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Aereo Gets OK From Bankruptcy Court To Auction Technology Assets
An anonymous reader writes Judge Sean Lane of the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan gave permission to Aereo to sell its remaining assets to the highest bidder. The decision came after Aereo reached an agreement with the major broadcast networks that are suing the service. From the article: "Now a bankruptcy court in New York has granted Aereo permission to sell off its assets, with one big caveat: those angry broadcasters who shut them down in the first place? They get to approve any sales that go down. The auction will take place on February 24, at which point the broadcasters have two weeks to decide if they're okay with the highest bidder."
so this means the broadcasters can approve a lowballed sale from their own subsidiary and then offer the same service as the now defunct aereo. status quo will remain status quo
I think it sounds like a good idea, and I'd be your first customer. Then again, I thought Aereo was a good idea too, and on solid legal ground as well. I'm dumbfounded the courts shut them down, but given that they did it seems pretty clear they will shut down whatever derivative or similar business model you come up with, on whatever technicality they can get to stick. It would seem that legality or common sense or "public benefit" doesnt play as much as a role as we would like to imagine.
Given that the bankruptcy is mostly due to the lawsuit demanding that Aereo pay them a bajillion dollars, they'd basically be paying that money to themselves. If they turn down a $1 billion dollar offer for the gear, then they don't get a billion dollars, because there's no other way they're going to get this money legit.
Personally I think the first post is the most insightful for once: they'll create a front company, put in an offer to buy the gear for $1 or whatever, reject everything else, kill off Aereo, then open CBSeo at ten times the price and half the features then when everyone quits they'll whine about piracy until the feds pass new laws giving the government more power. Wins all around! (except for us little people, but who cares about us little people?)
If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
"Alright, let's get this party started. Lot Number One... a pallet cube... we have a jumble of some sort of boxes of geegaw stuff, half have power cords. there are no manuals or labelling on the devices. let's start bidding at a dollar... one dollar dollar dollar, lot 1... still one dollar... do I hear 50 cents?"
if this is supposed to be a new economy, how come they still want my old fashioned money?
Do we know who the creditors are?
I was under the impression that it was the networks. If that is the case, the primary goal won't be to extract as much cash from the corpse or (as the conspiracies in this thread suggest - which is where my post was pointed to) cheaply take over the company. Rather, it would be to drive a stake through Aereo's heart. Yes, the court is supposed to oversee the process for abuses – but somebody has to contest the issue. I just don't see anybody pushing the issue to hard.
If there are other actors other than the networks, then there would be somebody else to contest the issue.
The law isn't the problem. Judges are corrupt and willing to consider inappropriate things like "will this cause the profits of a corporation to suffer" rather than just applying the law. It was a well crafted bit of technical trickery meant to follow the letter of the law.
The court chose to ignore that. Lower courts then chose to ignore the mental gymnastics the higher court came up with.
They changed the rules and refused to allow Aereo to change to accommodate them.
A Pirate and a Puritan look the same on a balance sheet.
Zediva was shutdown because like Aero they tried to work around the laws to skip paying for a license from the content provider.
They were purchasing regular DVDs and renting them in violation of the DVD license. Rental DVDs require a totally different license.
[bolded by me] That part is not true AFAICT. See The Consumer Video Sales/Rental Amendment of 1983.
In that case, the doctrine of first sale was upheld, and you can do whatever you want with something that you have legitimately acquired a copy of (ex. VHS or DVD).
Just one of many examples:
http://thinkprogress.org/ygles...