Aereo Wins Preliminary Injunction Hearing

bs0d3 writes "Aereo, a company that offers live broadcast TV via the internet to New York City residents, has won a preliminary injunction hearing. A federal judge has rejected a bid by major U.S. broadcasters to stop Aereo from rebroadcasting some of their programming over the Internet. District Judge Alison Nathan said that while the broadcasters have shown that they faced irreparable financial damage if the venture were allowed to continue, Aereo also showed it would face severe harm if the requested preliminary injunction were granted. The full injunction denial ruling can be found here."

Comments

Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[killfixx]

Why is it that the only way common sense can win, in court, is through some obscure technicality?

Company X provides Service Y for free (with ads), but through an outdated or inconvenient method/medium. Company Z provides convenient access to Service Y, without changing the product, and Company X sues Company Z into oblivion.

How was Company Z's product or service hurting Company X?

Balderdash!

Other than that, good luck to Aereo.

As a side note, why don't more gadget manufacturers include tiny antennae in their products specifically for tuning in OTA TV?

Is there some massive challenge that restricts this?

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[crashumbc]

Yeah, something is missing here. My bet would the re-transmission fees. right now cable pays to re-transmit the signal. I bet Aereo is paying and broadcast TV is scared the cable companies will decide not to pay.

The problem is the world is changing radically right now and many companies are in their death throws as their market is replaced. Broadcast TV is dead it just doesn't know it yet, same as Newspapers. What will ultimately replace them isn't clear, because the do provide a needed service of local news, its just that is about a 1/10th of what they do and get paid for now.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[crashumbc]

*Aereo ISN'T paying

--sigh I need to learn to proofread before posting on /. :(

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[SuricouRaven]

While the ads still get viewed, X no longer has the data to prove it. No marketing data means their ad-time is worth a lot less. It's also likely to cause legal complications for content (espicially sport) which X has licensed to broadcast only in a specific geographic area. In that case, the actions of Z could cause X to be unwittingly violating their contract with the producer of that content and so exposing X to liability.

If you're looking for sillyness, ask why there are so many region-specific licences still in use not only in an increasingly globalised world, but even limiting some things to specific states or local areas. Sports are the biggest culprit here by far.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[fuzzyfuzzyfungus]

Other than that, good luck to Aereo.

As a side note, why don't more gadget manufacturers include tiny antennae in their products specifically for tuning in OTA TV?

Is there some massive challenge that restricts this?

Based on the going rate for little USB-TV dongles (ATSC or DVB-T, depending on region) on ebay(obviously a OEM wouldn't shop there; but let's pretend that pacific-rim-bottom-feeder prices on ebay are vaguely correlated to actual-BOM-cost-for-something-not-totally-dreadful with savings from mass production) of $15-$25, depending on the phase of the moon, I'd assume that it's just the technically minor; but significant, issue of price sensitivity(and, in the UK market and any others with a similar setup, BBC licensing fees).

They don't seem to be cheap enough that you can throw-it-in-just-in-case(especially for customers in questionable signal areas, where external antennas, sometimes rather large, are a necessity, and just-throwing-it-in means adding an external antenna jack, and, for people who care, displays sold as TVs have them built in, basic cheap-n-nasty ATSC tuners for connecting to legacy displays are only $40-$50ish, and proper network-connected tuners like http://www.silicondust.com/ makes are certainly not free; but close to 'impulse purchase' for the target demographic.

Aero's offering draws its worth from selling location to users; but for equipment being run on-premises, standalone and optional tuners are cheap enough to be accessible; but too expensive to be in the category of 'just bundle it and save them the headache'

That would be my guess.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[Joce640k]

They can prove people are watching ads on broadcast TV? How does that work...?

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[SuricouRaven]

Sampling. That's what Neilson does. They have boxes attached to TVs in a number of volunteer households, and calculate from that sample approximate national figures. Cable decoders can also report back what channels they have been tuned to at which times. You don't need every TV monitored, just enough that you can estimate with a reasonable margin of error the larger viewership. An unauthorised stream isn't viewed on a TV, so it isn't going to count on either metric, and even if the ads were viewed they can't be so targetted - there is no point in advertising a local business on an internet stream when almost all the viewers will be in other cities.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[FullCircle]

The broadcasters are probably terrified because their marketing data is mostly speculation. They also have to attempt to control the end location of content they have licensed or else other broadcasters will sue them for stepping on their market area.

Aereo can tell what channels are being streamed at what times and could easily ask for demographics for targeted marketing. They can also send to mobile devices and offices where broadcast TV has very little uptake. Who carries a mobile receiver?

Streaming is potentially a huge improvement for the television market but rather than change or add to their current business model, broadcasters as a group attempt to litigate themselves into relevance.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[lkcl]

As a side note, why don't more gadget manufacturers include tiny antennae in their products specifically for tuning in OTA TV?

in china, the broadcast transmission signal strengths are so high that you can pick up a good signal with a bit of wet string (literally, not figuratively).

however in the west the signal strengths are much much lower, and whilst attempts have been made to create digital receivers that are sensitive enough, they are either far too power-hungry or far too expensive. each of these things is incompatible with portable hand-held mass-volume devices.

so this is why internet-based video transmission is so important. the signal can be sent across pre-established [semi-reliable] connections where the data rate can be tailored to the conditions. what i'm hoping is that this company will actually develop multi-level video CODECs and publish them as free software algorithms. it could happen.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[d3ac0n]

--sigh I need to learn to proofread before posting on /. :(

Yep. You and most /. posters. (myself included)

Also, as long as we are on the topic, its "death THROES" not "death throws".

The first means you are dying. The second implies you are playing a game of catch with the Grim Reaper.

Re:Overcoming stupidity via technicality

[bws111]

Seeing how many computers are streaming something does not tell you how many people are watching that stream, what their ages are, what their income bracket is, etc. The current ratings system provides that information, which is way more important to advertisers then how many devices are receiving a broadcast.

Wait how are broadcasters hurt?

[DarkOx]

Last I checked the business model was broadcasters license content to get people to watch and then get paid by advertisers to show commercials during the that content. Advertisers pay more based on the expected number of eyeballs and demographic.

If anything Aereo adds to the number of viewers, I am assuming the don't scrape the commercials out of the broadcast so I would think this would make the advertisers happy! If anything it should increase the stations revenue.

Re:Idiots abound!

[d3ac0n]

They do. It's called "Infomercials".

It's a simple rule...

[rastoboy29]

I think it should be a rule of thumb that, if you put something out in public--via broadcast or the internet--it is now public.

ie. you can't treat it as if it's some kind of proprietary thing.  Exactly how that would work might be open to some interpretation, but I just think pretending it's still under your control when you put it in public is just retarded.