What is the history behind Weather Underground?

[aceplace57]

I’ve used wundergound.com for my weather forecasts for over 14 years. The url was originally a .edu. Unfortunately, I can’t recall which university it was.

I was watching the news recently and their segment on severe weather had comments from Weather Underground.

So what is Weather Underground? Is it a independent meteorological organization? Is it still affiliated with a University?

I have tried google. All that gives is the weather forecast web site. They don’t even mention the old URL that was a .edu or any history.

WAG - I always thought this was a Graduate Studies, Science project at a University. I can imagine some crusty professor in tweed & a bow tie running this with his students. That’s just based on their old URL. Google is not saying much.

[MOIDALIZE]

About Us

[friedo]

It was started as a project of the University of Michigan which put a bunch of weather databases on the Internet beginning in the early 1990s. It’s now a for-profit enterprise.

The name of course comes from these not very nice people.

[aceplace57]

So it was a University project. I remember that .edu url like it was yesterday. Apparently it was the early nineties when I first got my weather from there.

Wasted all that time on Google for nothing. Didn’t even think to look at “About us”

thanks.

We could use Wayback machine to see any early page. But, we need the old .edu URL.

[running_coach]

nm

[aceplace57]

We could use Wayback machine to see an early page. But, we need the old .edu URL. I recall it ended /~something something

[aceplace57]

The professor that helped start Weather Underground in the early 90’s is still teaching. This guys class sounds like something I’d love. I always enjoyed science classes.
http://michigantoday.umich.edu/2007/Sep/samson.php

Professor Samson, Associate Chair of U-M’s Department of Atmospheric, Oceanic and Space Sciences, is a meteorologist. He can tell you how tornados form (roughly, warm, moist air is lifted by heavier cold or dry air, producing “supercell” thunderstorms) or why global climate change will result in more, and more intense, hurricanes (hurricanes derive their power from the ocean—the warmer the water the hurricane travels over, the more potential for hurricane formation and growth).

He can also explain, by drawing a simple bell curve, one of the most significant—and under-reported—threats of climate change: heat waves. Samson says an increase of only one degree in global temperature will put at risk vulnerable populations.

[postcards]

I was going to say, “You don’t need a weatherman to to know which way the wind blows”, but never mind.

[fiddlesticks]

Hey, who else used to use telnet to get the “madlab” forecast. Or at least that’s how I remember it. madlab.umich.edu, I think?

The telnet service is still available via rainmaker.wunderground.com, and is basically indistinguishable from the service I used in the mid 90’s at college.

[aceplace57]

yep, open cmd window, type telnet rainmaker.wunderground.com and use the menu. I just tried it and it still works. Brings back many, many memories.

I think the old address was madlab.sprl.umich.edu

[John_Mace]

Hmm. And here I thought someone was nostalgic for 1960s protest movements.

[fiddlesticks]

@aceplace57

yep, open cmd window, type telnet rainmaker.wunderground.com and use the menu. I just tried it and it still works. Brings back many, many memories.

I think the old address was madlab.sprl.umich.edu

Yep, that was the old address alright…

[campp]

@John_Mace

Hmm. And here I thought someone was nostalgic for 1960s protest movements.

Same here, sort of an unfortunate name choice. :eek:

[MsWhatsit]

@campp

Same here, sort of an unfortunate name choice. :eek:

It was deliberate. From their About page, linked up-thread:

The growing Internet weather program was given the name Weather Underground, a reference to the 1960’s radical group that also originated at the University of Michigan, which had taken its name from the lyrics to Bob Dylan’s Subterranean Homesick Blues, “You don’t need a weather man to know which way the wind blows.”

[fiddlesticks]

Just one more thing to add, wunderground.com & this message board are the only things I actually pay to use on the Interweb.