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Locast, a Free App Streaming Network TV, Would Love to Get Sued (nytimes.com)
Want to watch the Super Bowl and other network TV for free? A start-up called Locast will let you, and (so far) the big broadcasters aren't trying to stop it. From a report: On the roof of a luxury building at the edge of Central Park, 585 feet above the concrete, a lawyer named David Goodfriend has attached a modest four-foot antenna that is a threat to the entire TV-industrial complex. The device is there to soak up TV signals coursing through the air -- content from NBC, ABC, Fox, PBS and CBS. Once plucked from the ether, the content is piped through the internet and assembled into an app called Locast. It's a streaming service, and it makes all of this network programming available to subscribers in ways that are more convenient than relying on a home antenna: It's viewable on almost any device, at any time, in pristine quality that doesn't cut in and out. It's also completely free.
If this sounds familiar, you might be thinking of Aereo, the Barry Diller-backed start-up that in 2012 threatened to upend the media industry by capturing over-the-air TV signals and streaming the content to subscribers for a fee -- while not paying broadcasters a dime. NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox banded together and sued, eventually convincing the Supreme Court that Aereo had violated copyright law. The clear implication for many: If you mess with the broadcasters, you'll file for bankruptcy and cost your investors more than $100 million.
Mr. Goodfriend took a different lesson. A former media executive with stints at the Federal Communications Commission and in the Clinton administration, he wondered if an Aereo-like offering that was structured as a noncommercial entity would remain within the law. Last January, he started Locast in New York. The service now has about 60,000 users in Houston, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, Dallas and Denver as well as New York, and will soon add more in Washington, D.C. Mr. Goodfriend, 50, said he hoped to cover the entire nation as quickly as possible. "I'm not stopping," he said. "I can't now." The comment is basically a dare to the networks to take legal action against him. By giving away TV, Mr. Goodfriend is undercutting the licensing fees that major broadcasters charge the cable and satellite companies -- a sum that will exceed $10 billion this year, according to the research firm Kagan S&P Global Market Intelligence. For cable customers, the traditional network channels typically add about $12 to a monthly bill.
If this sounds familiar, you might be thinking of Aereo, the Barry Diller-backed start-up that in 2012 threatened to upend the media industry by capturing over-the-air TV signals and streaming the content to subscribers for a fee -- while not paying broadcasters a dime. NBC, CBS, ABC and Fox banded together and sued, eventually convincing the Supreme Court that Aereo had violated copyright law. The clear implication for many: If you mess with the broadcasters, you'll file for bankruptcy and cost your investors more than $100 million.
Mr. Goodfriend took a different lesson. A former media executive with stints at the Federal Communications Commission and in the Clinton administration, he wondered if an Aereo-like offering that was structured as a noncommercial entity would remain within the law. Last January, he started Locast in New York. The service now has about 60,000 users in Houston, Chicago, Boston, Philadelphia, Dallas and Denver as well as New York, and will soon add more in Washington, D.C. Mr. Goodfriend, 50, said he hoped to cover the entire nation as quickly as possible. "I'm not stopping," he said. "I can't now." The comment is basically a dare to the networks to take legal action against him. By giving away TV, Mr. Goodfriend is undercutting the licensing fees that major broadcasters charge the cable and satellite companies -- a sum that will exceed $10 billion this year, according to the research firm Kagan S&P Global Market Intelligence. For cable customers, the traditional network channels typically add about $12 to a monthly bill.
but the lawyers won't. Looking forward to seeing how this pans out.
Thanks.
It little behooves the best of us to comment on the rest of us.
How is the operation paying for itself? TANSTAFL.
I like it when spellcheck turns text into naturalistic post-modern poetry.
You are welcome on my lawn.
While the story is being covered by the, often paywalled, New York Times...
"Don't meddle in the affairs of a patent dragon, for thou art tasty and good with ketchup." ~ohcrapitssteve
This could be really good. I've moved around the country a bit and it's always a hassle being a fan of sports teams in cities where I no longer live. I wouldn't mind being able to watch the Astros or Rockets or Bears or Blackhawks without having to invest in an expensive package.
I think I'm gonna try this locast. Plus, on a day like today, it would be fun to watch a local news broadcast from Chicago, where it's -8 F while wearing shorts and sitting on my porch.
You are welcome on my lawn.
17 USC 111(a): "Certain Exempted. The secondary transmission of a performance or display of a work embodied in a primary transmission is not an infringement of copyright if... the secondary transmission is not made by a cable system but is made by a governmental body, or other nonprofit organization, without any purpose of direct or indirect commercial advantage, and without charge to the recipients of the secondary transmission other than assessments necessary to defray the actual and reasonable costs of maintaining and operating the secondary transmission service."
In other words, he probably isn't screwed.
I'm behind a small hill, just big enough to interfere with broadcast signals coming from Philly. After replacing a couple of small cable boxes with Roku sticks I found this and installed it. It's good enough. If my cable supplier starts charging for their streaming app, I'll drop their tv stuff and go all streaming.
Got it on my phone too...
Locast is a public service to Americans, providing local broadcast signals over the Internet in select cities. All you have to do is sign up online, provide your name and email address, and certify that you live in, and are logging on from, one of the select US cities (“Designated Market Area”). Then, you can select among local broadcasters and stream your favorite local station.
Locast.org is a “digital translator,” meaning that Locast.org operates just like a traditional broadcast translator service, except instead of using an over-the-air signal to boost a broadcaster’s reach, we stream the signal over the Internet to consumers located within select US cities.
Ever since the dawn of TV broadcasting in the mid-20th Century, non-profit organizations have provided “translator” TV stations as a public service. Where a primary broadcaster cannot reach a receiver with a strong enough signal, the translator amplifies that signal with another transmitter, allowing consumers who otherwise could not get the over-the-air signal to receive important programming, including local news, weather and of course, sports. Locast.org provides the same public service, except instead of an over-the-air signal transmitter, we provide the local broadcast signal via online streaming.
You need a broadband Internet connection for optimal performance. Using a laptop, smartphone, or computer connected to the Internet, point your browser to www.Locast.org to sign up. You then can choose which local broadcast station to watch from your Internet-enabled device.
This service is essentially no different, really, than what the earliest days of cable TV services were: a way for everyone in a market area to receive the television stations in that market area without having to have an antenna. I, myself, in the 70's and 80's in a housing tract where the HOA did not allow you to have an antenna on your roof; it was using the cable TV service or have an antenna in your attic or inside your house. We opted for cable TV. 'Locast' is, as it states, an internet-age updated version of that early 'antenna service'. So long as they can ensure within reasonable bounds that people outside the markets it's serving can't receive those stations, then I don't see a problem, really. They're not editing out commercials or inserting commercials, they're not recording content (if you don't count an AV data stream, even transcoded-on-the-fly, as 'recorded', that is) and they're not really 'selling' the signals themselves, they're selling a service to facilitate reception of stations within the market area to people who geographically-speaking should be able to receive it, but may not be able to do so for extenuating circumstances. So I can see why they'd want to be sued: if they win they create the legal precedent for services like this to be legally allowed.
I think broadcasters should welcome a service like this, if they want to save the OTA broadcast industry as a whole. I'm not saying they should ditch their megawatt transmitters and huge broadcast antennas, but they should allow services like this to exist as a supplement to OTA signals for the reason specified by Locast and companies like them: to fill in the gaps in signal coverage.
Are there going to be technically-inclined people who will find a way around technologically-enforced restrictions on who can stream what markets' stations? Yes, of course. But that will always be a minority; there's always going to be 'pilfering' of some kind with just about anything, and trying to stop 100% of it is an endless game of Whack-a-Mole, as the RIAA and MPAA damned well know, and as such it's not worth doing. There is a need for a service like this, which differs from 'streaming' services like Spotify or Hulu and their ilk, and I think it's time has come. The broadcast televsion industry would be wise to welcome it instead of fighting against it.
Copyright law doesn't say commercial distribution is prohibited while free distribution is allowed. It says the copyright holder has complete authority over distribution of their work. In fact that's why Aereo lost. Aereo wasn't actually charging for the broadcast TV content. They were charging you to rent an antenna from them (they went so far as to give each user their own individual antenna with their own encoder to generate their own individual stream, instead of using the signal from a single antenna to encode a single video stream broadcast to all their users). They were technically providing the TV broadcasts for free; you were only paying for equipment rental.
The Supreme Court ruled against them because the copyright holder has ultimate say over how their content is distributed, paid or free.
Good luck to locast users watching the Superbowl. The playoffs were so laggy via Locast that I gave up watching them.
This posting is provided 'AS IS' without warranty of any kind, implied or otherwise.
The parent post is very informative, but won't be seen by a lot of people because it's AC and doesn't have its own subject line.
Quoting the AC:
17 USC 111(a): "Certain Exempted. The secondary transmission of a performance or display of a work embodied in a primary transmission is not an infringement of copyright if... the secondary transmission is not made by a cable system but is made by a governmental body, or other nonprofit organization, without any purpose of direct or indirect commercial advantage, and without charge to the recipients of the secondary transmission other than assessments necessary to defray the actual and reasonable costs of maintaining and operating the secondary transmission service."
So the law is re-transmitting the broadcast is okay if it's done by a non-profit.
Note this is only about re-transmitting *broadcast* TV, which was already being sent out to everyone for free.
Only if Locast makes it available to people in the area only. If they let someone from Los Angeles watch a New York stream, the ads are completely irrelevant and worthless.
Even worse, the ads are worth less - less in New York because out of area viewers see them, and less in Los Angeles because there are viewers of the broadcast who won't see those.
Why would a Budweiser ad in New York be irrelevant to a viewer in Los Angeles? They have Budweiser in both markets, and it's the same product in both markets.
Same logic goes for any other advertising for a national brand; by and large most television advertising is purchased by these national brands.
Your point stands for any local businesses buying the advertisements, unless they also sell via a web site.
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