Guidelines for Media Usage and Redistribution

As of Aug 29, 2006 the media policy for this page has been updated (see highlighted portion). Previously, no media usage was permitted. Under the new policy, media outlets (print, television, web, blogs, etc.) are permitted to free use of the plots from this page, provided that the following guidelines are observed:

•  On-air usage guidelines (television, cable, satellite)
  •  Given that white is a bad color for display on television, you may crop the image down to the viewport (i.e. the 'map' portion of the image). Please do not crop any further than the viewport boundary.
  •  Please do not change the map background or plot in any further way (i.e. don't 'lift' the model lines from the background and use this separately). 
  •  For on-air use, it is not necessary to give source information (either author or institution), but you may if you wish. Please do NOT give out the web site address on-air.
  •  Please follow the general guidelines below when communicating with users. If the disclaimer info has been cropped, please especially remind users that you are showing this just to give a general idea of what the model spread is showing. Make sure viewers don't fixate on one particular model scenario.

   

•  Guidelines for usage of plots on the web (media news web sites, blogs, etc.) 
  •  Web sites (such as blogs, media) may use images from this site occasionally, provided that the full graphic is shown and the image quality is not degraded. Such usage must meet the following guidelines:
  •  It is prohibited for web site operators to download images from this site to use on their own site on a regular basis.   
  •  It is prohibited for web sites to upload images from this page (i.e. hot-linking), whether this is done server-side or client-side.
  • If you are going to use an occasional image, say on a blog or in a news story, download the image to your site and serve the image from your site.
  • Finally, you must include the following credit: "Plot provided courtesy of Jonathan Vigh, Colorado State University. For more information about this graphic, click here."
•  Finally, remember that absolutely no guarantees are made regarding the accuracy or timeliness of the products on these pages.

Here are some general guidelines to using this product effectively:

•  Remember that the current official NHC forecast (OFCL) is NOT shown on early guidance plots. Instead, the 6-h old interpolated forecast is shown (OFCI).
•  Viewers should be aware that they should not make decisions based on model guidance - they should refer to their local emergency management officials and statements from their local National Weather Service Forecast Office.
•  Remind viewers that models are frequently prone to LARGE track and intensity errors.
•  Remind viewers not to fixate on any one model forecast. All models are wrong to some extent. The likelihood that any single model forecast track will actually verify (say within 10 miles) is quite small in most cases. The model track guidance can be useful for getting a general idea of which way the storm will go.
•  The spread of the model guidance often (but not always) gives a useful estimate of the uncertainty associated with the forecast.
•  It may be helpful to express to viewers that in general, the uncertainty of a forecast increases with lead time. So a 5-day forecast has much more uncertainty than a 2-day forecast. Please familiarize yourself with the updated verification statistics of both the official forecasts and the various models: National Hurricane Center Forecast Verification and 2005 Verification Report.