Supreme Court side with networks, rules that Aereo flouts copyright
Streaming video startup Aereo -- which sells "antenna subscriptions" that allow consumers to stream over-the-air television content to any Mac, iOS device or PC via their Internet connection -- is likely to shut down following a Supreme Court ruling that the company's business model violated federal copyright laws.
The Court held that Aereo's customers constitute "the public," and that retransmitting television networks' copyrighted material goes against their exclusive right to perform their works publicly as the holders of the copyright. Justice Breyer wrote for the majority, joined by Justices Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan.
"We must decide whether respondent Aereo, Inc., infringes this exclusive right by selling its subscribers a technologically complex service that allows them to watch television programs over the Internet at about the same time as the programs are broadcast over the air," the opinion reads. "We conclude that it does."
Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Alito dissented, arguing that Aereo's digital transmissions do not constitute a "performance" and, as such, the networks have no standing.
The networks' claim that Aereo directly violates their copyright "fails at the very outset because Aereo does not "perform" at all," Justice Scalia wrote in the dissent. "The Court manages to reach the opposite conclusion only by disregarding widely accepted rules for service-provider liability and adopting in their place an improvised standard ("looks-like-cable-TV") that will sow confusion for years to come."
Though Aereo has yet to respond to the ruling, cofounder Chet Kanojia has previously said that they could have no alternative but to shutter the business if they lost the case. "There is no plan B," Kanojia declared in April.
The Court held that Aereo's customers constitute "the public," and that retransmitting television networks' copyrighted material goes against their exclusive right to perform their works publicly as the holders of the copyright. Justice Breyer wrote for the majority, joined by Justices Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor, and Kagan.
"We must decide whether respondent Aereo, Inc., infringes this exclusive right by selling its subscribers a technologically complex service that allows them to watch television programs over the Internet at about the same time as the programs are broadcast over the air," the opinion reads. "We conclude that it does."
Justices Scalia, Thomas, and Alito dissented, arguing that Aereo's digital transmissions do not constitute a "performance" and, as such, the networks have no standing.
The networks' claim that Aereo directly violates their copyright "fails at the very outset because Aereo does not "perform" at all," Justice Scalia wrote in the dissent. "The Court manages to reach the opposite conclusion only by disregarding widely accepted rules for service-provider liability and adopting in their place an improvised standard ("looks-like-cable-TV") that will sow confusion for years to come."
Though Aereo has yet to respond to the ruling, cofounder Chet Kanojia has previously said that they could have no alternative but to shutter the business if they lost the case. "There is no plan B," Kanojia declared in April.
Comments
Bunch of sad, old codgers that have no clue about how and where technology is headed. Pathetic ruling.
"Plan B" is for the public to shutter the entire cable/satellite industry. That will take a generation, but it is unstoppable.
Oh you've got to be kidding me.
Good luck to you TV corps. You can only legislate your business for so long.
Ugh is right. I'm torn on this, I used to work in the broadcast industry, but I really don't agree with it at all. I hate the cable companies, but it's a clear violation of the Funky Cookie Company laws of rebroadcasting a signal. My engineering side says who cares, all they are doing is renting out an antenna. It's the profit of copyrighted material the court evidently had a problem with.
Innovation was squashed today.
This is unrelated to the topic but I finally decided to give my wife imac/iphone/ipad her own AppleID on her devices. I will link her AppleID to my AppleID when iOS8 is out so we can share apps/music/TV/movies purchased.
My question is this: Can I link my father AppleID to ours if is home address is different than ours?
iOS 8 family sharing limitations question:
This is unrelated to the topic but I finally decided to give my wife imac/iphone/ipad her own AppleID on her devices. I will link her AppleID to my AppleID when iOS8 is out so we can share apps/music/TV/movies purchased.
My question is this: Can I link my father AppleID to ours if is home address is different than ours?
I think it matters on if the credit cards are shared. That is how I understand it.
Seems like the right decision to me. The broadcasters have the right to distribute their copyrighted content as they see fit. Just yesterday ABC announced some of their content would be live on Apple TV. That is the way it should be done. Grabbing the signal out of the air is basically stealing. It is protected just like any other content. Have you ever read the copyright on Apple's keynote broadcast? No rebroadcast, reproducing, re-streaming, etc. is permitted.
Aereo knew rebroadcasting was infringing which is why they came up with the convoluted scheme of renting your own remote antenna. Technologically there is no need to have thousands of separate antennas, it was just a legal end run around and it didn't work.
I think it matters on if the credit cards are shared. That is how I understand it.
well none of our accounts are link to credit cards, we load them with itunes card we buy at a discount. I get all my itunes card with airmiles so they are free actually.Another ruling designed to crush the consumer and uphold the antiquated ways of the evil corporations. I live in the mountains where, even though I am only 20 miles from downtown Denver as the crow flies, I cannot get TV via an antenna. And even cable conveniently stops a few hundred feet from my neighborhood so my only option was to get locked into a long-term, expensive contract with a satellite company. Aereo was a godsend. Figures that somebody would find a way to shut it down. Irritating.
How do you receive your Internet if the cable stops before your neighborhood? Is there some other broadband?
Edit: I just checked Aereo's site and none of the zip codes west of Denver appear to be in their coverage area. What is your zip code?
Bunch of sad, old codgers that have no clue about how and where technology is headed. Pathetic ruling.
Interesting that the most conservative members of the court dissented.
Interesting that the most conservative members of the court dissented.
It's not every day that Scalia comes out with a sane opinion.
The conservatives sided with Aero and the liberals sided with Copyright. Who didn't see this coming?
Conservatives are pro business while the liberal judges favor intellectual property rights. Copyright is more important than some startup trying to earn a living off of other people's hard work. Copyright is a concept that must be preserved.
If Aero had won, the cable companies would have been released from their obligation to pay the networks their outrageous fees. The networks are the weasels in this story. Not the courts, not Aero, and not the cable giants.
The networks are subsidized with millions in federal funds to keep the Emergency Broadcast network (EMN) open and in doing so, give their content away freely for billions of dollars in advertising revenue.
The networks are flush with cash, yet they continue to fill the airwaves with crappy censored television programming in the name of keeping the emergency signal open? That my friends is the real scam!
The networks have had it good for too long. The Emergency Broadcast network should move over to the internet. Divert the federal funds to the Electronic Frontier Foundation, et. al., and give the Networks and their advertising sponsors a taste of their own dog food.
Seems like the right decision to me. The broadcasters have the right to distribute their copyrighted content as they see fit. Just yesterday ABC announced some of their content would be live on Apple TV. That is the way it should be done. Grabbing the signal out of the air is basically stealing. It is protected just like any other content. Have you ever read the copyright on Apple's keynote broadcast? No rebroadcast, reproducing, re-streaming, etc. is permitted.
Aereo knew rebroadcasting was infringing which is why they came up with the convoluted scheme of renting your own remote antenna. Technologically there is no need to have thousands of separate antennas, it was just a legal end run around and it didn't work.
How is grabbing a open broadcast signal stealing? Those people who have only their "local" stations broadcasting openly, they are stealing according to you.
Sorry to say, technically many things are illegal then... your DVR... Reproduces (copies to it's hard drive), rebroadcasts (replay's), re-streams (to other boxes in your house or to your mobile device(s)), everything without paying any copyright fees. Your Mobile device, cable company's have the "watch anywhere" app's, and if your have it playing on your mobile device anywhere at all, your rebroadcasting. And don't give me that "cable company's etc already paid for that" BS... guess what, if they did then they would have to know what you are re-doing/watching and pay the parent company 25K for the license to rebroadcast anything and everything you record on DVR, or watch on your mobile device. BTW - that would be EACH time you did. Record a show and watch it 5 times, would be 25K PER TIME you watched, total for that would 125K.I thought that my cable bill was getting too high, so I looked into how to lower my cable bill drastically, and it worked.
I tweeted that I was going to cancel my cable service, and I used a hashtag for the cable company, and they responded back to me within an hour. After I provided a few details to them, some higher up person, not just a lowly customer rep, called me back, and I politely made my case, and I made a few changes to my service, and my new monthly bill is more than $60 less than it was before.
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Oh, and one more thing. Not only is my bill much less, but I got them to drastically increase my internet speed also.
I'm now getting 100 down and 10 up.
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How is it any different than you watching a program that you DVR'd over Slingbox, or recording a TV show onto a HDD, and using a media center like Plex to stream it?