Copyright Office Publishes Specialty Station List

The Copyright Office is publishing an initial list of television stations listed in filed affidavits in which the owner or licensee of the television station attests that the station qualifies as a specialty station in accordance with the Federal Communications Commission’s definition of specialty station in effect on June 24, 1981.

The Office requests that any objections to an owner’s claim of specialty station status be filed with the Copyright Office.  The final list shall be used to verify the specialty station status of those television stations identified as such by cable systems on their semi annual statements of account. Comments or objections are due by May 23, 2011.

According to the Office, under the cable statutory license, a cable operator may carry the signal of a television station classified as a specialty station at the base rate rather than at the higher 3.75% rate that is incurred for the carriage of a non-permitted signal. 37 CFR 256.2(c). 

Specialty station status is determined by reference to the former regulations of the FCC which defined a specialty station as ‘‘a commercial television broadcast station that generally carries foreign-language, religious, and/or automated programming in one-third of the hours of an average broadcast week and one-third of the weekly prime-time hours.’’ 47 CFR 76.5(kk) (1981).

The FCC no longer determines whether a station qualifies as a specialty station; however, the Copyright Office still keeps an active list because it remains relevant to the cable statutory license scheme.

The Office has received affidavits from 63 broadcast stations for which the owner or licensee of the television station had filed the requested affidavit. Any party objecting to any claim to specialty station status must submit comments with the Office, per the filing instructions noted above, stating his or her objections within thirty days of publication of this Notice in the Federal Register.

Once the list is published, the Copyright Office Licensing examiners shall refer to it in examining a statement of account where a cable system operator claims specialty station status for a particular station.

If a cable system operator claims specialty station status for a station not on the published final list, the examiner must determine whether the owner of the station has filed an affidavit since publication of the final list. Affidavits received after publication of the final annotated list shall become part of the public file maintained by the Licensing Division of the Copyright Office.

Any interested party may file an objection to any such later-filed affidavit and the objection shall be filed together with the corresponding affidavit.

Also See:

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FCC Modernizes Broadcast Television Public Inspection Files to Give the Public Online Access to Information Previously Available Only at TV Stations

Copyright Office Conducts Proceedings on Exemption to Prohibition on Circumvention of Copyright Protection Systems

Legislation to Deregulate Television Market Introduced in House and Senate

Copyright Office Proposes New Fee Schedule