RIP(?) Aereo - February 2012 - June 25, 2014: Supreme Court rules against Aereo in broadcasters’ cha

[wickedplayer494]

[url]http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/26/business/media/supreme-court-rules-against-aereo-in-broadcasters-challenge.html[/url]

[quote=New York Times]In a decision with wide-ranging implications for the television industry, the Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that Aereo, a start-up streaming service, violated copyright laws by capturing broadcast signals on miniature antennas and delivering them to subscribers for a fee.

The 6-3 decision was a victory for the major television networks, which had argued that Aereo’s business model amounted to a theft of their programming.[/quote]

[cis.joshb]

Does Aereo pay for a subscription to the broadcasts they are streaming for every customer, or do they just have one subscription that they distribute to all the customers?

[mobrockers]

Um this seems pretty clear cut to me?

[Major_Vice]

I'll admit, when you come down to it, having thousands of dime-sized antennas to circumvent existing laws was a rube-goldberg device that somehow lasted all the way to the top of the justice system, but the loss is still disheartening.

It's like supreme court just added a steel jacket to your wiring to prevent you from cutting the cord.

[bord2tears]

This is a antenna for you to install in your house - right? Then it streams to Aereo's servers so it can slingbox it back to you elsewhere?

Why is that illegal if that's the case?

[Major_Vice]

[QUOTE=bord2tears;45210466]This is a antenna for you to install in your house - right? Then it streams to Aereo's servers so it can slingbox it back to you elsewhere?

Why is that illegal if that's the case?[/QUOTE]

No, it was thousands of antennas in one location running in parallel. Because you can't re-sell over the air broadcasts of local TV from one antenna to multiple people, an Aereo user would essentially 'rent' a small antenna in an area connected to a DVR that they could access online.

I mean clearly it designed to sidestep existing laws, and (in my opinion) wasn't a viable business model, but (until today) it was '[I]not-illegal[/I]'' enough to build a startup on.