"The Summer Set" Wins iHeart/Macy's Contest

6-6-13
The Summer Set is a Scottsdale, Arizona pop rock band. They won the second Macy's iHeartRadio Rising Star Campaign and will now perform at this year's iHeartRadio Music Festival in Las Vegas on September 20 and 21. Six million votes were cast in the 2013 contest. The campaign also featured five in-store performances by the Top 5 finalists.

"It's such a surreal dream come true," said Brian Dales of The Summer Set. "Entering this competition was unlike anything we've done in our career and I still have a hard time believing we won. Legends (The Summer Set's fans) are the best fans in the world for coming together in support of this moment. I'm so excited to see all the doors this may open and I want to say thanks to Macy's, iHeartRadio and Fearless Records. Here's to the future"

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NAB Agrees With Entercom About Contest Rule

12-26-2012

The NAB has has filed comments supporting Entercom's request that the FCC update its rules, allowing stations to provide listeners with contest rules on station websites. The 1976 rule requires stations to make periodic on air announcements. These promos often take up valuable air-time that could be used for ads (or other programming), they are read at warp speed or buried at times few people are listening. Entercom filed a "Petition for Rulemaking" in January of 2012.

The NAB, which filed it comments last week, wrote "The Commission should revisit the Contest Rule and consider making ?adjustments to better serve the public by recognizing that there are now better ways to communicate detailed contest information and removing from the rules the requirement of counterproductive undesirable program content.?

Today, the public expects to be able to access information over the internet via computers, tablets, hand-held devices and smart phones. Communication is expected to be crisp, concise and brief. Consumers have many choices for entertainment, information and news and will flip from one to another if their expectations are not met. Reading detailed contest terms on air interrupts radio programming and can drive listeners away. It is also unnecessary, given other communication options today. In particular, accessing contest terms via the internet is a more user-friendly way for consumers to read, understand and assess the terms of a contest, rather than trying to catch a fleeting and periodic on air announcement.

Read the Entercom Filing HERE
Read the NAB Filing HERE

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Swift in Dream Contest With Clear Channel

10-19-2012

Here are more details on the Clear Channel/Taylor Swift promotion we wrote about yesterday. It's a direct result of the new relationship radio is cultivating with artists and record labels. On Monday Swift will release her newest album and more than 300 Clear Channels stations are helping the launch. Clear Channel listeners, across the country, are getting an opportunity to win a mountain of great prizes, Swift is getting massive promotion for her new album and Clear Channel gets tremendous access to THE hottest star in music today.

Now through November 9, all Clear Channel CHR stations will offer listeners the chance to text-in-to-win the ?24 Hour Dream Life? contest. One winner and three friends will be flown on a private jet to join Swift for a behind the scenes tour of her new show, front row concert seats at two of her tour stops, a backstage meet and greet with Taylor Swift and a signed guitar.  Beginning Q1 2013, Clear Channel Country stations will be offering a similar once-in-a-lifetime experience for its listeners.

Another component of the promotion is a Ryan Seacrest-hosted Taylor Swift 25-minute iHeartRadio Album Release Party. The event will air across Clear Channel radio stations on Monday, October 22 and will be available on demand at iHeartRadio.com. The on-air special will be followed by two weeks of exclusive content spotlighted across Clear Channel?s Country, Mainstream Contemporary Hits Radio (CHR#, Adult Contemporary #AC# and Hot Adult Contemporary #HAC) radio stations.
In addition to the Seacrest special, Clear Channel will activate its Artist Integration Program across four formats beginning Monday, featuring eight of Taylor Swift?s newest tracks. This AIP will include a series of on-air spots with Taylor Swift that will drive listeners online to access exclusive extended interviews and video content. Fans will also have instant access to download Swift?s newest album RED.
Taylor Swift is on Scott Borchetta's Big Machine Label company. Borchetta has been very active in cultivating new relationships with radio company's, most notably Clear Channel and Entercom so far.

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Caller Lies About Being Raped To Win Contest

10-8-2012

This one comes from Canadian radio station (KISS 92.5) where a caller lied about being raped by a former boyfriend so she could win $10,000. The Toronto Sun is reporting the morning show of "Roz and Mocha" are starting to face some backlash after airing the game Decision Impossible and awarding the woman the money. The game involves three callers, asking them why they deserve the money, and having the callers decide who should win.

The woman claimed had been verbally and physically abused by her former boyfriend. ?He would beat me, he would rape me,? she said. ?I felt helpless, I was trapped.? The woman appeared on the morning show the next day to face accusations she was lying. She admitted the majority of the story exaggerated. ?I was not raped and not physically abused at all."

Read the Toronto Sun story HERE

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Update: WCCC Fixes Problem With Contest Winner

10-4-2012

We've been following Monica Buchanan's story about a contest run by WCCC in Hartford. Buchanan is an NBC-TV reporter and first covered the story of listener Michele Mele who was furious when she says the radio station did not award her a contest prize she had won. Mele now says the station has made the situation right. This makes you wonder what the radio station would have done if the TV station did not run a negative story on what happened.

The contest promised up to $10,000 worth of car repairs for a person in need. WCCC owner Woody Tanger called the TV station "very concerned" and wanted to fix the problem as quickly as possible. The FCC doesn't take kindly to this kind of mistake.

In an email to NBC Connecticut, WCCC owner Woody Tanger wrote "You made every effort to find all the facts and we dropped the ball by not getting back to you in a timely manner." Mele says her vehicle, which she uses to get back and forth to therapy, was returned to her almost exactly the way it was when she gave it to the sponsors of the WCCC promotion. That prompted her call to the NBC-TV Troubleshooter team that pursued the story.

WCCC sales manager Jay Schultz told NBC, "I was just trying to make sure I was in command of the facts before I talked to you guys. I think communication is something we needed to do better.  We had a lot of people involved in this process and I should have been overseeing it more tightly and we should have had communication." Mele now says she's happy. "We had a talk about everything that happened and they offered me compensation that I'm very grateful for.  I thank them from the bottom of my heart for that. They made it right."

There is no mention as to whether a call was made to file a formal complaint with the FCC. The FCC has made it clear that it is the radio station?s responsibility to fully award each of the prizes offered in over-the-air radio station contests. 

Read the entire NBC story and watch the news report HERE
(picture courtesy the NBC Connecticut website)

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Nashville's Megan & Liz Win iHeartRadio Contest

5-14-2012
The duo Megan & Liz, 19-year-old fraternal twins generated over 150 million YouTube views, a spot on Billboard?s Social 50, and sold over 200,000 singles. Megan & Liz have performed with such artists as Hot Chelle Rae, Gym Class Heroes and Demi Lovato, and come September, they?ll have the opportunity to open the iHeartRadio Music Festival. The contest was sponsored by Macy's.

More than two million votes were cast by Clear Channel radio listeners, iHeartRadio fans and Macy?s shoppers across the country ? including some of music?s biggest names like Will.i.am, Pitbull, David Guetta, Enrique Iglesias and Randy Jackson ? for their favorite up-and-coming artist in the online competition. The celebrities helped spread the word by asking their Twitter followers to vote for their favorite band.

?We are so pleased with the response to this campaign, and wholeheartedly congratulate Megan & Liz on their well-deserved win,? said Michele Laven, Executive Vice President Strategic Partnerships, Clear Channel Media and Entertainment.  ?The next big pop star can come from anywhere, and this campaign highlights Clear Channel?s ability to showcase emerging talent in local communities.  Helping our listeners discover new musicians from across the country is a fundamental part of what we do.?

In addition to performing alongside major pop stars at the iHeartRadio Music Festival, Megan & Liz will also be featured on an iHeartRadio Custom Station titled ?Rising Star,? on in-store TVs in the MStyleLab department at Macy?s, on macys.com and via Macy?s social media sites. The winner will also have the opportunity to perform at signature Macy?s events including its four-city, high-fashion and music extravaganza ? Macy?s Glamorama. 

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$22,000 FCC Clear Channel Fine For Contest Rules.

The stations hit with the fine are KOST-FM, KHHT-FM, KBIG-FM, KFI-AM and KYSR-FM and the 2008 contest involved a car giveaway. The Clear Channel cluster asked listeners to produce commercials for a car, the best commercial would be voted on by website users. The FCC says Clear Channel deserves the fine of $22K because it failed to broadcast all the rules of the contest on the air. Clear Channel posted the contest rules online, the contest winner was chosen via online voting but the FCC says more details about contest rules should have been broadcast.

Take a look at how broadcast attorney David Oxenford summarized the situation in his blog:
1.You must provide all of the material rules of the contest in on-air announcements a sufficient number of times so that a listener could be expected to hear such announcements and
2.The rules for a contest that is primarily conducted through a station website must still be broadcast on the air if the fact that the contest is occurring on the website is promoted over the air (see our article on a previous case reaching the same conclusion).
The big fine is a result multiple stations being involved in the contest. Here are more details from the FCC ruling:

"Under section 73.1216 of the Commission?s rules, a broadcast licensee ?that broadcasts or advertises information about a contest it conducts shall fully and accurately disclose the material terms of the contest. Material terms, among other things, include any eligibility restrictions, means of selection of winners, and the extent, nature and value of prizes. We find that Clear Channel apparently violated section 73.1216 of the Commission?s rules by failing to fully and accurately disclose the material terms of the Contest in the method prescribed by the Commission?s rules.  Clear Channel asserts that the Contest ?was conducted on the Station Websites, and not as an over-the-air contest. It acknowledges, however, that the Stations broadcast advertisements for the Contest. Clear Channel further acknowledges that its Contest rules were not broadcast, but instead were made available via the Stations? websites.25 By asserting that the Contest was conducted ?on the Station websites,? Clear Channel appears to imply that the Contest was not subject to the Commission rule?s requirements, or that, alternatively, its method of disclosure was otherwise mitigating or exculpating.  The Commission, however, has previously found a licensee liable under section 73.1216 in a case where the licensee promoted its contest through broadcast even though the contest itself was conducted principally through its website. Thus, Clear Channel?s broadcast promotion of the Contest renders it fully subject to the Commission?s rule. Moreover, the Commission has found that licensees cannot avail themselves of alternative non-broadcast announcements to satisfy the requirement that they accurately announce a contest?s material terms.28 The Commission?s rules clearly provide that ?[t]he material terms should be disclosed periodically by announcements broadcast on the station conducting the contest.? The Commission?s rules provide that while disclosure by non-broadcast means (such as on a website) can be considered in determining whether adequate disclosure has been made, any non-broadcast disclosures must be ?[i]n addition to the required broadcast announcements? and cannot substitute for them.30 Accordingly, we find that Clear Channel?s failure to broadcast the material terms of the Contest constitutes a violation of section 73.1216.

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LEGAL - Do You Still Need to Air Contest Rules?

12-23-11

Now that contest rules are consistently listed on radio station websites, what do stations need to do about broadcasting those rules over the air? A Radio Ink reader asks the question: Is there a law requiring we broadcast them on a regular basis through all day parts and do those rules apply to streaming as well? We turned that question over to broadcast attorney John Garziglia.

A disgruntled listener filing a contest complaint at the FCC is one of the surest ways to provoke the FCC into an enforcement action against a radio station.  Therefore, asking about streaming is good as no broadcaster wants to be on the receiving end of an FCC complaint.  Section 73.1216 of the Commission's rules governs on-air broadcaster conducted contests.  That rule requires that, when a radio station-conducted contest is advertised, the broadcaster fully and accurately discloses the material terms of the contest, and conducts the contest substantially as announced or advertised.

There are no FCC contest requirements for programming on a streamed channel.  For the on-the-air contest that is also streamed, provided the contest rules so  state, the broadcaster may limit participation in the contest to residents of a certain geographic area, or require that prizes be picked up in person, to limit the  contest to contestants in the broadcaster?s market area, rather than allowing streaming listeners at some far away location to enter and win. 

The FCC states that the time and manner of contest rules dissemination are up to a licensee?s reasonable discretion. The material terms of a broadcaster conducted contest must be broadcast when the audience is first told how to enter or participate.  A contest?s material terms must be disclosed periodically by announcements on the station, but do not need to be broadcast fully each time an announcement promoting the contest is broadcast.  According to the FCC, the  broadcast of the material terms of contest rules ?in a reasonable number of announcements is sufficient.?   Simply broadcasting the full contest rules at 3:00 a.m., however, is insufficient. 

It is useful to note that the FCC?s broadcast contest rules are not applicable to the commercial advertisement of non-licensee-conducted contests.  Nonetheless,  as with any advertisement, the station still has a liability for material broadcast so even if the FCC?s contest rules are not implicated, the basic tenants of avoiding  fraud, other scams, and violations of state and federal laws, should be observed. 

Broadcasters are sometime asked to run a contest that the broadcaster believes may violate the law.  The contest may involve what is believed to be an illegal  lottery, offshore gambling, internet poker, the giving away of controlled products such as alcoholic beverages, or prizes that appear to be simply too good to be  true.  The broadcaster, of course, does not wish to turn away a buy, but also must avoid violating the law.  My suggestion to a broadcaster in such a situation is  to ask the entity or agency making the buy to supply a letter from its lawyer stating that the contest as planned is legal under applicable law.  Asking the client for

a lawyer letter usually quickly ferrets out questionable broadcast material.  Needless to say, even if you receive such a lawyer letter stating that the questionable contest is legal, you should still consult with your own legal counsel if you have any remaining doubts. 

There are no separate FCC rules for contests on streaming channels.  The FCC?s contest rule purview is limited to licensee-conducted on-air contests.  With all broadcast and streamed content, however, keep in mind other state and federal laws are also likely applicable. 

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