Supreme Court Rules Against Aereo Streaming Service

New submitter Last_Available_Usern (756093) writes that the Aereo saga is likely over. "The U.S. Supreme Court today dealt a potentially fatal blow to Aereo, an Internet service that allows customers to watch broadcast TV programs on mobile devices by renting a small DVR and antennas (in supported cities) to record and then retransmit local programming on-demand over the internet." Ruling (PDF). Aereo was found to be publicly transmitting, according to SCOTUSBlog "The essence of the Aereo ruling is that Aereo is equivalent to a cable company, not merely an equipment provider."

Comments

One disturbing bit:

[Penguinisto]

Justice Stephen Breyer, writing for the majority, stressed that it was a limited decision that will not “discourage the emergence or use of different kinds of technologies.”

...and he's certain of that - how?

Re:One disturbing bit:

[hendrips]

He almost certainly means that from a strictly legal standpoint, rather than as a general statement. It's somewhat common for the Supreme Court to put a disclaimer in an opinion stating that the opinion was so narrowly focused that it shouldn't be used as a precedent in other seemingly analogous cases. Presumably, this comment is more of a command to the lower courts, rather than a prediction of the future.

So, if Company X wants to start a business that is similar to, but not exactly the same as, Aereo's business, any legal challenge against Company X would still have to be upheld on its own merit. Challengers couldn't cite this Aereo decision as legally relevant.

Now, whether this ruling will have chilling effects, other than its legal precedent, is a different question.

Re:One disturbing bit:

[SydShamino]

On the other hand, if you contracted with your neighbor to rent a patch of his land, and you ran your own antenna up there so you could get the OTA signals yourself separately from his reception, that should be A-ok. That's even true if he already had a spare antenna installed and you just rent it from him.

Re:One disturbing bit:

[sjbe]

It seems to me that judges should be ruling based on the law, not perceived ancillary social influences.

For lower courts that is (largely) true but for SCOTUS it is not. The Constitution is not 100% black and white and many aspects of it are open to interpretation. The job of SCOTUS (and lower federal courts to some extent) is to provide that interpretation when there is a disagreement. This interpretation effectively is identical to making legislation. Furthermore interpretations over time tend to reflect the morals and social influences of the day. Cases like Dred Scott v Sandford once upheld interpretations of the law that today would be considered reprehensible. At some level the decisions that SCOTUS judges make reflects their belief systems, particularly on hot button topics like abortion where decisions are based more on personal morality than objective evidence. That's why we have 9 judges instead of just one.

Legislative makes the law, and judicial merely determines if actions are legal or not legal? Quaint, no?

Each branch of the government makes certain types of laws. The Legislative branch makes statues, the Executive branch makes regulations and the Judiciary makes case law. All three are necessary and proper to the functioning of civil society. All three are laws in every sense that matters. If any branch of the government was unable to make laws then that branch of government would be powerless against the other branches. Checks and balances only work if you can make laws.

Re:One disturbing bit:

[Solandri]

I haven't read through the ruling, but I suspect they just applied the "quacks like a duck" rule. Regardless of the technical nuances, Aereo operates like a rebroadcaster (takes services subscriptions, forwards broadcast transmissions to them). Therefore it must be a rebroadcaster.

I suspect the ruling may have been different if Aereo had required customers to buy their own antennas, and only charged an installation fee to host the antenna and monthly hardware insurance fee to replace broken ones. To draw from the analogy someone posted below, that'd be like you buying your own antenna and asking to place it on your neighbor's property because he sits on top of the hill blocking your house. Dynamically assigning a micro-antenna to a subscriber on-demand just blurs the line. (The fact that all this is technically stupid when you could just use a single antenna is simply a consequence of Copyright law creating artificial scarcity and giving content producers a monopoly on distribution.)

Re:Wrong decision

[bobbied]

Wouldn't the ruling also make cable boxes illegal, too?

The cable network is a public network in the sense that hundreds or thousands of people are on that network.

Uh, no... The ruling simply says Areo is operating a cable service and is thus required to obtain rights to retransmit the material (by paying fees). The cable company has already obtained retransmit rights (and paid the necessary fees) and thus can place their box in your home.

In short, Areo is governed by the SAME laws and rules as the cable company.

Re:Wrong decision

[bluefoxlucid]

Imagine you rent an apartment in San Francisco, hook your DVR up to the antenna, and set up Internet to watch it from New York.

Now imagine you rent that DVR from an electronics rental company.

Now imagine you also get an account with LogMeIn as your access method to your DVR.

Now imagine the landlord, the electronics rental company, and LogMeIn are all the same company.

That's Aereo.