Thou Shalt Not View The Super Bowl on a 56" Screen

theodp writes "For 200 members of the Immanuel Bible Church and their friends, the annual Super Bowl party is over thanks to the NFL, which explained that airing NFL games at churches on large-screen TV sets violates the NFL copyright. Federal copyright law includes an exemption for sports bars, according to NFL spokesman Brian McCarthy, but churches are out of luck. Churchgoers who aren't averse to a little drinking-and-driving still have the opportunity to see the game together in public on a screen bigger than 55 inches."

Comments

Why can live sports events be copyrighted?

[msauve]

They are in no way creative works. What "original authorship" exists? "Copyright shelters only fixed, original and creative expression," which a football game isn't.

Furthermore, to be copyrighted, a work must be fixed into a "tangible medium." That is not the case for a live broadcast (although it might be for an after-the-fact replay).

Re:Good luck with that, NFL

[insignificant_wrangl]

The Super Bowl is straight-up ole regular network TV. As the article mentions, all that this really affects is TV ratings (since fewer sets are showing the game). You must be European if you expect American TV ratings or copyright to make any kind of sense!

Re:Good luck with that, NFL

[The Analog Kid]

Is the Super Bowl pay per view

Nope. It's on Fox. In fact, Fox is free over the air. The problem they have with it, is that instead of lets say 4 people per 1 TV, they might have 40 people per 1 TV, where there would have been 40 people split using 10 different TVs. I think ratings are only affected if Neilsen homes aren't watching it though. So it all really comes down to ratings. They'd rather see 10 homes watching the SB rather than 1 church.

Re:Good luck with that, NFL

[cpt kangarooski]

The telecast is licensed for "private home viewing"

No, it's not, actually. Copyright law doesn't give any rights to the copyright holder with regard to private performances, so the copyright holder has nothing to license. In fact, even if he claimed that you couldn't watch the show privately on the basis of copyright law, you still could.

Only public performances fall under the ambit of copyright law.

Hell playing the radio in a Dr's office is technically infringing!

No, that would probably fall quite nicely into the 17 USC 110(5) "homestyle" exception.

They bought themselves a law!

[Xenographic]

IANAL, but this came up last year, too. They have a law written to forbid this, as stupid as it might be. If I could direct your attention to USC 17 110 (5) (B) (i) (II) or however you cite something buried that deeply in copyright law:

(II) if the performance or display is by audiovisual means, any visual portion of the performance or display is communicated by means of a total of not more than 4 audiovisual devices, of which not more than 1 audiovisual device is located in any 1 room, and no such audiovisual device has a diagonal screen size greater than 55 inches, and any audio portion of the performance or display is communicated by means of a total of not more than 6 loudspeakers, of which not more than 4 loudspeakers are located in any 1 room or adjoining outdoor space;

(emphasis added)

They're correctly reading the law, as sad as it might be. Now, the law here is ridiculous, there's NO question in my mind about that. There are plenty of other ridiculous provisions in there just like this one. Alas, we have the best laws money can buy :-(

Re:They bought themselves a law!

[sumdumass]

This law isn't the result of money buying legislation. It is an artifact of a time when TV's with a screen size of 55inches are larger were so costly that it could only be assumed that they were being used in commercial establishments. Section 5 of 110 was created in 1975 and was designed so that if you turned on a TV or radio in a public place for what would be considered home use, you wouldn't be in a violation if people gathered around or could somehow see or hear the broadcast. You can find more about it here. Your probably going to find it easier to search for 5 and it will take you to the parts dealing with section 4 and give a little case history on it.

The law probably needs an updating but it would be highly unusual if it didn't get updated with the best laws money can buy. This law, seeing how it was from 1975 seems to actually have the interest of the people in mind.

Re:Good luck with that, NFL

[Danse]

It's all about those Neilsen boxes. If one person with a box goes to watch the game at church rather than at home, that shows up in the statistics as thousands of people not watching. Nielson people have journals too. They have accounted for the possibility of them watching TV somewhere besides their home.