Don't Touch That REC button . . .
UNLESS and UNTIL you’ve got consent – Section 73.1206 leaves very little wiggle room.
The telephone rule strikes again! Back in February of last year, we thought we made it pretty darn clear that, with very few exceptions, you’re not supposed to record any part of a telephone conversation for future broadcast unless you have first obtained consent from the other party to the conversation. You can look it up – it’s Section 73.1206. And yet, barely three months later, another licensee did just what it wasn’t supposed to do. If only it had paid attention to CommLawBlog.com, it could have avoided a $2,000 fine. Oh well, maybe next time.
Truth be told, this violation was not as bad as some others we’ve seen – including, particularly, the one we wrote about last year. In this case, a station’s morning team called some guy at about 6:00 a.m., possibly to discuss some dispute the guy was involved in. With the recorder running (but not on the air), the announcers ID’d themselves. The guy immediately asked whether he was on the air. No, responded the jocks, but they acknowledged that “[t]echnically you’re being recorded right now.” [Note: Why they qualified that admission with “technically” is not clear, since they were, in fact, recording him. But it was 6:00 in the morning, after all.] The guy astutely advised them in no uncertain terms that he did not consent to the broadcast of his voice.
To which the announcers replied: “Oh bummer”.
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It’s been several months since that Hot Topic Of All Hot Topics, net neutrality, graced our space here. When last we reported on the subject, the net neutrality order had finally