The FCC’s Latest Broadcast Ownership Review: What’s At Stake
Every few years, the Federal Communications Commission has to look in the mirror and ask a deceptively simple question: Do our media ownership rules still make sense?
That moment is here again. In advance of its upcoming open meeting on September 30th, the Commission advanced a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (NPRM) as part of a restart of its long-delayed quadrennial review of broadcast ownership rules (MB Docket No. 22-459).
If that sounds dry, it shouldn’t. This process could reshape how many stations a single company can own in one market, whether the Big Four networks can ever merge, and whether radio caps still make sense in the streaming age. In other words, it goes to the heart of who controls local media voices in an era where YouTube, TikTok, and streaming platforms dominate audience attention.
What’s An NPRM?
An NPRM is the FCC’s way of kicking off a public conversation before it changes any rules. The Commission publishes a notice laying out the issues it’s considering, asks for written public comment, and then weighs the feedback before deciding. It’s the first formal step in potentially rewriting policy.
In this case, the Commission is asking whether today’s ownership rules should be retained, modified, or eliminated given the realities of the modern media marketplace. Broadcasters, industry groups, advocacy organizations, and ordinary citizens can all file comments. Afterward, the FCC can draft a final order that updates — or keeps — the rules in place.
Why Quadrennial Reviews Rarely Happen On Schedule
Congress requires the FCC to conduct a quadrennial review of various ownership rules. The intent was to ensure that limits on consolidation evolve as technology and competition evolve. Back in 1996 when this requirement was enacted, cable television was the big disruptor. Today, cord-cutting, digital video, connected TV, and global platforms like Amazon, Google, and Meta loom much larger.
In practice, though, the process has rarely been as orderly as the statute envisioned. Reviews have often slipped past their four-year cycle because of litigation, partisan gridlock, or shifts in FCC leadership. Prior reviews in 2010 and 2014 were delayed by litigation and leadership changes, sometimes overlapping into the next cycle. The “current” 2022 review, for example, remains pending nearly three years later, reflecting the same pattern of drawn-out, years-long battles shaped as much by politics and court rulings as by the underlying media marketplace.
So as the FCC issues a new NPRM in this docket, it’s more than a formality — it marks a reset in the ongoing tug-of-war over how, or even if, ownership rules should evolve in the digital age.
The Legacy Rules On The Table
Here are the big ones potentially up for debate:
Local TV Ownership Rule (Duopoly Rule): This rule generally limits a company to owning no more than two full-power TV stations in the same market. Even then, both stations cannot rank among the market’s “Top Four” in audience share, and at least eight independently owned stations must remain (the “eight voices” test). While the rule is meant to preserve competition and ensure multiple viewpoints, recent court challenges to the “Top Four” restriction show how unsettled the policy remains.
Local Radio Ownership Rule: Caps how many AM or FM stations a single owner can hold in a market, scaling the limit to market size. The rule aims to prevent any one broadcaster from dominating the local radio dial.
Dual Network Rule: Bars mergers among the “Big Four” national networks (ABC, CBS, Fox, NBC) to preserve national-level competition.
Together, these rules were built to preserve and encourage three things: competition, localism, and diversity of voices.
The Battle Lines
Predictably, broadcasters argue the rules are outdated. The National Association of Broadcasters and large station groups contend that scale is necessary for survival. With cord-cutting accelerating and ad dollars flowing to Google, Meta, and Amazon, they say consolidation is the only way to keep local TV and radio strong enough to invest in local newsrooms and compete with tech giants.
Public interest advocates see it differently. To them, loosening ownership caps would mean fewer local owners, less competition, and less diversity in local news and programming. They point to decades of consolidation that already hollowed out small newsrooms and homogenized local content. The fear is that relaxing these rules further would accelerate that trend.
Implications Beyond Broadcasters
This NPRM is not just an inside-baseball fight for communications lawyers and lobbyists. It’s a public reckoning with how much value we still place on localism — the idea that people deserve access to news and cultural programming produced in their own communities. In an era when most people consume media through global platforms, the FCC is deciding whether local ownership safeguards still matter, or whether the marketplace has already rendered them obsolete.
How To Follow Along (And Even Participate)
All filings will be available in MB Docket No. 22-459 on the FCC’s Electronic Comment Filing System (ECFS). Anyone can read the arguments or submit their own. To do so, go to ECFS, type “22-459” into the docket search, and view filings or submit a comment. Over the coming months, you can expect a flood of comments from broadcasters, tech companies, public interest groups, and even academics weighing in on what local media should look like in the 2020s and beyond.
The NPRM itself doesn’t change the rules — it just asks the questions. But the answers the FCC receives, and how it weighs them, could very well reshape the next decade of America’s local media landscape.
The Bigger Picture
The real question is whether broadcast ownership rules written for a world of media scarcity can still make sense in a world of communications abundance. On one hand, the internet and streaming have dramatically expanded consumer choice. On the other, local voices arguably matter more than ever in an age of misinformation, fragmented audiences, and civic disengagement.
This quadrennial review is more than an administrative exercise. It’s an opportunity to decide whether “localism, competition, and diversity” — the FCC’s long-standing guiding principles — still demand broadcast ownership caps in the face of Big Tech dominance. The coming debate will tell us whether policymakers see consolidation as a threat to those values, or a necessary step to keep broadcasters viable.
Local News To Peruse
Local TV Has Lost More Than Half Of Its Media Spending Market Share Since 2017 - George Winslow [TV Tech]
Fox, Madhive Team Up To Bring More Live Streaming Sports To Local Advertisers - Jon Lafayette [The Measure]
NPR To Trim $5 Million This Year As Public Radio Stations Struggle To Pay Bills - David Folkenflik, Frank Langfitt [NPR]
After Trump’s Cuts, ‘Crippled’ NPR And PBS Stations Must Transform - Benjamin Mullin, Jack Healy, David W. Chen [New York Times]
WETA Cuts 5% Of Workforce, Cancels Three Local Television Programs - Julian Wyllie [Current]
Penn State To Wind Down WPSU After Board Of Trustees Declines Transfer To WHYY - Carmen Russell-Sluchansky [WHYY]
