STCPPA Effect on S. 119 License Use a Question: CO
Use of Copyright Act Section 119 distant signal compulsory licenses letting direct broadcast satellite operators import distant local TV broadcast signals without negotiating with those stations has plummeted since passage of the Satellite Television Community Protection and Promotion Act (STCPPA)…
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of 2019, but that decline seems to reflect the overall decline in DBS subscribership, Copyright Office Director Shira Perlmutter said in a June 21 letter to House and Senate Appropriations committees leadership released Wednesday. It said cord cutting and a decline in use of the license also seems to come from a concentration of broadcast channel owners, resulting in possibly more difficulty in negotiating retransmission licenses. A CO study of Section 119 licenses post-STCPPA said the annual satellite royalty receipts from the licenses peaked in 2010 at more than $96 million, and by 2019 were down to about $8.7 million. Royalty receipts dropped more than 50% in 2020 to about $4.3 million, it said. Now only Dish Network is eligible to carry the Section 119 licenses, since AT&T's DirecTV hasn't negotiated license agreements to provide local-into-local network service in 12 of 210 designated market areas and use of the license is contingent on providing such service in all 210, Perlmutter reported. Given factors outside 119 affecting DBS, effects of STCPPA on that market "cannot yet be determined," CO said.