Last week, the FCC’s Enforcement Bureau issued a Notice of Apparent Liability proposing an $8000 fine on a Los Angeles radio broadcaster that did not award a contest prize until over a year after the contest rules called for the prize to be delivered. The contest rules called for the prize to be awarded within... Continue Reading…
With broadcasters and those in associated industries ready to make their annual pilgrimage to Las Vegas for the NAB Convention, the Wall Street Journal decided to weigh in on an issue important to many radio broadcasters – the future of AM in the car. One of the priorities for many AM broadcasters in the last... Continue Reading…
Last week, the FCC approved a long-pending request by GeoBroadcast Solutions to allow FM boosters to originate limited amounts of programming that is different from what is broadcast on the booster’s primary station. Boosters operate on the same channel as an FM broadcast station and have traditionally been used to fill in holes in an... Continue Reading…
Every year at about this time, with April Fools’ Day right around the corner, we need to play our role as attorneys and ruin any fun that you may be planning by repeating our reminder that broadcasters need to be careful with any on-air pranks, jokes or other on-air bits prepared especially for the day. While... Continue Reading…
In October 2022, I noted in an article that many broadcasters were totally confused by the FCC’s rules requiring that they seek certifications as to whether or not a foreign government is behind anyone buying programming time on a broadcast station. In our 2022 article, we noted that, even though broadcasters did not fully understand the existing... Continue Reading…
The FCC last week released its first EEO audit notice for 2024. The FCC’s Public Notice, audit letter, and the list of stations selected for audit is available here. Those stations, and the station employment units (commonly owned or controlled stations serving the same area sharing at least one employee) with which they are associated, must provide to... Continue Reading…
When you have been representing broadcasters in Washington for as long as I have, you see cycles in regulation of the industry. I was reminded of how long the FCC has been on a deregulatory cycle in reading today’s Washington Post obituary of former Democratic FCC Chair Charlie Ferris, who headed the FCC many decades... Continue Reading…
On February 22, the FCC released an Order reinstating the requirement for radio and television broadcasters, commercial and noncommercial, to annually file an FCC Form 395-B. All station employment groups with 5 or more full-time employees would need to classify all station employees, both full-time and part-time, by race or ethnicity and gender, as well... Continue Reading…
Today’s post will be a bit more into the legal weeds than many of our articles, addressing the standards used by courts to review the decisions of administrative agencies like the FCC. Last month, there was a Supreme Court argument in a case called Relentless, Inc. v. Department of Commerce that the popular press suggested... Continue Reading…