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Citizen Weather Observer Program:

http://www.wxqa.com/index.html

And to quell the alarm from the AC below:
http://www.wxqa.com/aprswxnetqc.html talks about the accuracy of the data and feedback to the user, along with a lot of good info about siting your station.

Citizen Weather Observer Program:

http://www.wxqa.com/index.html

And to quell the alarm from the AC below:
http://www.wxqa.com/aprswxnetqc.html talks about the accuracy of the data and feedback to the user, along with a lot of good info about siting your station.

"I've seen CNN use video from a DIFFERENT fire when reporting on those, so use of stock reports for weather isn't far-fetched at all."

And the beauty of seeing that is being able to reach for the remote and change the channel if you don't feel you are getting accurate reporting. The only thing that keeps NOAA even slightly honest is the fact that you can pick up a reasonably accurate thermometer at Costco for a few bucks. Look at how economic data is reported, using formulas and estimation that are constantly revised and massaged until the desired number is produced (all in the name of accuracy). And when someone questions the number, the department that produced it claims you're too stupid to understand it.

However, the truth is the first thing that goes away in most cases of mainstream media, and has been since the invention of the printing press. I don't know what the answer is, but something like the Citizen Weather Observer Program might be a good model or starting point.

One thing which is not mentioned here is that PWS owners also create websites to display their data. These sites have become increasingly sophisticated over the years. Some sites now have live Ajax updates, live radar, live weather cams, live weather radio and live lightning data.

For those who like to tinker with things which give real-world results, and help your community by providing weather data, being a PWS and weather website owner is quite rewarding.

http://www.wxqa.com/webpages.html

By the way, the hardest part of being a PWS owner is proper mounting of the equipment. This is where CWOP is really invaluable to PWS owners, providing a very comprehensive manual and data quality checker.

They do use data from State DOT roadside sensors (such as found at rwis.state.mn.us (nearly every state's dot uses these google "RWIS and your state"), APRS stations such as those found at findu.com, and Citizen Weather Observer Program

...it had damn well better stay public. But the internet routes around damage --- if noaa can't do it, it'll just become another open source project, as it partially is now...

My weather station
(the flatline yesterday was a power outage)

Citizen's Weather Observer Program

CWOP is the Citizen Weather Observation Programme, a part of NOAA. You can find the data on http://www.wxqa.com/ all about this data. The problem for the private weather industry is that all this data is freely available, and is not able to be restricted in availability thanks to the infrastructure...

With CWOP, all the data is sent to http://www.findu.com/ where anyone can retrieve the data.

Weather data is free this way, thanks to the support of Ham Radio operators internet infrastructure.

Darryl Smith, VK2TDS
Sydney. Australia