# FCC Moves on Significantly-Viewed



## Nick (Apr 23, 2002)

Late last week, the Federal Communications Commission
released an order that paves the way for satellite TV services
to offer significantly-viewed signals of out-of-market TV
stations to subscribers.

The FCC said the significantly-viewed rules for satellite TV
will operate in much the same fashion as they have for cable.
Involved parties must petition the FCC when seeking to either
add a station to the significantly-viewed list for a particular
community, or restrict carriage of a listed station through
network non-duplication or syndicated exclusivity rules.

Also, the FCC said a satellite TV subscriber must first be
receiving a local market network station in order to be
eligible to receive a significantly-viewed station affiliated
with the same network.

In addition, satellite TV services must notify all TV stations
in a market of their intention to retransmit a
significantly-viewed signal within 60 days of service.

The significantly-viewed rules are part of the FCC's
implementation of the Satellite Home Viewer Extension and
Reauthorization Act.

www.SkyReport.com - reprinted with permission


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## Tower Guy (Jul 27, 2005)

Nick said:


> Late last week, the Federal Communications Commission
> released an order that paves the way for satellite TV services
> to offer significantly-viewed signals of out-of-market TV
> stations to subscribers.
> ...


There are at least two exceptions to the LiL requirement;

1. SV can be imported where there is no affiliate with the same network affiliation as the SV station even if there is no LiL.

2. SV can be imported to anyone who obtains a waiver from the in-market affiliate.

For instance, Utica, NY is not a LiL market for either D* or E*. There is no CBS affiliate in Utica. The CBS station in Schenectady, WRGB, is SV in both Otsego County and Herkimer County. Those two counties may receive WRGB automatically. The ABC station from Albany, WTEN, is SV in Herkimer County. A waiver from the Utica ABC affiliate, WUTR, would be necessary prior to importation of WTEN.

The satellite companies are not required by law to provide SV stations but may do so at their own discretion. There are 60 day reporting requirements to affiliates that must be mailed out prior to any SV importation.


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## TNGTony (Mar 23, 2002)

One other statutory exception in the SHVREA is already being served by Dish. The two Mississippi counties in the Baton Rouge TV Market are now getting significantly viewed channels from Jaclkson. Baton Rouge locals are not available through Dish at this time.

See ya
Tony


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## Tower Guy (Jul 27, 2005)

TNGTony said:


> One other statutory exception in the SHVREA is already being served by Dish. The two Mississippi counties in the Baton Rouge TV Market are now getting significantly viewed channels from Jaclkson. Baton Rouge locals are not available through Dish at this time.
> 
> See ya
> Tony


The third exception is for the entire state with only one affiliate if that station is located in the capital TV market. This is true for some stations in Burlington, VT, but not the NBC station in Plattsburg, NY.

(Mississippi has five CBS affiliates.)


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## Alan Gordon (Jun 7, 2004)

Tower Guy said:


> The third exception is for the entire state with only one affiliate if that station is located in the capital TV market. This is true for some stations in Burlington, VT, but not the NBC station in Plattsburg, NY.


I'm assuming this is only for the top 4 networks, and not the WB?!

~Alan


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## Tower Guy (Jul 27, 2005)

Alan Gordon said:


> I'm assuming this is only for the top 4 networks, and not the WB?!
> 
> ~Alan


I went back and reread the text of SHVERA pertaining to capital stations. It's more limiting than I remembered. I guess it pertains to Jackson, MS stations.

``(iv) CERTAIN ADDITIONAL STATIONS.--If 2 adjacent counties in a single State are in a local market comprised principally of counties located in another State, the statutory license provided for in subparagraph (A) shall apply to the secondary transmission by a satellite carrier to subscribers in those 2 counties of the primary transmissions of any network station located in the capital of the State in which such 2 counties are located, if--

``(I) the 2 counties are located in a local market that is in the top 100 markets for the year 2003 according to Nielsen Media Research; and

``(II) the total number of television households in the 2 counties combined did not exceed 10,000 for the year 2003 according to Nielsen Media Research.


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## TNGTony (Mar 23, 2002)

That is the legislation that specifically allowes the two counties in MS that are in Baton Rouge to receive Jackson, MS locals.

There is another paragraph that specifically deals with WMUR without naming the station.

See ya
Tony


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## RaceTrack (Jun 11, 2004)

Will they just on with it, cause I want my SV stations, bout the whole Tulsa market is SV here.


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## kc1ih (May 22, 2004)

TNGTony said:


> There is another paragraph that specifically deals with WMUR without naming the station.
> 
> Tony


Can you post that paragraph or a link to it? Thanks!


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## jrwinter (Sep 2, 2004)

Have the SV channels started yet? If so what are the channels for the fresno-visalia california 93257 area?


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## TNGTony (Mar 23, 2002)

kc1ih said:


> Can you post that paragraph or a link to it? Thanks!


http://thomas.loc.gov/cgi-bin/query/F?c108:7:./temp/~c108Di5GxF:e1881227:
Two patagraphs above the text quoted in Tower Guy's post:



> `(i) STATES WITH SINGLE FULL-POWER NETWORK STATION- In a State in which there is licensed by the Federal Communications Commission a single full-power station that was a network station on January 1, 1995, the statutory license provided for in subparagraph (A) shall apply to the secondary transmission by a satellite carrier of the primary transmission of that station to any subscriber in a community that is located within that State and that is not within the first 50 television markets as listed in the regulations of the Commission as in effect on such date (47 CFR 76.51).


Basically WMUR is the only network station that is the only network station in a state as of 1995.

New Hampshire has three TV markets. Boston (which is WMUR's TV Market so secondary retransmission doesn't apply), Burlington, VT (Market #90), and Portland, ME (Market #74) So anyone in the state of NH is either in the WMUR market already or "not within the first 50 television markets".

Gotta love legalese!

Here is an exception that I am pretty sure applies to New Mexico:


> `(ii) STATES WITH ALL NETWORK STATIONS AND SUPERSTATIONS IN SAME LOCAL MARKET- In a State in which all network stations and superstations licensed by the Federal Communications Commission within that State as of January 1, 1995, are assigned to the same local market and that local market does not encompass all counties of that State, the statutory license provided under subparagraph (A) shall apply to the secondary transmission by a satellite carrier of the primary transmissions of such station to all subscribers in the State who reside in a local market that is within the first 50 major television markets as listed in the regulations of the Commission as in effect on such date (section 76.51 of title 47 of the Code of Federal Regulations).


All the NM network stations are in the Albuquerque market. One county in NM belongs to El Paso and 4 belong to Amarillo and one half a county to Midland. None of these are a to 50 market.

See ya
Tony


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## kc1ih (May 22, 2004)

I guess they don't count NH Public TV (Ch 11) as a network affiliate. IMO, they should be available to any subscriber in NH also.

The odd one is WMTW, also an ABC affiliate. In 1995, their transmitter was in NH, but several years ago they moved it to Maine. Also, I don't know if they count the city of license or the transmitter location for the purpose of this provision, WMTW was always licensed to ME.

Another thing I recently read is that for cable systems, any system in Vermont is going to be allowed to carry (or perhaps required to carry, I'm not sure) the network affiliates from Burlington, even if they are located out of the Burlington stations OTA signal area. I don't know if this will apply to satellite also.


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## wkomorow (Apr 22, 2002)

For some reason, Dish has been able to provide Vermont Public TV to everyone in Vermont regardless of the DMA in which they reside. I know several people in Southern VT who have VT public television from Dish, even though they get the Channel 17 WMHT PBS from Albany and by living in Bennington county live in the Albany DMA. Maybe it is just the Leahy factor.


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## TNGTony (Mar 23, 2002)

wkomorow said:


> For some reason, Dish has been able to provide Vermont Public TV to everyone in Vermont regardless of the DMA in which they reside.


I know there is a ton of confusion about this because of all the different rules in play. One set of rules in independent of any other. You just have to figure out which rules you are talking about!

A station/network can at any time they wish give permission to a satellite company to carry their signal anywhere the network owns the rights. In this case, Vermont Public TV has allowed Dish to carry their signal to the entire state of Vermont since VPTV owns the rights to that programming state wide. North Carolina, Arkansas, Mississippi and Georgia Public TV have made similar deals.



kc1ih said:


> I guess they don't count NH Public TV (Ch 11) as a network affiliate. IMO, they should be available to any subscriber in NH also.
> 
> The odd one is WMTW, also an ABC affiliate. In 1995, their transmitter was in NH, but several years ago they moved it to Maine. Also, I don't know if they count the city of license or the transmitter location for the purpose of this provision, WMTW was always licensed to ME.


PBS is not an FCC recognized "network". PBS is technically nothing more than a distribution service and not a network in the same sence as ABC, etc.

As to the other ABC affiliate, they are looking at station licenced TO the state and not transmission towers.

See ya
Tony


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## Geronimo (Mar 23, 2002)

I wish that DISH would carry Maryland Public Tv in the Washington, DC DMA as DirecTV does. I have askeda few times but the rely is that "The FCC won't allow it." Since they allow DirecTV that does not make much sense.


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## RaceTrack (Jun 11, 2004)

Nothing makes since with this stuff, I just wish they would let us have the channels that we have been wanting for years.


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

OK I have a SV Question

First off I have 2 ABC statsions at are considered local, 

1. WWSB channel 40 ( Sarasota) (Home town)
2 WFTS Cahnnel 28 (Tampa) 


Now Sarasota is included into the Market 13 (the Tampa Bay market) Now many many years ago all the stations switched networks except the nbc station. hence leaving us with 2 ABCs 

Pre flip flop
3- PBS
8- NBC
10- IND
13- CBS
16- PBS (ran by USF)
28- FOX
32 - IND
38- IND
40 - ABC
44 - IND
50 - HSN 
62 - IND

Post Flip Flop
3- PBS
8- NBC
10- CBS
13- FOX
16- PBS
28- ABC
32- IND
38- IND / later WB
40- ABC/ then went indie for a couple of months/lawsuit/back to ABC
44- IND/ later UPN
50- HSN/later some hispanic channel
62- IND/later Univsion
66- Pax


Now channel 50 WWSB contract with ABC for syndication was not up and was mad about the channel 28 deal. 40 then sued ABC and took the matter up with the FCC. a few months later fcc made a market inside a market as the newspaper called it. Basicly channel 40 got to keep the ABC syndication as long as they reduced transmitter power and only served 2 counties inside market 13 which happen to be Sarasota and Manatee County. Comcast offers both 28 and 40.... Both dish and direct do not carry 40 , After talking to a ceo csr about a a year and half ago they simply stated that they did not have to carry more than one abc so they would not .

Now on to the SV when I look up the list it does not show channel 40 but I know the channel gets at leat 25% viewership in town as it is the only place to get the minor sarasota news. If something big happens it on the tampa stations but all the smaller things are on WWSB 40. is there any way now with the SV to force Dish to provide channel 40 and hey while I dont know what it is Channel 36 rom cape coral as it is on the list.

I do live in Sarasota Florida which resides in Sarasota County so I am with in my rights to view the channel by the old fcc ruling But I just dont know if i could use SV to force dish to provid channel 40 to sarasota and manatee residence?


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## tsmacro (Apr 28, 2005)

Jawa78 said:


> OK I have a SV Question
> 
> is there any way now with the SV to force Dish to provide channel 40 and hey while I dont know what it is Channel 36 rom cape coral as it is on the list.
> 
> I do live in Sarasota Florida which resides in Sarasota County so I am with in my rights to view the channel by the old fcc ruling But I just dont know if i could use SV to force dish to provid channel 40 to sarasota and manatee residence?


The short answer is: no. SV doesn't mandate the satellite companies to carry anything. It allows them to carry stations from neighboring DMA's that are considered SV if they choose to. You can bet the only way that Dish will ever carry channel 40 in your area is if they see it as a way to add a signifigant income stream to their bottom line. As with all business, $$$ talks.


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## derwin0 (Jan 31, 2005)

Couldn't WWSB just ask for must carry?


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

derwin0 said:


> Couldn't WWSB just ask for must carry?


From what WWSB Network Director has said is that they tried a must carry but the fcc has ruled that Dish/Direct are not required to carry it as there is WFTS 28 which provides ABC. Dish also does not have to recongize the fact that WWSB is in it own market.

I just dont know most pople in town hate comcast so much that they have either direct or dish and most of them would pay an extra 2 dollars a month to add WWSB to the locals. but dish and direct have no listened to those pleas.


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## TNGTony (Mar 23, 2002)

The secondary ABC a substantially duplicate another channel's programming within the same DMA. Under this condition they do not qualify for must carry.

See point 4 on http://ekb.dbstalk.com/20.

If the second station was in another state, then it would qualify for must carry.

See ya
Tony


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

Tony,

after reading number 4 it still raises another question when looking at the guide the only dupication of programming is Is prime time 8-11 so it only 3 hours of dupication at night and they sare 2 hours during the day time. there is a total of 5 hours od duplicatoin out of a 12 hour programing day. Bottom line when looking at tv guide there is more different between the two then there is the same. Being the prime time block and the two hours in daytime. That is far from a majority so I dont see how some number 4 could apply. Now the question is there is a not a set number saying how much duplication is allow it just says substantially duplicate. There should really be a number attached to that.


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## FTA Michael (Jul 21, 2002)

Having your full prime-time lineup duplicated sure sounds "substantial" to me, regardless of what happens at 2 in the morning or 2 in the afternoon. 

Tony has more distant signal knowledge in his little finger that I have in my whole hand, so I'm sure he could expound on what officially constitutes "substantial" better than I can. I'm going with the dictionary definition: Considerable in importance, value, degree, amount, or extent.


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

carload said:


> Having your full prime-time lineup duplicated sure sounds "substantial" to me, regardless of what happens at 2 in the morning or 2 in the afternoon.
> 
> Tony has more distant signal knowledge in his little finger that I have in my whole hand, so I'm sure he could expound on what officially constitutes "substantial" better than I can. I'm going with the dictionary definition: Considerable in importance, value, degree, amount, or extent.


What is interesting is that techincally according to FCC I after the Jan 1 1995 flip flop and the presending law suit which the creating sarasota/manatee its own DMA but still list sarasota/manatee in DMA 13 which is Tampa bay market which Sarasota/Manatee are part of.

It is just a wierd mess, dish admits it, they seem to admit that there bottom line is it too much hassle for them go through and and sort out the people who lie inside the sarasot/manatee dma and which one dont as it not perfect little lines.

It just sucks that we have one truely local station that cover local news. I really dont give a rats ass what happens in tampa. I might be up there a couple time a week but somtimes I want to know why there was a firetruck outside bestbuy.


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## FTA Michael (Jul 21, 2002)

If there's a different service address nearby that better presents your correct DMA, you might consider "moving" there while keeping your billing address the same.

If you really belong to a different DMA than Dish's database shows for your address, then I'd think that it would be morally okay to "move" to the accurate DMA. That's just my personal opinion; for a legal perspective, check with your lawyer.


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## Link (Feb 2, 2004)

carload said:


> If you really belong to a different DMA than Dish's database shows for your address, then I'd think that it would be morally okay to "move" to the accurate DMA. That's just my personal opinion; for a legal perspective, check with your lawyer.


Check with a lawyer for that??? Lawyers probably would have no clue!!

It'd be nice if people could do annexations out of a certain DMA like the way some people do their residences in rural areas for school districts!!


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

OK I have talked with a couple people from the fcc about this as this conversatation on this forum. 

This is how the FCC views it. 

While techincally I am sitting int a DMA that is sitting in a larger dma as far as the fcc concerned rule 4 as tony mentioned applies. Why because I am legally part of the larger DMA. The sarasota/manatee dma was only created end the nasty lawsuit with the ABC/FCC vs WWSB. Only way for rule 4 not to apply is if some how magicly another 2 stations pop up in town with tow more Network Affiliates. so if any two stations that would carry one of the following NBC CBS FOX would broadcast here in Sarasota then the fcc would move sarasota/manatee out of market (dma) 13 and it would no long be engulfed by market 13 and then dish would have to cover them via the must carry rule. Then I could fill in the blanks and dish could offer all the old tampa channels as SV if they chose to do so or at least enough to fill in the network blanks.

situation b is is wfts 28 ( the other abc ) slacked off in the number of sarasota/manatee county news stories as there is a qouta they must meet, Then rule 4 does not apply and supposly i could demand dish carry wwsb.

Now on the for front after talking to wwsb again, they are in talks with DirectTV and if Direct TV can secure a deal is planing a be ad push down here as most of the dish net sub would switch to direct for wwsb. There is a lot of satellite customers down here as comcast and timewarner comcast - sarasota timewarner-manattee is just awful. 

So I will wait as my best deal is for direct to start airing wwsb then forcing dish to carry it or loose a considerable number of subs.


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## Tower Guy (Jul 27, 2005)

Jawa78 said:


> OK I have a SV Question
> 
> I do live in Sarasota Florida which resides in Sarasota County so I am with in my rights to view the channel by the old fcc ruling But I just dont know if i could use SV to force dish to provid channel 40 to sarasota and manatee residence?


Is there anything preventing you from erecting an antenna and watching the local station for free?


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

Tower Guy said:


> Is there anything preventing you from erecting an antenna and watching the local station for free?


Due to legal reasons mainly because of wfts channel 28, channel 40 has to limit broadcast power. and henc due to the expanding bulidings and condo development at one point I could get channel 40 on OTA no it kinda comes in. Only TVS i can get wwsb channel 40 is on the two HDTV tvs where i get the digital transmission which is much improved over the analog signal.

Like I said I hope DTV gets the deal with them as dish will then make a deal to keep from loosing customers.


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## derwin0 (Jan 31, 2005)

Jawa78 said:


> when looking at the guide the only dupication of programming is Is prime time 8-11 so it only 3 hours of dupication at night and they sare 2 hours during the day time. there is a total of 5 hours od duplicatoin out of a 12 hour programing day.


A bit more than that with ABC, NBC, and CBS.
2 hour morning show.
3 hours of soaps.
1/2 hour of nightly network news.
3 hours primetime.
2 hours of late night tv (letterman/leno/kimmel/etc...)

So that would be a total of 10 1/2 hours out of the day. That would be a substantial bit. Especially since I didn't count the network repeats of network news that is shown during the post-midnight wee hours of the morning.

If these were Fox stations, then they probably wouldn't fall under duplicative since Fox doesn't do daytime programming.


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

derwin0 said:


> A bit more than that with ABC, NBC, and CBS.
> 2 hour morning show.
> 3 hours of soaps.
> 1/2 hour of nightly network news.
> ...


Last time I watch channel 40 they tried canning most network tv except prime time and a few soaps. I belive in the attempt to get around rule 4 of the must carry law.


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## stonecold (Feb 20, 2004)

Just on a side note I would think that Dish Network would want WWSB since it was the first TV station to have a real suicide on live broadcast. One of there anchors blew there brains out back in 1974


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## colavsfaninnwia (Jan 25, 2006)

Maybe someone can help me out on which stations i can recieve. I live in Zip code 51241. I have Dish. I recive Sioux Falls, SD locals: KELO CBS(11), KSFY ABC(13), KTTW FOX(17), KCSD PBS (23), KWSD WB(36), and KDLT NBC (46). I also recieve KRNE PBS(12) somewhere out of Nebraska (I cannot recieve this station via antenna.) And just recently, I started to get KSMN PBS (20) out of Worthington MN. Now the local cable Co. can also offer KCAU ABC (9), KMEG CBS, (14) KTIV NBC (4) and KPTH FOX (44). all out of Sioux City, IA. However, they do not offer KTTW. Now all of these stations come in good to perfect except for KRNE on an indoor antenna. Will/Can Dish offer the Sioux City stations to me?


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