Station Compliance›Field Notes

If your station exists only as a stream, with no AM or FM licence behind it, you have probably wondered which of the rules the licensed station across town lives under actually apply to you.

Almost none of the FCC's. That is not a loophole. Nearly every broadcast rule is written to bind a licensee, or names the kinds of service it covers, and an internet stream is on none of those lists. But "the FCC does not regulate me" is only half an answer, and the dangerous half. Something else fills the space, and most of it costs money if you get it wrong.

The FCC rules, one at a time

EAS. Part 11 lists who is in the Emergency Alert System: AM, FM and low-power FM, digital radio, broadcast and low-power TV, cable, wireline video, wireless cable, satellite TV and satellite radio. Internet streams are not among them. So the program-chain security rule this site exists to explain, § 11.35(d), does not reach a stream either.

Sponsorship identification. The statute covers matter "broadcast by any radio station" for which the station is paid. A stream is not broadcast. The obligation to tell listeners who paid does not disappear, though. It moves to the Federal Trade Commission, below.

Indecency. The FCC's rule binds broadcast licensees, and restricts indecent material between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. A stream has no such window to observe. Obscenity is a different matter: it is not protected speech anywhere, licensed or not, and is outside what an FCC licence decides.

The public file and the political rules. Both attach to licensees. The political side is set out in detail in which political ad rules attach to your station: no reasonable access, no equal opportunities, no lowest unit charge, no political file.

What binds you instead

Music: the bill a broadcaster does not get

Copyright gives the owner of a sound recording the right to perform it publicly "by means of a digital audio transmission" (17 U.S.C. § 106(6)). An AM or FM station's over-the-air broadcast is exempt from that right (§ 114(d)(1)(A)). A stream is not. That is the single biggest difference between the two businesses, and it runs the opposite way to everything above: here the streamer has the obligation and the broadcaster does not.

So a stream playing commercial music pays twice:

• The recordings, through the statutory licence administered by SoundExchange.
• The songs, through the performing rights organisations: ASCAP, BMI, SESAC and GMR. A licensed broadcaster pays these too, but needs separate coverage for its stream.

If you stream through a hosted platform, check what its licence covers before assuming you are covered. Some carry the licences for stations on their service; some do not.

The programming rules that come with the licence

The statutory licence for the recordings comes with conditions on how you program. The best known is the sound recording performance complement (§ 114(j)(13)). In any three-hour period on a channel, you may play no more than:

• 3 songs from one album, and no more than 2 of them in a row; or
• 4 songs by one featured artist, or from one boxed set, and no more than 3 of them in a row.

The licence for an eligible webcaster is conditional on staying inside it (§ 114(d)(2)(C)(i)). A "three-in-a-row" artist block or an album-side feature, standard on terrestrial radio, can take a stream outside its licence.

Advertising: the FTC, not the FCC

Paid content still has to be disclosed. The FTC's Guides Concerning Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising apply whatever the medium. A host who reads a sponsor's copy as a personal recommendation, without making clear it is paid, is the case they are written for.

State law

Election advertising disclosures, consumer protection and contest rules are set by states, and they apply to anyone who airs political or commercial content to that state's residents, licensed or not. The political article gives California's audio disclosure rule as an example. Check your own state's before you sell a campaign.

Your host's terms

A streaming platform's acceptable-use and content terms are a contract. For many small streams they are the most specific rulebook you actually agreed to.

Why this is worth knowing either way

If you are streaming-only, you have real freedoms a licensee does not: no EAS gear to buy or secure, no public file, a rate card with no political strings, and no 6 a.m. to 10 p.m. content window. You also carry music costs and programming limits a broadcaster never sees. Price and program with both in mind.

If you hold a licence, the stream in your market is not cheating when it does none of what you do. It is operating under a different, and in places stricter, set of rules. Compete on what the licence actually gives you: the transmitter, the coverage and the audience.

Before you rely on it

This is an implementation perspective, not legal advice. The FCC side is short and every rule is linked. The music and state-law side is where the money is, and that is a conversation for a copyright or media lawyer, and for whoever licenses your stream.