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Each year, as the NCAA basketball tournaments get underway, my colleague Mitch Stabbe highlights the trademark issues that can arise from uses of the well-known words and phrases associated with the games in advertising, promotions, and other media coverage. Here is Part I of his review. Look for Part II tomorrow.

March is certainly a busy month for sports.  The professional basketball and hockey leagues are getting close to their playoffs.  Baseball is in the midst of Spring Training.  NFL teams are signing free agents.  And, of course, the NCAA College Basketball Tournaments will take place over the course of the month.

This is my eleventh annual column for the Broadcast Law Blog on the subject of the potential pitfalls to broadcasters in using the NCAA’s FINAL FOUR and other trademarks or accepting advertising that use the marks.  There continue to be changes in college sports, particularly in the area of paying student athletes for the use of Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) rights and teams changing conferences .  However, the NCAA’s hard line against unauthorized uses of FINAL FOUR or its other marks has not changed, including at least one action that took place just a few weeks ago..

That said, it is clear that the value of the NCAA’s basketball tournament rights has, however, greatly changed, which helps explain the enduring efforts to challenge unauthorized uses of its marks.  Thus, broadcasters, publishers and other businesses need to continue to be wary about potential claims arising from their use of terms and logos associated with the tournament.

NCAA Trademarks

The NCAA owns the well-known marks March Madness®, Final Four®, Final 4®, Women’s Final Four®, Elite Eight®, Women’s Elite Eight®, Road to the Final Four® and The Road to the Final Four® (with and without the word “The”), each of which is a federally registered trademark.  The NCAA does not own “Sweet Sixteen” – someone else does.  However, the NCAA has a license to use the mark and has federal registrations for NCAA Sweet Sixteen®and NCAA Sweet 16®.Continue Reading It’s March … Time for Madness!:  Risks of Using or Accepting or Engaging in Advertising or Promotions that Use FINAL FOUR or Other NCAA Trademarks:  2026 Update – Part I

The FCC’s Media Bureau released a Public Notice this week starting an examination of the marketplace for sports rights and how changes in that market have affected local broadcasters and consumers.  The notice recognizes what is evident to all consumers – that the sports marketplace has changed as competition has grown for rights to transmit sports to the public.  While asking for comments on those changes, perhaps the most important question asked by the Bureau is, even if it is found that changes in some ways disadvantage some consumers, does the FCC have any jurisdiction to do anything about those changes?

Initially, the FCC recognizes that sports programming long desired by TV broadcasters to attract local audiences is now also sought by cable and streaming companies to attract those same audiences. The FCC notes that competition for these rights likely increases the costs of acquiring this programming, perhaps making it harder for consumers to get access to the programming when it is not on free TV.  The FCC also suggests that the dispersion of rights in some sports leagues may make it harder for consumers to find the programming that they desire, as coverage is spread across multiple broadcast and streaming platforms.  Not only are consumers confused, but they may end up paying more through subscriptions to multiple services to ensure that they can see the games of their favorite teams.Continue Reading FCC to Examine Changes in Sports Media Marketplace and Its Impact on Broadcasters’ Public Interest Obligations

Corrected 9/9/25 – to update the first date of the filing opportunity for new LPTV stations and TV translators to January 21, 2026.

The FCC’s Media Bureau released a Public Notice announcing the opportunity to file applications for major changes in the channel and location of LPTV, Class A, and TV translator stations starting on October 22, with a subsequent opportunity to file applications for new LPTV and TV translator stations starting on January 26.  These are not technically “windows” for filing applications as they do not have defined end dates, but they are instead the lifting of freezes on applications by these stations that have been in effect for well over a decade.  Once the freezes are lifted, as explained below, with limited exceptions for temporary freezes set by the Public Notice, these filing opportunities will remain in effect until further notice.  The opportunity to make major changes in existing stations, and to file for new stations, have long been requested by LPTV advocates anxious to improve station coverage and adapt to marketplace changes – opportunities that have largely been limited for over a decade during the TV incentive auction process and the subsequent repacking of the TV spectrum.

The “major change” window will allow for channel changes by existing stations and site moves of up to 121 kilometers (roughly 75 miles).  To have a stable database from which applicants can operate, a freeze on all major changes for these stations went into effect on September 3, and all minor changes will be temporarily frozen on October 15 (details below). 

Applications for new LPTV and TV translators will be allowed starting on January 21 – with another temporary freeze on all major changes taking effect on December 3, and one on minor changes on January 14.  This will be the first opportunity to file for new LPTV and TV translator stations in 15 years as the FCC froze applications for new stations in 2010 (see our article here), and had precluded applications in larger markets well before that date.  All freezes will be lifted on January 26. Continue Reading Windows for Filing Applications for LPTV and TV Translator Major Changes and New Stations Announced By FCC

While May is one of those months that does not have any routine, scheduled FCC filing deadlines, there are still a number of regulatory dates and deadlines that are worthy of note for broadcasters.  As detailed below, this includes comment deadlines in several FCC rulemaking proceedings, the effective date of the FCC’s application fee increases (including fees for broadcast station applications), the deadline for LPTV to Class A conversion applications, and the tentative deadline for TV stations to begin complying with the FCC’s audible crawl rule if it is not extended again.  As always, remember to keep in touch with your legal and regulatory advisors to make sure that you don’t overlook any other regulatory deadlines we may have missed here or ones that are specific to your station.

One May date with potential broad interest is May 23 – the effective date of the FCC’s January Order increasing its application fees by an average of more than 17%, including those for broadcast station applications, to reflect changes in the Consumer Price Index.  We previously provided more details on our Broadcast Law Blog on the increases and suggested that, where possible (e.g., in connection with internal company reorganizations or for planned technical changes), broadcasters file applications as soon as possible to beat the implementation of these increased fees.Continue Reading May 2025 Regulatory Dates for Broadcasters – Comment Deadlines on ATSC 3.0 and EAS, Application Fee Increases, Audible Crawl Rule, Political File Windows, and More

April brings a number of routine regulatory dates for broadcasters across the country, including the requirement for posting Quarterly Issues Programs Lists to full-power station’s online public inspection files.  April also brings comment deadlines in several rulemaking proceedings including one in which many broadcasters are interested – the FCC’s “Delete, Delete, Delete” proceeding looking to eliminate unnecessary broadcast regulations.  Finally, we note lowest unit rate windows that open this month, including one for primaries in the New Jersey gubernatorial race, one of the more significant “off-year” elections in 2025.  We look in more detail at some of the most significant deadlines below. 

April 1 is the deadline for radio and television station employment units in Delaware, Indiana, Kentucky, Pennsylvania, Tennessee, and Texas with five or more full-time employees to upload their Annual EEO Public File Report to their stations’ Online Public Inspection Files.  A station employment unit is a station or cluster of commonly controlled stations serving the same general geographic area having at least one common employee.  For employment units with five or more full-time employees, the annual report covers hiring and employment outreach activities for the prior year.  A link to the uploaded report must also be included on the home page of each station’s website, if the station has a website.  Be timely getting these reports into your station’s OPIF, as even a single late report has in the past led to FCC fines (see our article here about a recent $26,000 fine for a single late EEO report).Continue Reading April 2025 Regulatory Updates for Broadcasters – Annual EEO Public File Reports, Comment Deadlines, Quarterly Issues/Programs Lists, Political Windows, and more

A decision from the past week shows that the FCC shows no mercy for broadcasters who don’t know the rules, even when the broadcaster attempts to comply.  The FCC proposed a $369,190 fine against a Texas TV station because the station’s employees did not know how to properly participate in the 2018, 2019, and 2021 nationwide Emergency Alert Service tests.  According to the Notice of Apparent Liability, the station employees apparently knew that Nationwide EAS Tests were to be conducted in these years.  But, from the recitation of the facts, it appears that the station employees did not understand what was supposed to happen during these tests.  Rather than retransmitting the test alert conveyed either by IPAWs (the internet-based delivery system for EAS alerts) or by the traditional over-the-air daisy chain transmission, the station itself created an alert using the test language from some old alerts and transmitted that information on the air.  As the FCC noted in the Notice, that is not what the rule requires and does not further the purpose of the test as it does nothing to show whether the EAS alerting system works to pass along messages from the alert originator to the stations and then to the public.

This issue was compounded by the station filing reports on its participation in the test in the EAS Testing Reporting System certifying that it had received the alerts and retransmitted them as required by the rules.  While the station claimed that it tried to comply with the EAS testing requirements and that its failure to live up to the letter of the law was due to its inexperienced staff not knowing how to receive and retransmit the actual EAS test signals, the FCC rejected the station’s argument.  In fact, the Commission decided to propose more than the base fines for these violations (base fines are on the order of $8000 for each of the four violations, plus separate fines for the reporting issues) because of their repeated nature and given the fact that the apparent violations relate to public safety issues. The large fine for these violations illustrate several concerns for broadcasters – including that ignorance is no excuse for broadcast violations.Continue Reading A $369,190 Proposed Fine for Improper Participation in EAS Tests Shows that Ignorance of FCC Rules Is No Excuse for Noncompliance

Since 2015, TV broadcasters that transmit any emergency information visually in text during non-news programming have been required to convert that information into an audio broadcast on a station’s Secondary Audio Programming channel (its “SAP channel”).  The SAP channels are usually used for Spanish and other non-English translations of the audio on TV programs.  As we have written before (see our articles here, here, here and here), TV stations are required to take textual information (like textual crawls) containing information about a current emergency and to provide those messages in audio on SAP channels so that visually impaired viewers can get the emergency information. The blind and other individuals with visual impairments are notified of the emergency information that is contained in a crawl by audible tones that stations air when they are providing such information during a non-news program. 

The rule also provides that TV stations must describe non-textual emergency information (like weather radar images) on the SAP channel when they appear during non-news programming.  But because broadcasters have no way to make such a conversion of graphic images into speech (short of having a person sitting in the studio at all times to make the audio description live if and when necessary), the FCC has agreed on multiple occasions to delay the effective date of that requirement – most recently until November 26, 2024 (see our note in a weekly update here).  With that deadline now looming, and with no obvious technical solutions to make such descriptions available automatically, the NAB last week filed a Petition for Rulemaking and Extension of Waiver asking that the FCC further extend the effective date by 18 months while it considers new rule proposals for making this information available.  The NAB notes that, as there is no technical solution on the immediate horizon that can timely provide reliable descriptions of graphical information, if some relief is not granted, stations will be forced to stop providing emergency information in graphical form outside of their news programming. Continue Reading NAB Requests Further Delay in Requirement that TV Stations Provide Audio Description of Non-Textual Emergency Information While Rule Changes are Considered