Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf] • Hacker News Board

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#81

Post by cheez0r » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:52 PM UTC

untog wrote: post #33

cheez0r wrote: post #10

The Supreme Court is wrong- the reason cable companies are treated as a 'public' performance of a work is that their distribution medium is shared- any subscriber can tune into that broadcasting of that work over a shared common carrier where one copy of the work is transmitted and many subscribers can view it. Aereo is different in that it only transmits the signal captured to a single subscriber at a time, removing…

Aereo's setup is absurd. Placing hundreds if not thousands of identical antennas on a rooftop, capturing identical signals and sending them, individually, to users. That's expensive and inefficient. The only reason they did it was to exploit a potential loophole in the current law - and now the Supreme Court has effectively closed that loophole.

Yes- they are renting me an antenna in the locale the performance is being broadcast, and providing connectivity to that antenna. That is not a loophole- that is the letter of the law- that an individual can receive a broadcast performance of a work, but that it cannot be duplicated. It meets the letter of the law- unlike a system that received the broadcast signal, captured it, and provided the same copy to many users, which would violate the 'public performance' section of the law. Renting me an antenna makes it my individual private antenna, removing the public aspect of the performance, and making it perfectly legal.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#82

Post by berberous » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:53 PM UTC

acheron wrote: post #32

acjohnson55 wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm reading the opinion now, and I would not have guessed that those particular justices would have made the ruling they did. Does anybody have insight into how this decision fits with the ideological views of the justices?

It's almost as if the justices are actual people with complex sets of knowledge, opinions, and interpretations rather than just your stereotypes!

While I generally agree, this opinion split down ideological lines and it also strikes me as curious.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#83

Post by skottk » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:53 PM UTC

themgt wrote: post #43

The really interesting question is the implications for future precedent/innovations. The ruling says "But this difference [Aero's technological setup] means nothing to the subscriber. It means nothing to the broadcaster. We do not see how this single difference, invisible to subscriber and broadcaster alike, could transform a system that is for all practical purposes a traditional cable system into “a copy shop that…

The user involvement bit is addressing the Cartoon Network case regarding Cablevision's remote DVR architecture that Aereo is based on.

Cablevision designed a remote DVR system that made transient, user-specific copies based on the user's pressing a button on their set-top-box remote. In their defense against Cartoon Network et al., Cablevision made the "volitional conduct" defense that Scalia talks about in the dissent here- essentially, that the user who pressed the button was responsible for making the copy. Cablevision won at trial and on appeal in the Second Circuit.

The biggest difference between the Cablevision case and the Aereo case is that Cablevision has and pays for the broadcast licenses that Aereo was trying to avoid having to obtain.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#84

Post by the_ancient » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:54 PM UTC

johnpmayer wrote: post #11

Seems like, because Aereo isn't just a hardware renter but also an integrated SaaS provider, they were treated as such. The court opinion talks in terms of user interaction with menus on the site to select shows. We're kidding ourselves if this works anything like "hardware rental". If it were, it would feel more like AWS.

I see so if you want to be "hardware rental" you have have a bad UI but if you have a good ui you are then SaaS..

WTF

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#85

Post by danielweber » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:54 PM UTC

Grue3 wrote: post #27

pgrote wrote: post #9

Justices Breyer, Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Kagan were the majority. It isn't over since the case now goes back to the lower court, but Aereo can no longer argue they are the same as a person putting an antenna on their roof.

So, all the "liberal" judges? Sucks that the ones who usually defend human rights are also the same people who stifle innovation.

Everything following this comment is a horrible derail. And would be expected from the plain text of the comment.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#86

Post by mikeash » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:54 PM UTC

skottk wrote: post #58

mikeash wrote: post #42

I imagine this is a minority opinion here, but I don't see a problem with this decision. Tech people like to treat laws as rigid rules that would be written in a formally specified language if only legislators were capable of such a thing. But they're not, and by design. It doesn't make sense for a law to be written such that receiving on one antenna and sending the result to your users is illegal, but receiving one…

Your points about the way law works are exactly where technical people often run into trouble when they reason about the law. Given that the TV broadcasters are paying for the right to broadcast (often gigantic amounts of money), I don't see a problem with preventing an Aereo from free-riding on that privilege. YMMV.

Why do they pay for the right to broadcast, though? Because they want people to watch, right? Isn't receiving their signal and transmitting it to more people who can watch it more easily and with higher quality doing them a service?

If you look back before cable TV, broadcasters transmitted their signal and the only people who could watch it were those with suitable equipment within range. Broadcasters competed to get as many people as possible to watch. Each new eyeball (preferably in pairs) meant additional revenue for them with no additional cost.

Then comes cable TV. In addition to access to new channels, it also provides the benefit of being able to watch regular broadcast channels even when you couldn't receive them over the air. That means more viewers for the broadcast stations, and thus more revenue. Why, then, should broadcast stations get paid for distributing their signal to more people, which is what they want anyway?

It's clear to me that this is what the law says, and since the Supreme Court's job is to interpret the law, it also seems clear enough to me that they made the right decision here. But it doesn't seem like a very good law.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#87

Post by pla3rhat3r » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:54 PM UTC

jonnathanson wrote: post #45

Grue3 wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, all the "liberal" judges? Sucks that the ones who usually defend human rights are also the same people who stifle innovation.

Well, the problem is that Aereo probably could not have prevailed at SCOTUS, because SCOTUS looks to precedent. In this case, their interpretation of the precedent itself (Copyright Act of 1976) was accurate, even if that precedent is out of date in our eyes. If you want SCOTUS justices to innovate, you need to challenge the precedents at their fundamental level, or else point to other precedents that should invalida…

Well said.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#88

Post by jcampbell1 » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:54 PM UTC

Alupis wrote: post #39

pgrote wrote: post #9

Justices Breyer, Roberts, Kennedy, Ginsburg, Sotomayor and Kagan were the majority. It isn't over since the case now goes back to the lower court, but Aereo can no longer argue they are the same as a person putting an antenna on their roof.

Can someone explain the gist of what's going on to an outside observer not familiar with Aereo?

Aereo is a company that setup 1000s of DVR's with 1000s of antennas on a New York City rooftop. They lease access to these DVRs for roughtly $5/month and the DVRs stream to your computer.

In the US, broadcast channels are free over the air. However, there is a law that says if cable companies want to retransmit the broadcasts, the networks can charge the cable companies.

Is Aereo "retransmitting" the broadcast, or just renting personal antennas? That is what the Supreme Court was deciding.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#89

Post by rayiner » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:54 PM UTC

themgt wrote: post #43

The really interesting question is the implications for future precedent/innovations. The ruling says "But this difference [Aero's technological setup] means nothing to the subscriber. It means nothing to the broadcaster. We do not see how this single difference, invisible to subscriber and broadcaster alike, could transform a system that is for all practical purposes a traditional cable system into “a copy shop that…

I find the use of "innovation" here irritating. There's nothing "innovative" in 2014 about a service that streams TV over the internet. The only thing "innovative" about Aereo is its legal strategy of exploiting a loophole in the law.

Re: Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

#90

Post by smeyer » Wed, Jun 25, 2014, 2:55 PM UTC

Apoorv02 wrote: post #69

smeyer wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Aereo is not violating anything but they should have been prepared for something like this. In what other sense could they have been prepared? They fully expected to end up in the courts, likely through the supreme court, and planned appropriately. They lost the case, but it doesn't seem to be for lack of preparation.

I was proposing for them to be prepared before it happened not for the trial.

Sorry, I'm still confused what you mean by "be prepared before it happened". Are you saying they should have pursued a different strategy/loophole around copyright law? That they should have realized they had no chance and not pursued funding? I'm not trying to be argumentative, I just genuinely don't understand what preparation you're saying they should have taken.

For the record, I work at a company with a lot of former Navic Networks employees (the company Chet Kanjoia founded before Aereo) so there's plenty of talk about Aereo and I'm pretty familiar with their model.