the Niagara WXR alerts turned on, but couldn’t go back to standby and that has also happened with my Sangean CL-100 WX radio too, sometimes. It just keeps playing indefinitely, until I do something about it like turning it off, or manually putting it back to standby mode. So, maybe this can be given a listen in the log and then, remember that not everyone uses the same radios every day. Some radios react differently, to SAME and it was much better, with the egg timer and the human voices reading out the blurb, for both the RWT and RMT. Obviously, the humans are gone and so is the egg timer in Ontario, but what about the preamble, about it being a weekly test of our alert equipped Weather Radio conducted every Wednesday near noon… in both English and French? Certainly this can be brought back and should have been left as it is with which ever voice would be selected.

As for what will happen with i-Notify in the future, I don’t know and nobody from Weatheradio Canada has come forward with any groundbreaking news, as to any changes and The voice selection and whether I approve, or disapprove of them. I’ve always said, my doors always open if they need help with selecting which voice performs certain functions on the broadcast. However, even I as a long time old reliable listener am not immune to being shut out of decision making and unfortunately, the great unwashed (majority) get the final say, as opposed to someone who knows what sounds best for a particular box. Everything is all in one basket and their needs to be a shake-up in the cycle, in order to make the broadcast more interesting. By which I mean that there needs to be more variety in what voices are selected to speak certain things and not a change in the order of the forecast all the time, as there needs to be consistency, in what we hear and when we hear it, but not at the cost of sacrificing regions from the broadcast cycle for public forecasts. At this point, the voices are consistent but not the order of the public and marine forecasts an this has to change quickly, so that more people who are listening, will get a general idea of when what they are listening for is coming up soon (i-e) the local forecasts.

In closing, I hope that any changes which are slated to happen with i-Notify, will happen quickly. Also, I hope that those of us who are active listeners will get a heads up, as to what and when any changes will happen. Personally, I hope that I am the first, as I email Weatheradio Canada every week with my RWT and RMT reports for two WXRs which I can hear. I also wouldn’t mind having a say, as to any of the changes as well, as I know all 4 voices like the back of my hand. All that would need to be done, is to give me the text of what ever could be selected to have a change in voice, or even the phraseology involved. For example: a change in the station ID and maybe even a mention of WeatherCAN or providing an email Address, for those who wish to provide comments to Weatheradio Canada, outside of calling a voicemail. I have an email address which I fire off all sorts of comments, questions and reports every week, but others may not. Not everyone is comfortable talking on the phone and they may wish to communicate by text. At this point, there is no Weatheradio Canada accout on Twitter or Facebook, but there are groups and my own Weather Radio Listeners Newsletter FB and Twitter accounts. I don’t wish to receive complaints because I am a listener like you, but I also volunteer and help out Weatheradio Canada when I can. I also sport my jacket in the spring and fall proudly, which I was given in 2014 and of course, I try to promote the service as best I can. Anyway, I am glad that i-Notify is here and I believe that at some point, things will get better and we will hopefully be shocked and pleasantly surprised at what we will hear in the coming months to a year. I have hopes, but I also know that there are those who are not so optimistic and I hope that those minds can be changed. This new software is providing a golden opportunity to show listeners who were around before AVIPADs, that Weatheradio Canada used to be much like NWR is now, but with humans reading out the text on tape. Now that we have text to speech, things can only get better, if they want to make it so. Well, do they? Of course they do. By the way, here is what the weekly and monthly tests used to sound like on AVIPADs, complete with the preamble and I hope that it returns to Weatheradio Canada, with Ava and Chantal doing the talking. https://youtu.be/Wqs7VJSk_QM

I hope that any changes being made to i-Notify will happen soon, but probably not before my birthday tomorrow, as I will turn 50. If anything does happen, I will be pleasantly surprised and it would be nice to hear the station ID being spoken by females, Tom and Nicolas doing weather alerts and the monthly and weekly tests telling us that this is a test of our radios, along with the return of short term forecasts to the network. I really want this to happen asap and because, we need this to change. After all, i-Notify has stayed the same for 2 years now and we need a shake up in the broadcast, which is positive and not something to provoke complaints from listeners. I have been a listener since I was 14 and now that I will be 50, I will have gone through 2 major changes to the broadcast in terms of the voices and the inclusion of SAME in the 2000s. Surely Weatheradio Canada can constantly improve the broadcast and if not, maybe a bunch of people will stop listening, which will give the impression that stations need to be decommissioned. Is that what management wants? I hope not.