Aereo TV founder faces Supreme Court

[Hum]

Just days before the Supreme Court hears oral arguments in the case that will determine the fate of his streaming video service, Aereo founder and CEO Chet Kanojia sat down for a wide-ranging interview with Yahoo Global News Anchor Katie Couric.

The New York-based startup ? backed by billionaire investor Barry Diller, among others ? is at the center of a legal battle that has been raging since the company's inception in 2012. Aereo currently operates in 13 cities.

The heart of the case involves Aereo's practice of assigning subscribers mini remote antennas so that they can stream over-the-air broadcast signals directly to their tablets and other mobile devices. The antennas function in the same manner as old-fashioned "bunny ears." Aereo also uses cloud technology, which lets subscribers watch the programming live or store it for a later time.

 

Broadcasters say Aereo?s service amounts to theft.

"They don't talk to me. They only talk through lawyers," Kanojia told Couric, when asked how the network honchos who are suing him feel about the whole idea.

News Corp. COO Chase Carey has said, "We need to be able to be fairly compensated for our content. We can't sit idly by and let an entity steal our signal."

Kanojia maintains that media companies are fairly compensated through advertising, and scoffs at the notion that using an antenna to access over-the-air TV is in any way illegal.

"Many federal courts have found that Aereo is, in fact, not infringing on their copyrights or anything along those lines. I just don't find that rhetoric has any credibility," asserts Kanojia.

source & video interview

[DarkTorizo]

So, from what I gather by watching the video is:

 

Aereo takes free over the air broadcasts and then in turn streams it for people to watch on devices other than a television.

 

How is that illegal?

[Buttus]

wow, so all those years of using bunny ears and a vcr was illegal?

[+primortal Subscriber²]

What would be the kicker is that if supreme court rules this is legal that cable operators invest in this technology and do away with paying re-broadcast fees...

[DConnell Member]

wow, so all those years of using bunny ears and a vcr was illegal?

 

Well, technically you were supposed to just record stuff for time-shifting, but I don't think anyone limited themselves to that.

 

But to me this just seems like another attack on the concept of fair use.

[Hum]

So, from what I gather by watching the video is:

 

Aereo takes free over the air broadcasts and then in turn streams it for people to watch on devices other than a television.

 

How is that illegal?

Aereo is cutting into Cable & Sat. TV profits -- that's why. :p

[+Red King Subscriber²]

What would be the kicker is that if supreme court rules this is legal that cable operators invest in this technology and do away with paying re-broadcast fees...

I don't know, Supreme Court recently made a lot of decisions which are highly immoral (Citizens United for example).

[+SOOPRcow MVC]

I don't know, Supreme Court recently made a lot of decisions which are highly immoral (Citizens United for example).

 

They don't rule on morality of a law, they rule on constitutionality of the law. There is quite a significant difference in that morality is so much more arbitrary. Citizens United addressed a pretty clear cut violation of the first amendments right to free speech. It said that no person and or a collective of people (which include corporations and unions) should have an arbitrary limit, financial or otherwise, placed upon their constitutional right to get out their message.

[Hum]

The original Warner cable took free over-the-air broadcasts, and charged for the strong TV signals.

 

They paid the TV stations nothing, at first.