What are these new rules passed by the the FCC? I haven't heard exactly what they are except that by January 1st stations with digital sub-channels need to have at least two hours of e/i programming. Is Peggy Charren of the Children's Televison Act of 1990 back??? Anyways, I was flipping through the radio when I heard a certain popular but drab radio persona discussing the policy with another person, but I never heard what the new ruling was.
There are increased E/I programming responsibilities for broadcasters who choose to multicast. For every increment of 28 hours in free programming offered on subchannels, the broadcaster must add 1/2 hour of core educational programming in addition to the 3 hours required on the main broadcast stream. So from 1-28 hrs, add 1/2 hr, from 29-56 hrs, add 1 hr, etc. A station that broadcasts two full-time free programming streams (1 main, 1 subchannel), 168 hrs per week/28 = 6 increments * 1/2 hr = 3 hrs additional E/I programming.
In a nutshell, the 3 hr/wk E/I rule still applies to digital subchannels, but will only be required as a ratio of how much actual free programming is broadcast on those subchannels. I didn't read the whole article, so I don't know if the additional time is required on each of the subchannels, or can be divided among all streams as the broadcaster sees fit.
Source:
http://hraunfoss.fcc.gov/edocs_public/attachmatch/FCC-04-221A1.pdf(go to item #18 to cut to the chase)
