James Delahunty
12 Oct 2013 16:32
U.S. broadcasters have petitioned the highest court in the land to review legal cases surrounding Aereo, a service that retransmits broadcast signals over the Internet.
Aereo is a premium service that allows subscribers to view broadcast TV content. It literally assigns subscribers to miniature antennas that pick up the publicly accessible signals and broadcast them to play on a variety of devices. The company believes that this setup complies with laws and regulations in the United States.
Broadcasters on the other hand are diametrically opposed to Aereo. They argue that Aereo's retransmission of content amounts to a "public performance" which has not been authorized by copyright holders.
So far, Broadcasters have failed in the courts to stop Aereo. A New York federal judge refused to grant a sought injunction because each Aereo subscriber was receiving a private, transmission stream. Broadcasters then failed to get the 2nd Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse the decision of the lower court. Aereo also won a case in which a Boston TV station challenged the service in court.
Broadcasters filed a petition for writ of certiorari, asking the Supreme Court to have the ultimate say on this. While the broadcasters have had no joy stepping on Aereo, they have had success in similar cases against Film On X in L.A. and Washington district courts. Film On X also uses antennas and provides digital streams to users. This, Broadcasters feel, amounts to evidence that different courts were delivering conflicting ruling on the legality of such services.