(a) Library of Congress staff acting under the general authority of the Librarian of Congress may reproduce fixations of television and radio transmission programs consisting of regularly scheduled newscasts or on-the-spot coverage of news events directly from transmissions to the public in the United States in accordance with section 170(b) of title 2 of the United States Code. Recording may be accomplished in the same or another tangible form as the original transmission. The choice of programs selected for recording will be made consistent with the purpose of, and based on the criteria set forth in, the American Television and Radio Archives Act at 2 U.S.C. 170(a), and on Library of Congress acquisition policies in effect at the time of recording.

(b) Specific notice of an intent to copy a transmission program will ordinarily not be given. In general, the Library of Congress will seek to copy off-the-air selected portions of the programming transmitted by both noncommercial educational broadcast stations as defined in section 397 of title 47 of the United States Code, and by commercial broadcast stations. Upon written request addressed to the Chief, Motion Picture, Broadcasting and Recorded Sound Division by a broadcast station or other owner of the right of transmission, the Library of Congress will inform the requestor whether a particular transmission program has been copied by the Library.