Earlier this week, our friends at the broadcast and digital media consulting and research firm Jacobs Media posted an article on their blog called “What Could Possibly Go Wrong,” dealing with the financial and reputational issues that can arise if a contest is not fully thought out. That article reminded me of all of the legal issues that we have written about over the years that can arise if all of the issues with a broadcast contest are not carefully considered. Those potential issues range from the an FCC fine if the contest is not conducted as advertised, to the threat of civil liability if the contest results in an injury to a contestant or observer. I thought that I would highlight some of the articles that we have written in the past to remind broadcasters of those potential liabilities.

On the FCC side, the FCC has always been a stickler on the rules, requiring that broadcasters, when conducting their own on-air contests, announce the rules of those contests and to follow those rules as announced. While that burden has become somewhat lighter in the last year as the FCC has allowed stations to publicize the material rules of a contest on a station’s website rather than having to announce them on the air (as long as the on-line location of those rules is itself publicized sufficiently on air, see our post here), that rule change has not affected the underlying obligation of a broadcaster to conduct the contest as announced, in accordance with the contest’s announced rules.
Continue Reading What Could Possibly Go Wrong With a Broadcast Contest? – From the Legal Side