For a company that could always punch well above its weight in drawing press coverage, Aereo’s sale of its assets in bankruptcy last week drew surprisingly little coverage. Less than a month before last year’s Supreme Court decision finding that Aereo’s retransmission of broadcast TV signals over the Internet constituted…
It is an unusual occasion indeed when the FCC offers to revise its rules to provide regulatory relief to both television and radio stations. Yet that is precisely what the FCC proposed in a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) to update its station-conducted contest rule to allow broadcasters to post…
January 2015 Pillsbury’s communications lawyers have published FCC Enforcement Monitor monthly since 1999 to inform our clients of notable FCC enforcement actions against FCC license holders and others. This month’s issue includes: Individual fined $25,000 for Unauthorized “Chanting and Heavy Breathing” on Public Safety Station Failure to Timely Request STA…
In a just released Public Notice, the Media Bureau has designated May 29, 2015, as the Pre-Auction Licensing Deadline. That is the date by which certain full-power and Class A TV stations must have a license application on file with the FCC in order for their modified facilities to be…
The press has been abuzz in recent months regarding the launch of various Internet-based video services and the FCC’s decision to revisit its current definition of Multichannel Video Programming Distributors (MVPDs). In December, the FCC released a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM), seeking to “modernize” its rules to redefine what…
In what has become an annual holiday tradition going back so far none of us can remember when it started (Pillsbury predates the FCC by 66 years), we released the 2015 Broadcasters’ Calendar last week. While starting a new year is usually jarring, particularly breaking yourself of the habit of…
Pillsbury’s communications lawyers have published FCC Enforcement Monitor monthly since 1999 to inform our clients of notable FCC enforcement actions against FCC license holders and others. This month’s issue includes: Sponsorship Identification Violation Yields $115,000 Civil Penalty $13,000 Increase in Fine Upheld for Deliberate and Continued Operation at Unauthorized Location…
The FCC announced in March of this year that it would begin treating TV Joint Sales Agreements between two local TV stations involving more than 15% of a station’s advertising time as an attributable ownership interest. However, it also announced at that time that it would provide parties to existing…
December 2014 The next Quarterly Issues/Programs List (“Quarterly List”) must be placed in stations’ public inspection files by January 10, 2015, reflecting information for the months of October, November and December 2014. Content of the Quarterly List The FCC requires each broadcast station to air a reasonable amount of programming…
At its Open Meeting this morning, the FCC adopted a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking to “modernize” its station-conducted contest rule, which was originally adopted in 1976. The proposal would allow broadcasters to post the rules of a contest on any publicly accessible website. Stations would no longer have to broadcast…