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Will Your Super Bowl Party Anger the Copyright Gods?
garg0yle writes "According to some folks, watching the Super Bowl on a television bigger than 55 inches is illegal. Is this true? Yes and no — long story short, if you're in a private residence you're probably okay, but if you're running a sports bar you may technically have to negotiate a license with the NFL. Just don't charge for food, or call it a 'Super Bowl' party, since the term itself is copyright."
There are sports nerds
That's an oxymoron and is completely incorrect. The people you refer to are called "jocks", as in "jock strap".
The guys who memorize every stat for everyone on all thirty-something teams.
Nerds do not memorize meaningless trivia without good reason.
Free Martian Whores!
The term "Who dat" has been selling black face-paint for over 100 years now. Instead of having a Saints Super Bowl party, you could all get together and do Vaudeville comedy routines making fun of grammar stereotypically used by colored people.
The Champions League football final is now the most watched annual sports even in the world (109M last year compared to 106M for the Super Bowl). Maybe this means you will soon be able watch something more exciting whilst waiting for those much hyped half-time adverts?
Phillip.
Property for sale in Nice, France
You just took a service subscription and compared it to a property rental. Not even close. For the analogy to be even close, it would be the landlord restricting who is allowed to visit your rented aparentment, which unless the person is causing huge problems (loud parties, etc), there is NOTHING the landlord can do about it.
In the type of transaction being discussed, there is little, if any discernible difference between a purchase involving transfer of ownership of a particular item (or the ability to receive 'entertainment' for a limited time) and the "magic" purchase that somehow resembles a rental or lease. In fact, purchases that are defended as the latter are blatantly advertised as the former ("Own yours [a DVD or CD] today!"). This deception is deliberate, because if a purchaser were made aware of the fact that they were actually 'only renting', they would not complete the purchase. Keep in mind also that there are plenty of examples of transactions involving *the same material* that are clearly not transfers of ownership (rental from Blockbuster, going to a theater, etc), so people aren't missing something because they are confused. Go to a store, pay money (without signing a contract), getting handed your purchase with a "here's your ! Enjoy!" and take possession. If someone takes it, they are stealing. If you don't want it any longer, you can sell it. It's yours. It's not rented. The fact that you might want to buy a big screen TV and some extra chairs and invite a bunch of people to watch should not matter one whit. Even if you did charge for drinks or even entry.
I can see this with Pay Per View, because the consumer is paying a fixed fee to watch something, and they can put restrictions on how many people can view it. Too many people watching at a single house would directly cut into revenues.
No, that is what you were manipulated into believing. What really happened is the consumer paid a fixed fee to have something watchable on a screen *delivered to their house*. The number of people present is irrelevant.