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Justice Dept Backing Broadcasters Against Aereo

posted by LaminatorX on Wednesday March 05 2014, @09:16AM   Printer-friendly
from the justice-for-whom dept.

Fluffeh writes:

"Following up on our earlier story, the Justice Department has filed in the Supreme Court supporting Broadcasters in their case against Aereo the company that rents a small antenna for each customer, lets them record free to air TV, the streams it back to them anywhere.

The Justice Department argues that by doing so, they are allowing their customers to 'gain access to copyrighted content in the first instance, the same service that cable companies have traditionally provided.' but do so without paying broadcasters a license fee to do so. Aereo has argued that it isn't violating federal copyright laws and isn't threatening the future of the broadcast industry. Company executives have argued in public and in court filings that the service appeals to cord cutters and will help broadcasters keep those viewers."

 
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  • (Score: 5, Informative) by compro01 on Wednesday March 05 2014, @02:30PM

    by compro01 (2515) on Wednesday March 05 2014, @02:30PM (#11334)

    I fail to see why the Justice Department has a pony in this race

    Because this dude [wikipedia.org] is the Solicitor General.

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  • (Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 05 2014, @04:16PM

    by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday March 05 2014, @04:16PM (#11382)

    This is an issue for the content producers, Disney, etc, and not for the cable companies. The content producers successfully extorted the cable companies into paying for Network television, which is broadcast over the air for free. Aero is trying to legally evade those fees. The content providers, and their paid lawyers, Verrilli, included, are trying to stop this.

    • (Score: 3, Insightful) by Foobar Bazbot on Wednesday March 05 2014, @07:10PM

      by Foobar Bazbot (37) on Wednesday March 05 2014, @07:10PM (#11469) Journal

      The cable companies don't like it either, though, because they're already stuck paying those fees, and an Aereo victory won't let them stop. So they'd much rather see Aereo (which offers a competing, though not equivalent, service) stuck with the same fees, else Aereo will have an advantage and take more of their customers.

      • (Score: 3, Interesting) by evilviper on Wednesday March 05 2014, @09:16PM

        by evilviper (1760) on Wednesday March 05 2014, @09:16PM (#11524) Homepage Journal

        No, cable companies can do the same thing as Aereo... The broadcast channels will just be delievered "OnDemand" like PPV / Movies / etc., instead of a normal channel on the dial.

        --
        Hydrogen cyanide is a delicious and necessary part of the human diet.