Number: RL32641
Title: 'Localism': Statutes and Rules Affecting Local Programming on Broadcast, Cable, and Satellite Television
Authors: Charles B. Goldfarb, Resources, Science, and Industry Division 
Abstract: Each broadcast television license is assigned a community of license, in the form of a specific city. Most broadcast television stations' viewing areas extend far beyond the borders of their city of license, and in many cases extend beyond state borders. The local broadcast television stations that each cable system must carry are determined by the Nielsen Designated Market Area (DMA) in which the cable system is located. In the 1992 Cable Act, Congress amended the 1934 Communications Act to require, subject to certain exceptions, each cable system to carry the signals of all the local full power commercial television stations "within the same television market as the cable system," with that market determined by "commercial publications which delineate television markets based on viewing patterns."
Pages: 63
Date: January 9, 2008