Superstation

==Definition==
In its most precise meaning, per an amended definition under the Copyright Act of 1947, the [[Federal Communications Commission]] (FCC) in the United States defines a ''superstation'' as a "television broadcast station, other than a network station, licensed by the [FCC], that is secondarily transmitted by a satellite carrier."<ref>{{cite web|title=§119. Limitations on exclusive rights: Secondary transmissions of distant television programming by satellite|url=https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/USCODE-2017-title17/html/USCODE-2017-title17-chap1-sec119.htm|website=[[U.S. Government Publishing Office]]|access-date=April 29, 2019}}</ref> Superstations may fall into one of two classifications, based on the factoring of their extended reach for advertising and program acquisition purposes:<ref>{{cite web|title=Superstation|url=http://www.museum.tv/eotv/superstation.htm|author=Megan Mullen|website=[[Museum of Broadcast Communications]]|access-date=April 29, 2019|url-status=dead|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140203161106/http://www.museum.tv/eotv/superstation.htm|archive-date=February 3, 2014}}</ref>
* '''Active superstations''' – Television stations that intentionally seek retransmission of their signal outside of their home market through an arrangement with a common satellite carrier firm (which uses an FCC-licensed satellite or satellite service facility to establish "point-to-multipoint" broadcast signal distribution, and which owns or leases a capacity or service on a satellite to provide such distribution), and markets the added distribution to program suppliers and advertisers; these stations target their programming and purchase advertising aimed at a national or regional audience, in addition to selling localized advertising viewable only on the originating broadcast feed;
* '''Passive superstations''' – Television stations that make little or no acknowledgement of their superstation status in on-air and other marketing avenues; the station's signal is involuntarily redistributed without prior formal consent by a satellite carrier, which handles national advertising, marketing and some programming services for the cable-originated feed in lieu of the station's licensee, which itself maintains a neutral or obstinate stance toward the expanded distribution. Locally, the "passive superstation" prioritizes programming and advertising for their originating market, charging rates for such acquisitions and sales accordingly. The station may receive supplementary revenue from federal [[royalty payments]] for licensee-copyrighted programs, but subscriber fees paid by cable systems for the use of their signals are distributed to the common carrier.

Through an amendment to the [[compulsory license]] statute of the 1947 copyright law, the Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act of 1999 (SHVIA) created a sub-definition for "nationally distributed superstations," which the FCC constitutes as FCC-licensed television stations permitted by [[United States Congress|Congress]] for retransmission by satellite carriers regardless of whether they reach "served" or "unserved" subscribers pursuant to the Copyright Act (effectively preventing them from subjection to geographic retransmission restrictions and absolving them from copyright liability if received by subscribers not residing in "unserved households" that have limited to no access to television stations offering similar programming). These stations must also fit the following tight date-specific criteria:<ref>{{cite web|title=Code of Federal Regulations 47 CFR 76.120|url=https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CFR-2017-title47-vol4/xml/CFR-2017-title47-vol4-sec76-120.xml|website=U.S. Government Publishing Office|date=October 1, 2017|access-date=April 29, 2019}}</ref><ref>{{cite web|title=NOTICE OF PROPOSED RULEMAKING: Implementation of the Satellite Home Viewer Improvement Act of 1999|url=https://transition.fcc.gov/Bureaus/Cable/Notices/2000/fcc00004.txt|publisher=Federal Communications Commission|date=January 7, 2000|access-date=April 29, 2019}}</ref>
* "(A) [the applicable station] is not [[owned-and-operated station|owned or operated]] by or [[network affiliate|affiliated]] with a television network that, as of January 1, 1995, offered interconnected program service on a regular basis for 15 or more hours per week to at least 25 affiliated television licensees in ten or more states;"
* "(B) [the applicable station] on May 1, 1991, was retransmitted by a satellite carrier and was not a network station at that time; and
* "(C) [the applicable station] was, as of July 1, 1998, retransmitted by a satellite carrier under the statutory license of Section 119 of [[Title 17 of the United States Code|Title 17, United States Code]]."
Beyond the six stations that fit that criteria (including [[WPIX]], [[KTLA]] and [[KWGN-TV]], which, at present, uniquely constitute as both "network stations" as well as "nationally distributed superstations" under the FCC and the SHVIA's overlapping definitions for both), the definitions under SHVIA and Congressional retransmission consent rules (per Section 325 of [[Title 47 of the United States Code|U.S. Code Title 47]], as amended through the enactment of SHVIA) are restrictive, leaving little possibility that any television stations would in the future be able to befit such criteria and legally be considered a national superstation.

While the FCC defines "superstation" as a term, it does not prohibit its use by others outside of that scope; for example, primary [[American Broadcasting Company|ABC]]/subchannel-only [[The CW|CW]] affiliate [[KYUR]] (channel 13) in [[Anchorage, Alaska]] had collectively branded itself and its network of [[Broadcast relay station|repeater stations]] (including full-power satellites in [[KATN|Fairbanks]] and [[KJUD|Juneau]]) as "[[Alaska]]'s SuperStation" from 1996 to 2011. Some Spanish language networks like [[Telemundo]] and [[Univision]] may only have one station within an entire state that serves the largest city in their market and is distributed statewide via cable; one such case is Telemundo affiliate [[WYTU-LD]] (channel 63) in [[Milwaukee]], which maintains cable distribution throughout [[Wisconsin]] via [[Spectrum (cable service)|Charter Spectrum]], along with extended coverage on [[low-power broadcasting|low-power stations]] in [[Rockford, Illinois]], and [[South Bend, Indiana]], providing it broad coverage resembling a regional superstation though not marketing itself as such. The term has been (and, in a few cases, currently is) used by many other television and radio stations, but none of these operations is a superstation as defined by the FCC and solely use the term for marketing purposes. Similarly, the "superstation" term has also been occasionally stretched within the broadcasting industry to encompass major network affiliates imported by satellite common carriers to C-band and direct broadcast satellite providers—through packages such as [[Primetime 24]] and its associated "Denver 5" tier, and the Netlink-distributed A3 package—that could not receive locally based network stations prior the implementation of the Satellite Television Extension and Localization Act in 1999.<ref>{{cite magazine|title=Affiliate superstations on the way|periodical=[[Broadcasting & Cable|Broadcasting]]|publisher=Broadcasting Publications, Inc.|page=52|date=December 8, 1986}}</ref>