i have found in the past snow-forecast to be reasonably precise and free for up to 3 days ahead, although why they want payment for 6 days forecast when everybody knows that going 3 or more days is just like gambling.It should be reverse the longer the forecast the less viable so should be free.The knowledge of the long live locals is to be taken into account and I always rely on them when venturing high but checking some FREE websites prepare for the worst of the possibhle weather and go.

Another issue with Meteo France is this:
if for argument’s sake you pay them to see what is going to be the forecast for the next 24hr and relying solely on their forecast when starting, but noticing the weather is drastically different??
Will you ask them to refund your money immediately and would they?
I dont think so.
Weather Forecast should be FREE the sooner Meteo France gets it the better. Like most of the news --free to air and maybe if you want very very detailed forecast for something, then maybe to pay(but who wants that? Nobody!

Thanks for the comment Miro, I’ve changed the wording to (hopefully) make things clearer.

Yan has attracted a lot of comment on the French websites such as Skitour. Not very favourable to be honest. I think there is a general point of people heading up into the mountains, especially high summits, when the weather forecast is good, but as the French say

“Qui regarde la météo, passe sa journée au bistrot”

.

Yan should maybe compare Meteo France’s free sevice (which uses pictogrammes) with the other websites. I think the free websites do well in this context.

It would be nice if Meteo France put more information online like the Americans do

http://ows-public.sembach.af.mil/index.cfm?section=MetsatAnal

Or the Met Office in the UK
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/weather/europe/surface_pressure.html , they used to charge for this but it’s free now. The Paragliding “lot” use all sorts of high tech looking free sites.

Chamonix-Meteo.com is put out by a local expert that lives in Chamonix full time and is super passionate about what he does, not to mention very well trained, well informed, and having the local knowledge that even Meteo France lacks. I would certainly not call him “amateur” and his forecast in my experience is hands down the most accurate forecast for Chamonix Valley.

This is all about money - Meteo France would love a way to get more people to pay for their forecasts and doesn’t want any competition. But advertising-supported information benefits everybody involved, and the basis of free market economy is that competition leads to fair prices and better quality in the long run.

I encourage pistehors.com to review my comments and integrate them into this blog entry since simply translating Meteo France’s position from another source has led to an unfairly biased version of the story, perhaps unknowingly to the authors!

Thanks,
Brian Birtle
Chamonix
24/07/09

Chamonix-Meteo definitely gets my vote, I wonder how many people rely on him. Very many I suspect.