11 ms·

Feds now oppose Aereo, rejecting cloud apocalypse argument

47 points by Baustin 13y ago

asn0 13y ago
The biggest threat of this lawsuit will be to the meanings of arcane technical terms such as "acquire", "playback" and "her".
fragsworth 13y ago
I don't understand why the broadcasters care enough to make a big deal about this. Isn't their goal to get as many viewers as they can, so they can make more advertising money? If Aereo is distributing the content to more people, aren't they getting more viewers? What is the problem here?
- samelawrence 13y ago
  I think the issue is that because of the DVR capabilities, users can now skip commercials. Also, because people won't be watching as much TV live in the future, the Nielsen data will get wonky. As we move towards an age of streaming, advertisers will pay more or less for placement in shows based on viewership data... but if Aereo controls the stream, then CBS / NBC / ABC would have to pay them to get that data to their advertisers. It's about control and antiquated business methods. This too shall pass.
  - rayiner 13y ago
    There's nothing "antiquated" about the business method here. Spending a lot of money to create content, and then distributing that content to customers is as viable as a business as ever. What broadcasters are objecting to is Aereo's trying to work a loophole in the copyright law with respect to over the air content. Normally, if a company wants to stream NBC's content to its customers, it will have to sign a contract (and pay money to) NBC. This is exactly the same as any other business where a middle man (like Aereo, or Netflix, or Amazon) sits between the customer and the producer. What Aereo is trying to do is distribute NBC's content to customers without paying for it. This is not an example of "technological innovation" challenging "antiquated business methods." It's a company using a Rube Goldberg contraption to try and exploit a loophole of copyright, to profit from someone else's product without paying for it.
    - revelation 13y ago
      You are carefully omitting that broadcasters are distributing their content over public airwaves, a right that they have only been granted to first and foremost serve the public interest. Relevant regulations forbid them from, for example, encrypting their content (despite proven commercial solutions; we wouldn't be having this discussion if they could). So we are in the peculiar situation that broadcasters have to simultaneously restrict access to their content to make money from it, while satisfying FCC regulation that forces them to make it available such as to serve the public interest. That's a Rube Goldberg contraption of a business model if I've ever seen one: it requires the government to continue its practice of giving broadcasters a practically free distribution channel, while relying on lobbyism and legal threats to make the government forget about the public mandate.
      - rayiner 13y ago
        There's absolutely nothing Rube Goldbergian about the business model. Broadcasters generally have a right to control the distribution of their content, with the exception that in return for being able to use the airwaves, they must allow people to receive over the air television freely. That's the bargain. It's a clearly defined benefit coupled to a clearly defined obligation. Obviously, the broadcasters have a legitimate interest in not wanting companies like Aereo to game that loophole for their own profit. The public mandate isn't implicated at all. Nobody is talking about cutting off conventional over the air TV. Streaming service like Aereo was never part of that bargain.
        revelation 13y ago
        This is where we reach the crux of the issue at hand. The question being: what is special about airwaves? As you explain it, broadcasters must allow me to receive their over the air content freely, but when I receive the same content from a 3rd party that took it from the air and made it available to me over cable, internet, smoke signals.. they are illegally rebroadcasting. So between congress establishing this bargain (where the only obvious medium for broadcasting was over-the-air) and today, where there are many ways to transmit TV, it suddenly became important over which medium I receive their content under the license granted to me by the bargain the broadcasters entered into. This seems like an odd situation we find ourselves in, because when the FCC started giving out licenses for spectrum nobody gave any thought to other mediums; there simply were no others. I say we end this charade, broadcasters stop transmitting over the public airwaves, we repurpose their spectrum for something useful and everybody keeps watching their favourite show on cable, as they are already doing.
- natdempk 13y ago
  Maybe it ruins their advertising locality or the value of having local network affiliated stations? But both of those seem like pretty lofty arguments.
  - samelawrence 13y ago
    No, it doesn't. You tell Aereo where you are, and it gives you your local broadcasts only (last time I checked).
    - natdempk 13y ago
      Ah okay, looking into it more and as another commenter has mentioned its probably the DVR aspect, which allows/encourages skipping commercials. They probably fear that the commercials will be stripped out or easily skippable.
    - joezydeco 13y ago
      They verify your location off the billing zipcode given when you drop a credit card number with them. They also geolocate your inbound IP when watching the service and try to bump you when you're not in the viewing area. It's been like this since the Beta started but I'm guessing once the court rulings are over they would lift the IP restrictions.
- bdcs 13y ago
  Hmm, good point. I would guess that Aereo, etc. may remove commercials, à la TiVo, during post-processing. Or even more rudimentarily, allow seeking, e.g. fast-forward over commercials.
  - acjohnson55 13y ago
    Aereo doesn't post-process. It just forwards the content of a miniature antenna to your device over IP. There's a one-to-one mapping between viewer and antenna. Cable companies, by contrast, currently tap the main feeds at one point, rebroadcast the content to their subscribers, and pay retransmission fees to the broadcasters. (Aereo also operate a DVR service, but the big fight is over the retransmission fees they're not paying)
- abat 13y ago
  Cable companies pay them a lot of money to retransmit network TV. If Aereo is legal, that means that cable companies could use same trick destroying a large portion of their revenue.
  - mikeryan 13y ago
    So why transmit OTA at all?
    - ProAm 13y ago
      Because we pay for it with our taxes.
      - hangonhn 13y ago
        Am I missing something? I thought they pay the FCC to use the spectrum.
        ProAm 13y ago
        They pay a license fee for the spectrum, but do not own it. Because no one can own a frequency. So the frequency is licensed by the government.
    - joezydeco 13y ago
      Not transmitting OTA leaves little excuse to retain a broadcast license on that spectrum.
      - letstryagain 13y ago
        So what?
    - paul_f 13y ago
      Exactly. They'd prefer not to. But then they can't charge the cable companies as much. A weird circle, huh?
- fleitz 13y ago
  TV and film distribution are dying industries grasping at straws. It's an end cycle game like aggressive stage 4 cancer treatment for the elderly, you blow all your money on a strategy that might buy 5 years of hell.
- Touche 13y ago
  They make more money from cable companies paying redistribution feeds.
- paul_f 13y ago
  You don't understand? Seriously? Can I pass along a life lesson? If you're ever unsure of another's motivations, just assume "money". You'll be right 98% if the time. Broadcasters, if they could, would never transmit over the air and keep their $1 month/subscriber.
brubaker 13y ago
Well the argument is bullshit.
fleitz 13y ago
This case is going to follow the legal principle of what the government wants the government gets. For example shopping malls and corporate headquarters are a public use of land, while growing a plant in your closet and consuming it in your home is interstate commerce.
snorkel 13y ago
Fed argument hinges on this "Under the 1976 Copyright Act, a company that retransmits copyrighted broadcast television programs must obtain a license, though qualifying retransmission services may avail themselves of the detailed statutory licensing schemes established by Congress." All television broadcasts are copyrighted, and local broadcasters, cable providers, and satellite providers all have attained licenses to retransmit those works. Feds are arguing that Aereo is charging customers for public retransmission of copyrighted works without a licence from the copyright holders. Of course current TV providers welcome this stance because they're also trying to sell DVR services.
- diminoten 13y ago
  Aereo isn't retransmitting to the public though, it's allowing you the ability to remotely deploy an antenna in a place where reception is good, and forwarding that signal onto you.
  - kej 13y ago
    It's a stretch to say they're letting me deploy an antenna. It's not like they're just an antenna colocation company where I go install it myself.
    - deelowe 13y ago
      If they were, would this change your mind? What if they acted as if they were a subcontractor? At a certain point the line isn't so clear anymore. I don't know the correct answer here, but I'm concerned about the precedent this could set.
    - icebraining 13y ago
      That's an interesting proposition. If you did have different companies doing the job - say, Aereo would rent you the roof space and provide a dumb Internet pipe, another would sell you the device and yet another would install it for you -, who would be to blame?
    - koenigdavidmj 13y ago
mark-r 13y ago
The Obama administration supporting broadcasters? What a shock.
higherpurpose 13y ago
If it may seem odd to you that the White House would get involved in this issue, this may uncover the mystery - this is what you get when White House hires former MPAA and RIAA executives in the administration: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140303/17554626416/us-solicitor-generals-office-run-former-top-mpaa-lawyer-shockingly-sides-with-broadcasters-over-aereo.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140303/17554626416/us-sol...
forgotAgain 13y ago
Anyone have any knowledge of the particulars of the license that the broadcasters bought for the spectrum they use. Are they perpetual or for a limited time? Just wondering if with the networks claim that most of their viewership comes from cable if their use of the spectrum would no longer be considered the best use for serving the public interest. Taking it further, would that allow the government to re-purpose the spectrum for other use.
ynniv 13y ago
The problem with the argument against Aereo is that (regardless of the Justice Department's statement) it unravels rental services. Where is the line drawn? Can I not rent a hotel room and watch television in it? Can I not rent a hotel room, put a networked camera in it, and watch the television in the room while I am not physically in it? Can I not rent a hotel room that already has such a camera in it? Can I not rent a 1x1x1 hotel room with a miniature television and network camera in it? Can the television and camera not be one device? The "room" of Aereo is much smaller, but does size change legality?
- bduerst 13y ago
  Only if you were to redistribute said content. The argument they're making looks like they're saying that Aereo can't stream copyrighted content over the internet, because the copyright owners (the broadcasters) don't want their content used in the manner. This is weird because broadcasters aren't supposed to have copyrights on material once it's been broadcast. That's been Aereo's edge. Basically they're trying to close the loophole by saying Aereo isn't consuming the signal, hence they are interfering with the broadcast to the real consumer.
  - icebraining 13y ago
    Hum, who says the broadcasters aren't supposed to have copyright on the material? That makes no sense, if they didn't everyone could just capture it and rebroadcast to the whole world at will. I believe Aereo's position is not that the broadcasters don't hold the copyright, it's that they aren't violating it since they just do "location-shifting".
    - ynniv 13y ago
      they aren't violating it since they just do "location-shifting" This is my understanding. For $8/mo, people are renting the physical space that contains an antenna. The crux of the case is whether renting a sensor, or access to a space with a sensor, is illegal.
      - 13y ago

47 points by Baustin 13y ago

asn0 13y ago

The biggest threat of this lawsuit will be to the meanings of arcane technical terms such as "acquire", "playback" and "her".

fragsworth 13y ago

I don't understand why the broadcasters care enough to make a big deal about this. Isn't their goal to get as many viewers as they can, so they can make more advertising money? If Aereo is distributing the content to more people, aren't they getting more viewers? What is the problem here?

samelawrence 13y ago
I think the issue is that because of the DVR capabilities, users can now skip commercials. Also, because people won't be watching as much TV live in the future, the Nielsen data will get wonky. As we move towards an age of streaming, advertisers will pay more or less for placement in shows based on viewership data... but if Aereo controls the stream, then CBS / NBC / ABC would have to pay them to get that data to their advertisers. It's about control and antiquated business methods. This too shall pass.
- rayiner 13y ago
  There's nothing "antiquated" about the business method here. Spending a lot of money to create content, and then distributing that content to customers is as viable as a business as ever. What broadcasters are objecting to is Aereo's trying to work a loophole in the copyright law with respect to over the air content. Normally, if a company wants to stream NBC's content to its customers, it will have to sign a contract (and pay money to) NBC. This is exactly the same as any other business where a middle man (like Aereo, or Netflix, or Amazon) sits between the customer and the producer. What Aereo is trying to do is distribute NBC's content to customers without paying for it. This is not an example of "technological innovation" challenging "antiquated business methods." It's a company using a Rube Goldberg contraption to try and exploit a loophole of copyright, to profit from someone else's product without paying for it.
  - revelation 13y ago
    You are carefully omitting that broadcasters are distributing their content over public airwaves, a right that they have only been granted to first and foremost serve the public interest. Relevant regulations forbid them from, for example, encrypting their content (despite proven commercial solutions; we wouldn't be having this discussion if they could). So we are in the peculiar situation that broadcasters have to simultaneously restrict access to their content to make money from it, while satisfying FCC regulation that forces them to make it available such as to serve the public interest. That's a Rube Goldberg contraption of a business model if I've ever seen one: it requires the government to continue its practice of giving broadcasters a practically free distribution channel, while relying on lobbyism and legal threats to make the government forget about the public mandate.
    - rayiner 13y ago
      There's absolutely nothing Rube Goldbergian about the business model. Broadcasters generally have a right to control the distribution of their content, with the exception that in return for being able to use the airwaves, they must allow people to receive over the air television freely. That's the bargain. It's a clearly defined benefit coupled to a clearly defined obligation. Obviously, the broadcasters have a legitimate interest in not wanting companies like Aereo to game that loophole for their own profit. The public mandate isn't implicated at all. Nobody is talking about cutting off conventional over the air TV. Streaming service like Aereo was never part of that bargain.
      - revelation 13y ago
        This is where we reach the crux of the issue at hand. The question being: what is special about airwaves? As you explain it, broadcasters must allow me to receive their over the air content freely, but when I receive the same content from a 3rd party that took it from the air and made it available to me over cable, internet, smoke signals.. they are illegally rebroadcasting. So between congress establishing this bargain (where the only obvious medium for broadcasting was over-the-air) and today, where there are many ways to transmit TV, it suddenly became important over which medium I receive their content under the license granted to me by the bargain the broadcasters entered into. This seems like an odd situation we find ourselves in, because when the FCC started giving out licenses for spectrum nobody gave any thought to other mediums; there simply were no others. I say we end this charade, broadcasters stop transmitting over the public airwaves, we repurpose their spectrum for something useful and everybody keeps watching their favourite show on cable, as they are already doing.
natdempk 13y ago
Maybe it ruins their advertising locality or the value of having local network affiliated stations? But both of those seem like pretty lofty arguments.
- samelawrence 13y ago
  No, it doesn't. You tell Aereo where you are, and it gives you your local broadcasts only (last time I checked).
  - natdempk 13y ago
    Ah okay, looking into it more and as another commenter has mentioned its probably the DVR aspect, which allows/encourages skipping commercials. They probably fear that the commercials will be stripped out or easily skippable.
  - joezydeco 13y ago
    They verify your location off the billing zipcode given when you drop a credit card number with them. They also geolocate your inbound IP when watching the service and try to bump you when you're not in the viewing area. It's been like this since the Beta started but I'm guessing once the court rulings are over they would lift the IP restrictions.
bdcs 13y ago
Hmm, good point. I would guess that Aereo, etc. may remove commercials, à la TiVo, during post-processing. Or even more rudimentarily, allow seeking, e.g. fast-forward over commercials.
- acjohnson55 13y ago
  Aereo doesn't post-process. It just forwards the content of a miniature antenna to your device over IP. There's a one-to-one mapping between viewer and antenna. Cable companies, by contrast, currently tap the main feeds at one point, rebroadcast the content to their subscribers, and pay retransmission fees to the broadcasters. (Aereo also operate a DVR service, but the big fight is over the retransmission fees they're not paying)
abat 13y ago
Cable companies pay them a lot of money to retransmit network TV. If Aereo is legal, that means that cable companies could use same trick destroying a large portion of their revenue.
- mikeryan 13y ago
  So why transmit OTA at all?
  - ProAm 13y ago
    Because we pay for it with our taxes.
    - hangonhn 13y ago
      Am I missing something? I thought they pay the FCC to use the spectrum.
      - ProAm 13y ago
        They pay a license fee for the spectrum, but do not own it. Because no one can own a frequency. So the frequency is licensed by the government.
  - joezydeco 13y ago
    Not transmitting OTA leaves little excuse to retain a broadcast license on that spectrum.
    - letstryagain 13y ago
      So what?
  - paul_f 13y ago
    Exactly. They'd prefer not to. But then they can't charge the cable companies as much. A weird circle, huh?
fleitz 13y ago
TV and film distribution are dying industries grasping at straws. It's an end cycle game like aggressive stage 4 cancer treatment for the elderly, you blow all your money on a strategy that might buy 5 years of hell.
Touche 13y ago
They make more money from cable companies paying redistribution feeds.
paul_f 13y ago
You don't understand? Seriously? Can I pass along a life lesson? If you're ever unsure of another's motivations, just assume "money". You'll be right 98% if the time. Broadcasters, if they could, would never transmit over the air and keep their $1 month/subscriber.

brubaker 13y ago

Well the argument is bullshit.

fleitz 13y ago

This case is going to follow the legal principle of what the government wants the government gets. For example shopping malls and corporate headquarters are a public use of land, while growing a plant in your closet and consuming it in your home is interstate commerce.

snorkel 13y ago

Fed argument hinges on this "Under the 1976 Copyright Act, a company that retransmits copyrighted broadcast television programs must obtain a license, though qualifying retransmission services may avail themselves of the detailed statutory licensing schemes established by Congress." All television broadcasts are copyrighted, and local broadcasters, cable providers, and satellite providers all have attained licenses to retransmit those works. Feds are arguing that Aereo is charging customers for public retransmission of copyrighted works without a licence from the copyright holders. Of course current TV providers welcome this stance because they're also trying to sell DVR services.

diminoten 13y ago
Aereo isn't retransmitting to the public though, it's allowing you the ability to remotely deploy an antenna in a place where reception is good, and forwarding that signal onto you.
- kej 13y ago
  It's a stretch to say they're letting me deploy an antenna. It's not like they're just an antenna colocation company where I go install it myself.
  - deelowe 13y ago
    If they were, would this change your mind? What if they acted as if they were a subcontractor? At a certain point the line isn't so clear anymore. I don't know the correct answer here, but I'm concerned about the precedent this could set.
  - icebraining 13y ago
    That's an interesting proposition. If you did have different companies doing the job - say, Aereo would rent you the roof space and provide a dumb Internet pipe, another would sell you the device and yet another would install it for you -, who would be to blame?
  - koenigdavidmj 13y ago

mark-r 13y ago

The Obama administration supporting broadcasters? What a shock.

higherpurpose 13y ago

If it may seem odd to you that the White House would get involved in this issue, this may uncover the mystery - this is what you get when White House hires former MPAA and RIAA executives in the administration: http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140303/17554626416/us-solicitor-generals-office-run-former-top-mpaa-lawyer-shockingly-sides-with-broadcasters-over-aereo.shtml http://www.techdirt.com/articles/20140303/17554626416/us-sol...

forgotAgain 13y ago

Anyone have any knowledge of the particulars of the license that the broadcasters bought for the spectrum they use. Are they perpetual or for a limited time? Just wondering if with the networks claim that most of their viewership comes from cable if their use of the spectrum would no longer be considered the best use for serving the public interest. Taking it further, would that allow the government to re-purpose the spectrum for other use.

ynniv 13y ago

The problem with the argument against Aereo is that (regardless of the Justice Department's statement) it unravels rental services. Where is the line drawn? Can I not rent a hotel room and watch television in it? Can I not rent a hotel room, put a networked camera in it, and watch the television in the room while I am not physically in it? Can I not rent a hotel room that already has such a camera in it? Can I not rent a 1x1x1 hotel room with a miniature television and network camera in it? Can the television and camera not be one device? The "room" of Aereo is much smaller, but does size change legality?

bduerst 13y ago
Only if you were to redistribute said content. The argument they're making looks like they're saying that Aereo can't stream copyrighted content over the internet, because the copyright owners (the broadcasters) don't want their content used in the manner. This is weird because broadcasters aren't supposed to have copyrights on material once it's been broadcast. That's been Aereo's edge. Basically they're trying to close the loophole by saying Aereo isn't consuming the signal, hence they are interfering with the broadcast to the real consumer.
- icebraining 13y ago
  Hum, who says the broadcasters aren't supposed to have copyright on the material? That makes no sense, if they didn't everyone could just capture it and rebroadcast to the whole world at will. I believe Aereo's position is not that the broadcasters don't hold the copyright, it's that they aren't violating it since they just do "location-shifting".
  - ynniv 13y ago
    they aren't violating it since they just do "location-shifting" This is my understanding. For $8/mo, people are renting the physical space that contains an antenna. The crux of the case is whether renting a sensor, or access to a space with a sensor, is illegal.
    - 13y ago