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Supreme court: Aereo is violating copyright law [pdf]

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

#371

Post by davorak »

lisper wrote: post #366
davorak wrote: post #361

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> Just because a single instance of an activity is legal does not necessarily mean that N instances of the same activity are legal. One person does something it is legal, but if N people do it it is illegal? I do not think that is what you are trying to say, but I can not isolate what you are trying to say.

Actually that's exactly what I'm saying. And there are lots of examples where an activity is only illegal if N>>1. Unlawful assembly, for example.

> Unlawful assembly, for example.

I thought about that example specifically and it does not seem to fit.

Normally the problem with too many people assembling is that they they block businesses, road ways, etc. In this case each person is not doing the same thing as when N=1. Some N+1 person comes along and decides that it is ok to block a door way or a road, or can not tell that their addition adds to an egress problem if there is a fire. In the example of unlawful assembly of N>>! people are not taking the same actions as when N=1.

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

#372

Post by alexqgb »

davorak wrote: post #362
alexqgb wrote: post #339

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The critical difference with Aero is that it's never your antenna. It's leased, not owned, and moreover, Aero treats the antennas themselves on a fungible basis, meaning that they they simply maintain a 1:1 relationship between the number of antennas and the number of subscribers, so you're not even leasing any specific piece of equipment. You're just buying individual access to an independently owned and operated an…

> they simply maintain a 1:1 relationship between the number of antennas and the number of subscribers, That is not my understanding. Bob and George could have both leased Aero antenna in the same area. Bob's could get good rescission and George's could get bad reception impacting making George's experience worse. Or so says the public statements of Aero. > You're just buying individual access to an independently own…

Here's how the arrangement was described last year in a Gigaom article.

"the antennas are “multitenant” which means that, when one Aereo subscriber is not using an antenna at a given time, it is available to all other subscribers."

http://gigaom.com/2013/02/06/inside-aereo-new-photos-of-the-...

So no, it's not "your" antenna any more than a weekend rental from Hertz is "your" car. Moreover, the antenna is only part of the package. The real lyncpin making the system work is - or was - Aero's proprietary transcoding setup and the equipment that handles the feed coming off the antenna, and that is definitely not run on a 1:1 basis.

I mean, the whole idea that this is a bunch of individually "leased" equipment packages that just happen to be co-located in the same facility without any meaningful overlap between each person's personal, individual feed ("just like me putting my antenna on someone else's roof!") is such complete and utter bullshit.

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

#373

Post by davorak »

harryh wrote: post #312
BrandonY wrote: post #303

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Are you suggesting that it should be illegal to rent an antenna via a recurring fee?

If it's bundled with a service that streams over the air broadcasts via the internet to wherever you happen to be, then yes.

So it would be ok to by the equipment, then occasionally pay for repair when it breaks? What is the dividing line that would make buying and paying for repairs ok, but not renting?

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

#374

Post by AnthonyMouse »

npizzolato wrote: post #357
AnthonyMouse wrote: post #314

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> By weighing the intentions of the company against the intentions of the law. Putting aside how you're supposed to evaluate the intent of Congress or Aereo without evaluating exactly what it is they're doing, are you ready for the stupid consequences of that? It would mean someone doing the same thing with the same result would be legal if they had different intent. For example, someone could set up a service where…

Intent of involved parties is already a big part of the legal system and is a major (and sometimes necessary) aspect of many laws[1]. And in my opinion having intent matter is just common sense. It's why torrent clients are perfectly okay despite how easy it is to find torrents of copyrighted material, but Popcorn Time was probably going to have a challenging time in the courts[2]. [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Me…

The way an intent requirement is supposed to work is that there is some evil specified by the law that you are not supposed to do, and the prosecution or the plaintiff has to prove not only that you did it but that you intended to do it.

The problem with cases like this or Grokster is that it's the reverse of that. If you intended to get the same result as the prohibited thing then whatever it is you actually did is retroactively defined as the offense. It's thoughtcrime. You were thinking "bad thoughts" when you did something, therefore whatever it is you did is prohibited.

The consequences of that are all kinds of stupid. On the one hand it means that everybody has to hire lawyers and censor their employees to make sure nobody says anything that could retroactively cause their actions to be interpreted as unlawful by providing evidence of intent. It's completely pointless for BitTorrent to be OK while Popcorn Time isn't. Popcorn Time is essentially BitTorrent with a different logo. If you can't shut down BitTorrent then being able to shut down Popcorn Time will cause a zero percent reduction in piracy.

Meanwhile for all the language about not wanting to discourage innovation, how is that not the only possible result of this? You might as well post a sign that says "technological solutions to legal problems are prohibited." And technological solutions to legal problems are great, because legal problems are problems and technological solutions are solutions.

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

#375

Post by davorak »

harryh wrote: post #340
baddox wrote: post #338

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not arguing that the law is the way I think it should be. I'm just arguing that the law is really dumb, and that it's pretty clear the legal system just makes decisions that serve the interests of powerful lobbies, rather than some intelligent or even discernible set of rules or principles.

I understand that you think it's really dumb but I think most people would disagree with you. When you get bogged down in the technical details of Aereo's datacenter configuration you miss the forrest for the trees. They're a company that streams TV into people's homes. Other companies (the cable companies) have to pay a fee to the content creators to do that. Why should it be different for Aereo? It costs a lot of m…

> They're a company that streams TV into people's homes. Other companies (the cable companies) have to pay a fee to the content creators to do that. Why should it be different for Aereo?

The fee was already paid then that party decided to stream it over the air. If the content creator does not want that they they do not have to allow for that usage. Or charge more for it.

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

#376

Post by davorak »

harryh wrote: post #289
belorn wrote: post #282

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That is the argument of the ruling, but it seems arbitrary defined. I would ask what law grounds the definition of the black box. If one would try to do the same to a illegal content hosted on a website, where should I start drawing this box? At my ISP, since it is the edge where I as a customer receives the content? At the websites ISP, since it is the one that broadcast the content? The coo-location of the server,…

Welcome to the world of common law. It's not source code with precisely defined rules. It's a set of values adjudicated by judges attempting to issue rulings that most would consider fair.

> It's not source code with precisely defined rules.

I do not see anyone making the argument that it is.

> It's a set of values adjudicated by judges attempting to issue rulings that most would consider fair.

belorn is offering arguments/evidence that an unfair decision was reached by the court in this case.

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

#377

Post by davorak »

Goronmon wrote: post #241
coldpie wrote: post #230

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can I set up my own antenna in New York and stream its recordings back to myself in Minneapolis? How long is my antenna allowed to be before it magically switches to becoming illegal? This is an incredibly stupid decision that raises many more questions than it answers.

Can I set up my own antenna in New York and stream its recordings back to myself in Minneapolis? How long is my antenna allowed to be before it magically switches to becoming illegal? If I'm not mistaken, the answers to these questions haven't changed because of this decision. So whatever you think the answer was before, that's the same answer now.

That is not clear to me. I can not pay Aero to set up and maintain the antenna and equipment or at least that is what this ruling seems to indicate. If I can not pay some one to do it for me why is ok for me to do the work with my own two hands?

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

#378

Post by harryh »

davorak wrote: post #373
harryh wrote: post #312

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If it's bundled with a service that streams over the air broadcasts via the internet to wherever you happen to be, then yes.

So it would be ok to by the equipment, then occasionally pay for repair when it breaks? What is the dividing line that would make buying and paying for repairs ok, but not renting?

"bundled with a service that streams over the air broadcasts via the internet to wherever you happen to be"

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

#379

Post by harryh »

baddox wrote: post #351
shmerl wrote: post #342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is such streaming a "public performance" really? Aereo rents one antenna per user. Or public is now redefined?

harryh's point, and the point of this legal decision, is that the text of the law is not really relevant. Anything that appears to any halfway reasonable person to abide by the text of the law, but which upsets powerful groups, will be prohibited, because the goal of our IP legal system is to protect those groups. Personally, I still think that is dumb and bad.

That's not my point at all. That is, in fact, a gross misstatement of my point. Rather than assuming that everyone on the other side of this is an idiot and/or corrupt you'd be better served to step back a bit and try to work from the assumption that there are reasonable people on the other side of this.

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

#380

Post by harryh »

davorak wrote: post #375
harryh wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I understand that you think it's really dumb but I think most people would disagree with you. When you get bogged down in the technical details of Aereo's datacenter configuration you miss the forrest for the trees. They're a company that streams TV into people's homes. Other companies (the cable companies) have to pay a fee to the content creators to do that. Why should it be different for Aereo? It costs a lot of m…

> They're a company that streams TV into people's homes. Other companies (the cable companies) have to pay a fee to the content creators to do that. Why should it be different for Aereo? The fee was already paid then that party decided to stream it over the air. If the content creator does not want that they they do not have to allow for that usage. Or charge more for it.

That is wrong. The law specifically says that cable companies cannot transmit TV that is broadcast over the air unless they pay rebroadcasting fees.
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