Can the television industry use litigation to avoid the fate of the music industry? While the big record labels were ultimately able to vanquish digital competitors like Napster in court, they never fully recovered their previous market share. The major networks’ business model has been challenged recently by new television services from Aereo Inc. and Dish Network LLC, and the broadcasters too have headed to court.
An early court ruling in the networks’ case against Aereo, however, has demonstrated the difficulties of a legal strategy. On July 11, U.S. District Judge Alison Nathan in Manhattan rejected the broadcasters’ motion for a temporary injunction that would have shut down Aereo. Backed by billionaire Barry Diller, Aereo is a service that streams broadcast channels over the Internet, using thousands of dime-sized antennas mounted in arrays on the tenth floor of a Brooklyn building to pick up over-the-air television signals. Aereo customers, who pay a monthly fee of $12, are assigned an individual antenna. They can then use the service to view TV programs on their computer, tablet, or other mobile device with a buffering delay of seven seconds, or they can keep a recording for later viewing.
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