Posted on 12/08/2014 11:03:13 AM PST by Haiku Guy
I have noticed over the last few months that the temperature I get for my location from Yahoo Weather on my iPhone is running 3-4 degrees F higher than the actual temperature that I observe through my own equipment or on various thermometers around town.
For instance, right now it is 29 degrees F, the puddles are frozen, and the termometer outside my window, the radio and the bank across the street all agree that it is 29 degrees F.
But my iPhone is telling me it is 34 degrees.
If this just happened from time to time, I would chalk it up to errors or bad data. But it is very consistent. every time I check my phone. Now, every time I see a thermometer, I check my phone against it, just to see if it is consistently warmer, and it is, every single time.
What was it James Bond said, "If it happens once, it is happenstance. If it happens twice, it is coincidence. If it happens three times, it is enemy action".
So, the question is, obviously, why would Yahoo Weather do such a thing? If they can't even say when it is freezing outside, they are going to hurt their business. So what is their motivation in getting this wrong?
My guess it is all about Global Warming. They are generating a data set for every location in the country. The would be the easiest thing, if you want to look at temperature trends, to just pull up the Yahoo Weather data for year-to-year comparisons. Since nobody is allowed to talk about the weather anymore without lying about it, maybe Yahoo Weather is biasing their data upward to "prove" that Global Warming really does exist.
It all depends on the location of the thermometer the local station is using and several degrees difference around town is normal.
Around here, depending on the site I’m checking on my phone or the computer, the local station reporting can be a local, small airport, or a middle school with a data gathering station.
No conspiracy.
I would think so, too, except the same error is consistent as I move from town to town. The iPhone changes the location as I move, but the temperature is always running 3-5 degrees F higher.
For instance, Yahoo Weather is reporting the temperature in the town where I live is 1 degree F warmer than my work location, so it is obviously running off of a different sensor. But they are both consistently just a few degrees high. This is true wherever I go in the area.
If I hadn't been noticing this consistently over the last couple of months, or so, I would think it was nothing. But it has been too consistent for too long a time to dismiss it as simple error.
I like Intellicast.
I use it on my phone.
The Weather Channel here only takes the temperature from one place in each county so, of course, the temperature is going to vary. I would bet yahoo is getting their data from the exact same location. If the location is in a large city, then the temperature will be hotter than out in the suburbs or the rural area.
It depends which weather station your app is accessing. The only one I can access through my app is about ten miles away. I use weather apps for forecasts not to compare to the thermometer in my yard...
Yahoo has the current temperature in my area posted as 2 degrees warmer than other sources...what caught my attention were the little ‘windmill’ icons representing current wind and pressure...no agenda there. No sir.
It’s such a pleasant and listener-friendly kind of tune.
‘...the termometer...’
Well, there’s your problem, right there! I can recalibrate that for you, and add an ‘h’ for $90.00. ;)
I rely on my own indoor/outdoor set up, versus even my LOCAL weather peeps.
‘Gaslighting’ means someone making you think you’re crazy...when you’re not!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0ToLfQU2xmg
And as an added bonus - ‘Unholy desires!’
I haven’t noticed my iPhone reporting consistently higher temperatures than the actual temperature, but i have noticed reported temps are consistently lower up until a few hours before sunset, and consistently higher until a few hours before sunrise. In other words, it’s not the most up-to-date weather reporting service around and seems to lag by a couple of hours. Or at least that’s what I’ve been chalking the discrepancy up to.
I noticed it a few weeks ago, but temps around here vary with distance from the lake, so I didn’t dwell on the reason.
I usually stick my nose out the door to see what the temp is - if nothing's frozen, then nit's above 32 F. If the wind's not blowing, then I can get by with a lighter jacket. If it's cold, windy and humid (raw) I can stay in and hang out on FR.
Weather underground does the same thing -at least for Oldsmar, FL. In October during cool weather, in the mid 80s WU would show a large spike to over 100 degrees from around 10am to 2pm even though it would be cloudy or partly cloudy. When it keeps reporting highs of 100+ degrees when it never got out of the 80s on a cloudy day a person takes notice.
Imo all part of the ‘this year was the hottest year ever’ meme.
On my iPhone, I have about a half dozen of the cities I frequently visit on my Weather app and the temperatures are dead on with what my car reads when I hit those cities. When I'm home, my backyard thermometer is almost never more than a degree off then what the app is telling me from a station a few miles away.
So the science of being able to tell the current temperature in a given spot is pretty much perfected. Just about every car built since 2000 has an accurate current temperature displayed on the dashboard. Most people have those internal/external thermometers at home.
So even if Yahoo! got together with Google and the rest to try and fool us about the temperature, they would get outed pretty quickly.
I use WeatherUnderground but I have noticed that Cox Communications records weather here as offbase.
For instance, it’ll say the next 5 days are sunny (typical for Phx) but then change that to rain, if it doesn’t rain, change it back to whatever DID happen. They couldn’t predict their way out of a paper bag.
In the summer the temps are never right. I will have to pay attention to see how off they are, and in what direction, but they are not correct, that is for sure.
I can believe your theory. Yes.
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