Aereo loses bid to become a ‘cable’ company
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Michelle Clancy
| 26 October 2014
It looks like it’s the end of the line for Aereo. A federal judge in New York has issued an injunction against the streaming start-up, preventing it from signing cable-analogous retransmission deals with local broadcasters to offer their feeds over the Web.


Her ruling means a national application for the injunction against the company.

"Doing its best to turn lemons into lemonade, Aereo now seeks to capitalise on the Supreme Court's comparison of it to a (cable) system," US District Judge Alison Nathan said in her ruling, a bid that she said is a "fallacy.”

Aereo went to the Supreme Court in April to defend its right to exist in the face of copyright infringement suits from every major broadcaster. ABC, CBS, NBC et al argued that because the company broadcasts local feeds via the Internet without paying retransmission fees, it’s essentially stealing their content. Aereo has counter-argued that because it provides dime-sized antennae to its subscribers — who pay $8 per month for access to a couple dozen channels — it constitutes an over-the-air, rabbit ears-based service, which is exempt from retrans fees. It has also argued that its content is delivered to a single cloud-based DVR device for one subscriber and can therefore not be categorized as a public broadcast service, subject to fees and regulations.

The Supreme Court however held that the company was in violation of the Copyright Act, for a variety of reasons, which returned the case to the lower courts. Aereo from there has been trying to be cleared for consideration as a multichannel operator under FCC regulations, which would give it the right to sign retransmission deals with local affiliates for their content. Now, that hope has been dashed.

"We are reviewing the decision and evaluating our options moving forward," Aereo spokeswoman Virginia Lam said. inShare0