The FCC has voted to expand the online activities that define a candidate, and to square its political file rules with the 2002 Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA).

FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel had teed up the item for a vote at the January 27 public meeting, but it has already been approved and so won't be on the agenda after all.

The Report and Order (R&O) voted and released Tuesday (January 25), revises activities fitting the definition of "legally qualified candidate for public office" to include creating a campaign website or using social media to further that campaign.

That definition has to do with whether a write-in candidate has made a "substantial showing" of their bona fide candidacy. If a TV station provides airtime to a legally qualified candidate for public office, it must make a similar provision to all other bona fide candidates for that office.

Cable operators can also take into account those online activities when it comes to equal opportunities and lowest unit charge requirements.

The R&O also revised the political file rules to extend political record keeping rules to issue ads -- ads that communicate a message on any political subject of national importance -- as well as campaign ads. ■

Related:Pew Plots Rise of Trump

Donald Trump's campaign website "mostly posts" stories from external news media, in contrast to Hillary Clinton's, which "almost entirely bypass[es] the news media," with campaign news sections that resemble digital news outlets, populated mostly by in-house-produced content, according to a just-released Pew Research study.

The same pattern held for social media posts from the candidates. Pew said that 78% of Trump's Facebook posts were links to outside news stories, while 80% of Clinton's posts were links to her campaign pages -- and their mostly self-generated stories and info. Twitter showed a similar pattern.

Trump's fondness for tweeting at the drop or a hat or rise of a poll number was borne out in the study. Trump’s tweets were retweeted almost 6,000 times on average, compared with some 1,500-plus for Clinton.

Trump has famously slammed the media, both in general and by insulting individual reporters along the campaign trail and following debates.

The study was of the campaign websites of presidential candidates -- looking at design features, static content and original news items (news articles, press releases and videos) posted between May 1 and June 15.