FCC Form 323

Biennial Ownership Reports (FCC Form 323) for commercial radio and TV (including Class A and LPTV licensees) are due this fall and the Media Bureau just announced it will host an “information session” on the form on Sept. 22 from noon to 1:30 p.m. During the show, bureau staff will “present an overview of Form 323”, “conduct a filing demonstration,” and answer questions from the audience, both those presented in-person or by email. Nothing if not ambitious in its scope, the session is designed to “assist both novice and experienced filers.”

Every two years, broadcasters are to file Biennial Ownership Reports on Form 323 to detail the ownership of the companies that hold FCC licenses. Since 2009, all commercial broadcasters across the country are to file such reports in the same window of time. This year, the deadline has been moved to Dec. 2. The window for filing such reports is now open, according to an FCC Public Notice released on Friday.

Yikes, time is just screaming past us. Has it really been two years since the last biennial Ownership Report (FCC Form 323) was filed? Apparently so — and we know this because the FCC, apparently looking to get a jump on things, has already extended the deadline for the next biennial Form 323. In an order issued on its own motion (i.e., nobody even had to ask), the Media Bureau has announced that the 2013 biennial Ownership Reports will be due no later than Dec. 2. (That’s a month later than the original deadline.)

The FCC has announced that the time has come for the next round of biennial Ownership Reports (Form 323) for commercial broadcasters. And get this, the initial public notice about the upcoming deadline for filing pushes that deadline back a month, to Dec. 1. And in an apparent memory lapse, the commission fails to mention the last-minute effective elimination of the all-encompassing SSN-based FRN requirement.