Superstation

Superstation in United States television can have several meanings. In its most precise meaning, a superstation is defined by the Federal Communications Commission as "A television broadcast station, other than a network station, licensed by the FCC that is secondarily transmitted by a satellite carrier."In the early days of broadcasting, most large media markets had, by standards of the day, a large number of TV stations. Generally 3 VHF stations affiliated with NBC, ABC, and CBS, the then dominant television networks, and several UHF stations without network affiliation. These independent stations relied on reruns, old movies and local news, weather, or sports to fill their broadcast days. Smaller media markets, however, often had only the basic three channels. Cable television systems in smaller areas sought a foothold by "importing" signals from larger towns for their customers. The stations, anxious for more viewers, assisted by relaying their signals on by wire or microwave signals to these nearby regions. These stations became the first "superstations," on a regional basis.

With the advent of C-Band satellites, Ted Turner had the idea of distributing his WTCG in Atlanta via C-Band to the entire country (and beyond). This was the first national superstation, and his idea was soon copied by companies who applied for satellite connections to distribute other stations, including WGN-TV in Chicago, Illinois.

One key legal point is that Ted Turner's contracts with content providers charged him for content as if his station were reaching only a local market. No one had thought of adding contract language to deal with satellite broadcast to a much larger market. This loophole was closed right away, so other local stations that could get a satellite spot got charged appropriately.

This eventually caused conflict between these stations and providers of similar, or identical, programming in local markets. Eventually TBS, the successor to WTCG, gave up its status as a superstation and became a regular cable television channel. The FCC placed tight restrictions on the remaining superstations (excluding Superstation WGN), allowing no new ones and limiting the distribution of the five grandfathered ones to rural areas without distributors of similar programming.

As of 2006, Superstation WGN boasts over 68-million households on cable and satellite. The five remaining true superstations, UPN affiliates WSBK-TV in Boston and WWOR-TV in Secaucus, New Jersey, part of the New York City area, and WB affiliates WPIX-TV in New York, KWGN-TV in Denver, Colorado, and KTLA-TV in Los Angeles, California, are carried on some rural cable systems, and on the DISH Network DBS system to many customers in small media markets.

TBS Superstation is now simply known as TBS and WGN continues to bill itself as Superstation WGN (though the station tried to market under the simple name Superstation in late 2002-early 2003 after a logo change, before reinstating the call letters after confused viewers wondered where WGN went). However, while the FCC defines "superstation" as a term, it does not prohibit its use by others such as KIMO in Anchorage, Alaska, which has a network of repeater stations in other parts of that state and calls itself The Alaska SuperStation. And the term is used by many other TV and radio stations. However, none of these operations is a superstation as defined by the FCC.

Canada

Canada does not have any television stations that operate as "superstations" in the official sense of the term. Technically, almost every station in Canada is a superstation, as any station that is available on satellite (and almost all of them are), can be carried by any Canadian cable system. The closest Canadian equivalent to the "superstation" model is the television system.