HTTP/1.1 302 Found Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2014 01:35:00 GMT Server: Apache Set-Cookie: NYT-S=deleted; expires=Thu, 01-Jan-1970 00:00:01 GMT; path=/; domain=www.stg.nytimes.com Set-Cookie: NYT-S=0Ms3y1JYWzZpLDXrmvxADeHAMOh/4QUsYDdeFz9JchiAIUFL2BEX5FWcV.Ynx4rkFI; expires=Sat, 26-Jul-2014 01:35:00 GMT; path=/; domain=.nytimes.com Location: http://ift.tt/VnFiN1 Content-Length: 0 nnCoection: close Content-Type: text/html; charset=UTF-8 HTTP/1.1 200 OK Server: Apache Cache-Control: no-cache Channels: NytNow Content-Type: text/html; charset=utf-8 Content-Length: 79621 Accept-Ranges: bytes Date: Thu, 26 Jun 2014 01:35:00 GMT X-Varnish: 716445126 716445064 Age: 1 Via: 1.1 varnish X-Cache: HIT X-API-Version: 5-5 X-PageType: article Connection: close
http://nyti.ms/1mpiMgo
Play Video|1:23
What the Aereo Decision Means for TV
What the Aereo Decision Means for TV
The Supreme Court ruled that Aereo violated copyright law, granting television networks a much-desired win that will preserve the status quo — at least for now.
Credit By Natalia V. Osipova and Mona El-Naggar on Publish Date June 25, 2014
Credit Andrew Burton/Getty Images
WASHINGTON — Aereo made an all-or-nothing bet. The digital start-up threatened to upend the media industry and transform the way people watch television.
It likely will end up with nothing.
In a case with far-reaching implications for the entertainment and technology business, the United States Supreme Court ruled on Wednesday that Aereo, a television streaming service, had violated copyright laws by capturing broadcast signals on miniature antennas and delivering them to subscribers for a fee.
The 6 to 3 decision handed a major victory to the broadcast networks, which argued that Aereo’s business model was no more than a high-tech approach for stealing their content.
The justices’ ruling leaves the current broadcast model intact while imperiling Aereo’s viability as a business, just two years after a team of engineers, lawyers, marketers and even an Olympic medalist came together with a vision to provide a new viewing service that “enables choice and freedom.â€
Continue reading the main story
Related Coverage
-
Justices Skeptical of Aereo’s BusinessAPRIL 22, 2014
-
The Media Equation: At Stake in the Aereo Case Is How We Watch TVAPRIL 22, 2014
-
Bits | State of the Art: The Cloud Industry Needs Aereo to Win. But Consumers Need Something Better.APRIL 24, 2014
-
The Media Equation: Aereo Case Will Shape TV’s FutureAPRIL 20, 2014
Broadcasters applauded the ruling, and shares in the media groups shot up on Wednesday.
Photo
Chet Kanojia, the founder and chief executive of Aereo, called the ruling a “massive setback.” Credit Alex Wong/Getty Images
“For two years they have been in existence, trying to hurt our business,†Leslie Moonves, chief executive of CBS, said in a telephone interview. “They fought the good fight. They lost. Time to move on.â€
Chet Kanojia, Aereo’s founder and chief executive, said in a statement that the ruling was a “massive setback†for consumers and “sends a chilling message to the technology industry.â€
Aereo had previously said it had “no Plan B†if it lost in court. On Wednesday, Mr. Kanojia said that “our work is not done†and that Aereo would continue to “fight to create innovative technologies,†but he did not specifically say how the company would move forward. Analysts and legal experts said Aereo was left with few options in an opinion that rejected all of its major arguments.
The Supreme Court case was closely watched by the media and technology industries. Oral arguments in April attracted a who’s who of executives. It comes as broadcasters navigate the vast technological changes and rapid shifts in viewer habits, including a rising tide of viewers who are canceling traditional pay-television subscriptions in favor of cheaper streaming alternatives.
Continue reading the main story
ABC v. Aereo
| The court ruled that it is unlawful for the Internet start-up to capture and stream broadcast television signals to subscribers. |
In arguments before the court in April, the broadcasters contended that Aereo and similar services threatened to cut into a vital revenue stream — the billions of dollars they receive from cable and satellite companies in so-called retransmission fees, or money paid to networks for the right to retransmit their programming. The networks said they would have considered removing their signals from the airwaves if the court ruled for Aereo.
Aereo said that the service it provided through local warehouses of small antennas was merely helping its subscribers do what they could lawfully do since the era of rabbit ears: watch free broadcast television delivered over public airwaves.
Justice Stephen G. Breyer, writing for the majority, said the service was “not simply an equipment provider,†but acted like a cable system in that it transmitted copyrighted content. “Insofar as there are differences,†he wrote, “those differences concern not the nature of the service that Aereo provides so much as the technological manner in which it provides the service.â€
At the hearing in April, the justices had expressed concern that a ruling against Aereo would stifle technological innovation — a concern echoed throughout the tech industry. Justice Breyer took pains on Wednesday to say the decision was limited to Aereo’s service. “We believe that resolution of questions about cloud computing, remote storage DVRs and other novel matters not now before us should await a case in which they are clearly presented,†he said in announcing the decision from the bench.
Photo
The Supreme Court case comes at a critical time in the media industry. Credit Stephen Crowley/The New York Times
Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and Justices Anthony M. Kennedy, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan joined the majority opinion.
In a dissent that expressed distaste for Aereo’s business model, Justice Antonin Scalia said that the service had nevertheless identified a loophole in the law. “It is not the role of this court to identify and plug loopholes,†he wrote. “It is the role of good lawyers to identify and exploit them, and the role of Congress to eliminate them if it wishes.â€
Justices Clarence Thomas and Samuel A. Alito Jr. joined the dissent.
Mr. Kanojia said that Aereo had worked to create a technology that complied with the law. “Today’s decision clearly states that how the technology works does not matter,†he said.
Continue reading the main story
Document
Citing copyright law, the justices rejected the streaming service’s model of capturing broadcast signals and delivering them to subscribers.
Subscribers to Aereo paid $8 to $12 a month to rent one of the start-up’s dime-size antennas that captured over-the-air television signals. Users then could watch near-live TV and record programs on major broadcast networks such as ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox.
In combination with other Internet services like Netflix and Hulu, it could provide much of a viewer’s television diet at a fraction of the cost of a cable or satellite television bill. Though Aereo itself was a small service with fewer than 500,000 subscribers, the broadcast networks worried that cable and satellite companies would adopt similar technology in an effort to avoid paying retransmission fees, which according to SNL Kagan, a media research firm, total more than $4.3 billion annually.
It is unclear how soon the ruling will affect subscribers to Aereo, which is operating in about a dozen metropolitan areas in the United States.
Aereo has raised a total of $97 million in funding since Mr. Kanojia founded it. Analysts and legal experts said that Aereo could change its business model and pay broadcasters for the right to distribute their programming, but noted that such an outcome was unlikely.
Photo
Aereo uses thousands of tiny antennas to receive broadcast television signals. Credit Kirsten Luce for The New York Times
Mr. Moonves of CBS said that he would welcome a discussion with Aereo about a deal to distribute CBS programming if the start-up was prepared to pay. “We would talk to anybody,†Mr. Moonves said.
The case, ABC Inc. v. Aereo, No. 13-461, turned on a part of the copyright law that requires the permission of copyright owners for “public performances†of their work. The law defines such performances to include retransmission to the public.
Aereo had argued that its transmissions were private performances because it assigned an individual antenna to every viewer, but Justice Breyer rejected that argument as well. “You can transmit a message to your friends whether you send identical emails to each friend or a single email all at once,†he said.
The case was sent back to the lower courts. Last year, a divided three-judge panel of the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit in New York ruled for Aereo. In January, both sides agreed to bring the case to the Supreme Court to settle the two years of legal sparring.
At Aereo’s headquarters in the fourth floor of a building in SoHo on Wednesday afternoon, a scattered group of young employees pecked at their laptops amid open boxes of pizza. ESPN’s broadcast of the Nigeria-Argentina World Cup match played on a large flat-screen TV.
Aereo asked its employees to refrain from speaking about the ruling, but several posted to Twitter, lamenting the outcome and admonishing recruiters for trying to lure them to new jobs.
“Literally no idea what to do right now,†wrote Adam Sigel, an Aereo product manager.
Walking into the elevator, another employee said: “I can tell you how I’m feeling. I’m scared.â€
“I’m the sole breadwinner in my family,†he added. “This has a big impact on me.â€
More on nytimes.com
Site Index
Source: Top Stories - Google News - http://ift.tt/1qcbejV
0 comments:
Post a Comment