 | | Will the MLB and NFL sue if they show games? Will the MLB and NFL sue if they show games? | |
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 LinklistPremium
join:2002-03-03
Williamstown, NJ
kudos:5
3 edits |  Appeals court stopped preliminary injunction;not the lawsuit
The full trial is coming:
»www.nytimes.com/2013/04/02/busin···-tv.html
While the broadcasters have lost in New York’s federal courts so far, they have won a district court case in California last December against an Aereo-like service named Aereokiller, backed by the billionaire Alkiviades David.
Another appeals court judge, Denny Chin, dissented on Monday, calling Aereo’s antenna workaround “a Rube Goldberg-like contrivance, overengineered in an attempt to avoid the reach of the Copyright Act and to take advantage of a perceived loophole in the law.” He concluded that the Aereo streams to subscribers were “public performances” and thus violations of copyright. | |
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 | Reviews:
 ·Mediacom
·RoadRunner Cable
| Re: Appeals court stopped preliminary injunction;not the lawsuit Exactly. Those calling this a "major win" are not aware of (or are ignoring because it suits their narrative) the actual legal status. What's in play right now is a preliminary injunction, not a final ruling. The legal requirements to get a preliminary injunction are much more strict than those required to get a final judgement. | |
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| | | | Re: Appeals court stopped preliminary injunction;not the lawsuit This is true. Basically, all the court is saying is that the broadcasters' case isn't an absolute slam dunk. They may still win, but they might also lose.
IMHO, if Aereo had been smart, they would have declared that they were going to launch a TV service and deliver it over the Internet, stating that it will only offer retransmission of broadcast channels and no cable channels, then ask the broadcasters if they choose must carry or retransmission consent. This would have put the broadcasters' parent companies in an incomfortable position. Since they routinely demand carriage of their whole channel portfolios in order to get a particular channel, they might try that tactic, but then Aereo could have argued that they aren't interested in offering cable channels, only broadcast channels for those who can't get good reception. OTOH, they could try and jack up their retrans rates in order to keep Aereo out of the market, but then they could be accused of unfairly discriminating against it. I'm not saying either of these approaches would have triggered a lawsuit, but Aereo could have gotten much mileage out of them in terms of making the broadcasters look like greedy slimeballs who are trying to keep a new competitor out of the market. | |
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| | |  r81984Fair and BalancedPremium
join:2001-11-14
Katy, TX | Re: Appeals court stopped preliminary injunction;not the lawsuit All Aereo does is lease you a TV antenna and TV tuner that you connect to with a long cable.
Aereo does not offer any channels. You only get the channels in range of the TV antenna.
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...brought to you by Carl's Jr. | |
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| | | | JPLPremium
join:2007-04-04
Downingtown, PA
kudos:2 | Re: Appeals court stopped preliminary injunction;not the lawsuit said by r81984:All Aereo does is lease you a TV antenna and TV tuner that you connect to with a long cable.
Aereo does not offer any channels. You only get the channels in range of the TV antenna.
Couple comments to respond to the points in this thread. First, this is a major victory. No, they didn't win the lawsuit. But the loss of injuctive relief means that Aereo can keep the lights on, so to speak. If the broadcasters won an injunction, then Aereo would be required to cease and desist right now, pending the lawsuit being decided. That loss of business would be a death sentence to most start-ups.
Second, you have to look at WHY the court decided as they did - they indicated that the broadcasters didn't demonstrate that they would likely win in court. Which is the only reason you would grant injuctive relief. No, it's not over, but it's a major victory any way you slice it.
Next, the broadcasters are being very disingenuous here. Their notion that this is theft is bizarre. If that's their arguement going forward, they're going to lose this fight for real. They're only upset because of how they've chosen to negotiate with local cable companies. Many of them have decided not to be specified as must-carry, and negotiate carriage agreements with cable operators. As a result, the more people who watch their channels OTA, the worse it is for them from that perspective. | |
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| How is it a public performance when Aereo isn't "broadcasting" anything? An antenna rental that's connected by a cord of a slightly different style on someone else's rooftop doesn't equal public performance or copyright violation in my book.
I say let's bring the case to Virginia and have me and 11 other rational people sit on the jury. We'll show the greedy broadcasters and cable/satellite operators just exactly where on their bodies they can shove their lies and disdain for the public.
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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| | | Reviews:
·Mediacom
·RoadRunner Cable
| Re: Appeals court stopped preliminary injunction;not the lawsuit said by Androidian:How is it a public performance when Aereo isn't "broadcasting" anything? ...snip...
Not really the point here. The topic is, let's look realistically at the status of this case in the courts. | |
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 morboComplete Your Transaction
join:2002-01-22
00000 | It's not stealing A group of broadcasters, including Fox and PBS, immediately issued a statement calling the ruling "a loss for the entire creative community," adding that "the court has ruled that it is ok to steal copyrighted material and retransmit it without compensation." Commercials are transmitted with Aereo, so how exactly is this stealing? It's only stealing if antenna users are also stealing. | |
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| me1212
join:2008-11-20
Pleasant Hill, MO | Re: It's not stealing If thats stealing, then I don't want to know what it I do when I watch DVR'd OTA shows with my friends, who don't live with me, and skip the comercials. | |
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| | | | Re: It's not stealing said by me1212:If thats stealing, then I don't want to know what it I do when I watch DVR'd OTA shows with my friends, who don't live with me, and skip the comercials.
You should be considered an economic terrorist. You're stealing from hard working network executives who are just trying to support their families. You should be shipped off to Gitmo. Sorry... couldn't resist 
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MNSi Internet - »www.mnsi.net | |
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| | | | Yeah those nice starving ex's familily members that have to suffer eating Regular beef instead of fillet Mignon...How Dare you..LOL but I like it | |
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| | | KearnstdElf WizardPremium
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ | Re: It's not stealing And the kids that might have to driven to school in a BMW instead of a Rolls Royce!
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports | |
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| Re: It's not stealing Oh the humanity! LOL 
They might only be able to afford to lease a Gulfstream 4 for their next vacation instead of a Gulfstream 5. (Wasn't it Brittney Spears who spewed some garbage like that when whining about people pirating music? Couldn't resist.)
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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| | | | DVRing shows for personal use in your home is not illegal, whether you fast forward through the commercials or not. This was established long ago in the Betamax case. | |
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| |  RARPSL
join:1999-12-08
Suffern, NY | said by me1212:If thats stealing, then I don't want to know what it I do when I watch DVR'd OTA shows with my friends, who don't live with me, and skip the comercials.
You have the right to skip the commercials (or leave the room while they are playing). All the sponsor buys is the right to have their ad transmitted so it can be potentially viewed - Not the right to force it to actually be viewed. So long as the commercial is actually transmitted and recorded (if the show is not being viewed in real time) they have gotten what they paid for. | |
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·Comcast
| Re: It's not stealing said by RARPSL:So long as the commercial is actually transmitted and recorded (if the show is not being viewed in real time) they have gotten what they paid for. You just made me want to invent a DVR that automatically skips recording commercials even more than ever.
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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| | | | BiggA
join:2005-11-23
EARTH | Re: It's not stealing There's some software solutions out there that do it on MCE, but they are buggy and tricky to set up. A relatively small number of people have them set up and working. | |
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| | | Commercials have nothing to do with copyrighted material. It's illegal to copy and reuse copyrighted material, regardless of whether you include the commercials or not. | |
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| | KearnstdElf WizardPremium
join:2002-01-22
Mullica Hill, NJ | Re: It's not stealing said by MyDogHsFleas:Commercials have nothing to do with copyrighted material. It's illegal to copy and reuse copyrighted material, regardless of whether you include the commercials or not.
However it is not a copy, It is a format conversion from an OTA Antenna to a stream. And it is technically only available in the broadcast area.
That is why this case is not open and shut in the courts. If it were just about copyright it would be case closed for Aero.
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[65 Arcanist]Filan(High Elf) Zone: Broadband Reports | |
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| | | | | Re: It's not stealing If they had solid merit the broadcasters would have received an injunction. Having failed at that, the court is basically saying your chances of winning are slim. | |
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| | | r81984Fair and BalancedPremium
join:2001-11-14
Katy, TX Reviews:
 ·row44
 ·AT&T U-Verse
 ·AT&T DSL Service
| said by Kearnstd:said by MyDogHsFleas:Commercials have nothing to do with copyrighted material. It's illegal to copy and reuse copyrighted material, regardless of whether you include the commercials or not.
However it is not a copy, It is a format conversion from an OTA Antenna to a stream. And it is technically only available in the broadcast area. That is why this case is not open and shut in the courts. If it were just about copyright it would be case closed for Aero. It is not a format conversion either in the legal sense.
Calling it a format conversion would be saying your converting formats when you pick up TV with an external antenna connected to a HD tuner then connecting that to your TV with an HDMI cable so your TV can display the channel.
Technically that is converting formats, but not in the legal way.
Aereo does not even offer 1 TV channel.
They lease you an antenna, a tuner, and a DVR that you connect to over the internet. You only get the channels that the antenna you lease picks up.
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...brought to you by Carl's Jr. | |
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| | BiggA
join:2005-11-23
EARTH | Except that Aereo is doing it on a 1:1 basis, so it is just like a community antenna. Are condo community antennas now illegal too? Didn't think so. | |
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| | | said by morbo:Commercials are transmitted with Aereo, so how exactly is this stealing? It's only stealing if antenna users are also stealing.
OK so let's think of it another way.
Let's say an ice cream truck is giving away free ice cream. You come up and you get as much as you want.
But then you decide to break into the ice cream store (owned by the same company) and simply take as much as you want.
Is the latter stealing or not?
Another thing is that I can see Aereo's workaround as being clever and proper but it really does defy the laws of physics. How does a dime sized antenna in an electrically noisy datacenter pick up anything? | |
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| | | | Re: It's not stealing That's a terrible analogy. Ice cream is a finite resource. OTA transmissions are not. | |
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| |  badtripI heart the East BayPremium
join:2004-03-20
Albany, CA | No. To use your ice cream analogy, it's like the ice cream truck driver is charging his customers a fee for ice cream that the ice cream company just leaves out on the sallyport with a sign that says "Free". | |
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·Comcast
| SMH. I have no words to describe that horrendous analogy. Anyway, I'm willing to bet all the ice cream in that truck that Aereo will win in court, again and again. What are they losing? Absolutely nothing! Just another attempt to hold onto an old, outdated, lacking imagination and use of relevant technology to reach the customers. They're pissed they did not come up with it. | |
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| | | | said by fifty nine:Another thing is that I can see Aereo's workaround as being clever and proper but it really does defy the laws of physics. How does a dime sized antenna in an electrically noisy datacenter pick up anything?
Are they really in the datacenter or merely on the roof or in a window? Then again given the NYC market and that most broadcast from the Empire State Building or Secaucus I would think you could pick up the signal just about anywhere. | |
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| | | Broadcasters get paid by advertisers based on viewership. Aereo doesn't (currently) factor into those viewership numbers. | |
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| | RARPSL
join:1999-12-08
Suffern, NY | Re: It's not stealing said by Viewer Bewar :Broadcasters get paid by advertisers based on viewership. Aereo doesn't (currently) factor into those viewership numbers.
Neither do anyone who watches the show OTA as opposed to a cable system. How can they count my viewing their show when there is no indication that I am watching it (unless I am a Nelson Family). | |
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| | PBS, too, eh? Even so, broadcasters should be paying us to watch their ad-driven drivel. | |
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|  FBGuyPremium
join:2005-03-19
Evanston, IL | Re: PBS, too, eh? they should | |
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| | | said by NotHereNow :Even so, broadcasters should be paying us to watch their ad-driven drivel.
If it's so bad then why are so many people watching?
If it's so bad then why do people torrent shows? | |
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| | | | Re: PBS, too, eh? Have you seen the shows in Nielsen's top 10/top 20 ratings? Full of pure crap that you couldn't even pay me to watch. Well, there's no accounting for taste--some people will watch anything just because it's bright/colorful and loud. Sure, there are a few shows here and there worth watching, but none that I'd pay to watch. And given that my/our money already pays for the commercials... | |
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·Comcast
| said by fifty nine:If it's so bad then why are so many people watching?
If it's so bad then why do people torrent shows? Because no matter how hard we try, society still hasn't come up with a way to prevent people like Honey Boo Boo's parents from procreating.
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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| | | | | Re: PBS, too, eh? said by Androidian:Because no matter how hard we try, society still hasn't come up with a way to prevent people like Honey Boo Boo's parents from procreating.
We have, it's just you can't force someone to get it done. | |
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| | coming to Miami They say they are coming soon to Miami.
I will be one of their first customers. | |
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| | Fast forward a year or two from now... In other news Barry Diller was arrested for tax evasion/fraud. This is how it always ends for people who go against the big dogs. | |
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| openbox9Premium
join:2004-01-26
japan
kudos:2 | Re: Fast forward a year or two from now... Not if he has a good accountant and pays his legally required taxes. Guilt of tax evasion isn't due to the "big dogs", it's due to ignorance and/or stupidity. | |
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| | Umm... Why would anyone pay $12 a month for something that is being offered for free? | |
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| badtripI heart the East BayPremium
join:2004-03-20
Albany, CA | Re: Umm... Mostly ignorance but there are folks, like renters, that may not be able to put up a good antenna. | |
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·Comcast
| Re: Umm... Or certain people who want to get local channels from out-of-market areas. With Aereo, all it theoretically takes is a credit card with a billing zip code in the town you want to buy local channel access to.
Or certain people (like myself) who live far enough out of the major populated areas around DC that reception with an indoor antenna is terrible. Once this goes live down here, I'll likely add my name to the list of cord cutters.
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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|  japPremium
join:2003-08-10
038xx | said by steelingbox:Why would anyone pay $12 a month for something that is being offered for free? Tablets are easier to carry around the city and use on the bus, in the park, in the tube, etc. than a 115v AC television and it's antennae. | |
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| elray
join:2000-12-16
Santa Monica, CA | Because OTA reception isn't what it used to be. | |
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| | What if? What if I put up an antenna in New York and ran a 1000 mile no-loss coax to my home, would that be legal? | |
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| japPremium
join:2003-08-10
038xx | Re: What if? said by Jes Askin :What if I put up an antenna in New York and ran a 1000 mile no-loss coax to my home, would that be legal? Sure. As long as you leave 993 miles of the coax wound on their spools and the other seven to reach your home which is in the same broadcast licensing market as the antennae. | |
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| r81984Fair and BalancedPremium
join:2001-11-14
Katy, TX | Yes.
There is no legal authority or law that can regulate the length of your cable to your antenna. | |
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Reviews:
·Comcast
| PBS? PBS is suing these guys? Really? How asinine. As a taxpayer I'm outraged. This is how they waste my (our) money?
Perhaps the numerous politicians who suggested that PBS was a waste of taxpayer money and in need of some "trimming" were 100% on the mark in their statements. I plan to write my Congress Critters tomorrow and request that all funding to PBS be cut immediately. (Not like it will matter, but at least it will make me feel better.)
Kudos to Aereo. As soon as they start offering streaming in the Pittsburgh or DC markets, I'll happily and eagerly become a paying customer. It's nice to see someone fighting the twisted networks and cable rip-offs and actually winning for a change.
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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Reviews:
·Comcast
·Frontier Communi..
| If Dish network and Aereo win, broadcast TV dies. Should the networks lose both the Dish Hopper and the Aereo lawsuits I would expect the networks to quickly move as much as of their programming as possible to cable and let their affiliates go bankrupt. No sense for them to spend billions of dollars per year on programming costs if the fact that something is transmitted OTA leaves a huge legal loophole for a third party to both strip out all the ads and redistribute their product without paying them a single dime. | |
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| Re: If Dish network and Aereo win, broadcast TV dies. I hardly think it's the death knell for broadcast TV. Maybe it will force some changes to their business model - like, for instance, using more product placement in their shows instead of giving us 10 minutes of commercials every half hour that we all have a right to skip.
It's not a legal loophole; it's good business. People want to watch television without harassment, and companies are just trying to figure out ways to give that to them.
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A sane approach to our federal budget: NO tax increases / 15% cuts across-the-board / defunding of all ObamaCare-enacted programs. | |
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| | Re: Germany @Linklist; MyDogHsFleas et al
In order to issue an injunction the court must apply a four pronged test. One of the prongs is likelihood to prevail on the merits of the claim. The claim here is copyright infringement.
If a court doesn't believe there is likelihood to prevail on the merits in a preliminary injunction it is very likely they wont succeed to show an actual copyright infringement in the case in chief.
So it IS a major win for AERO, anybody saying otherwise is either blind or perhaps affiliated with the copyright mafia. | |
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| | Death of Retrans While there may be copyright issues, the real concern of broadcasters are retransmission fees being collected by affiliates and programmers from telco, cable and dish video providers.
Over the past 4+ years, major stations have elected retrans status and negotiated with each of the pay tv providers in their DMA. It's huge money per sub that will be challenged in court if/after Aereo really "wins".
The implications of an Aereo victory also have the Pay TV providers paying very close attention. On the other hand, programmers will likely tie this issue up in the courts for several years, which could extend past current retrans contracts. | |
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