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iCraveTV sued for IP Theft 271

Posted by emmett from the did-you-really-think-it-would-stop dept.
LocalYokel writes "This Yahoo! article states that 10 motion picture and 3 broadcasting companies today filed a complaint against iCraveTV and individuals and companies behind the Internet operation, including William R. Craig, William R. Craig Consulting, George Simons and TVRadio Now Corp. They're also in hot water with the U.S. National Football League. Is the idea of streaming Internet television, the dream of many, truly viable under the constant threat of copyright lawsuits?" This isn't the first time we've seen action against iCrave; check it out here. The original Slashdot iCrave story is here. Enjoy.
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iCraveTV sued for IP Theft More

iCraveTV sued for IP Theft

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  • How can this even be news? (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    This is a blatant case of copyright violation. This is no different than a company violating the GPL or any other licensing agreement.

    And if you have a moral disagreement with copyrights, please just go make your own tv shows and movies and distribute it under the GPL. Don't complain about how current TV shows are copy protected, make GPL tv and movies and show everyone that GPL tv is better. The power of the community can overcome all financial obstacles.

  • You missed the point (Score:1)

    by Anonymous Coward
    The networks only make up half of the advertising. Local stations make up the other half. they also pay dearly for the right to broadcast netowrk shows. ABC affiliate's pay for the right to broadcast ABC shows. They pay this, so they can sell local advertisments. This is where the network itslef really makes the money. the local stations make the money off of the advertising.

    If I can sit in Los Angles, and watch a Canadian station, then I won't see any LA ads. If I am not watching LA ads, then the LA station loses revenue. If the LA station loses revenue, they will pay less for the opportunity to carry ABC programming. If they pay ABC less money, then ABC loses. All because living in LA, I could care less who is sellig cars in Toronto.

    This is the same reason the satelite TV's can't broadcast network feeds. No one would watch the local network feeds.

    Is it that hard for you people to understand that just having more people see an ad isn't worthwhile. You have to have more people see the ad that will buy the product.
  • 647 is definitely not Toronto. I've never heard of it. The actual city of Toronto is area code 416, and the surrounding areas are 905, 519, and 705.
  • I work for iCraveTV's ISP, and am involved in the project. The antanas are on our roof, in Canada. No signals are captured anywhere else.
  • >>
    There are more people watching--tell the adveritisers that--make more money
    >>

    But the networks just can't quantify to the advertisers how many more people (and more importantly, their age and median income) will watch iCrave, since they have no control over it. So they have nothing on which to base their ad rate hikes.
  • I think you at least partially understand my ludicrous reasoning.

    What scares people about digital technology is that they are able to make very good to perfect copies that don't degrade and can last for a long time, cheaply. That's also why analog tape players and VCRs degrade copies from the originals. Some of this is by design, when they were created.

    Since streaming technology is inherently flawed in this respect, it is more like analog technology. Copying it right now would be silly. Therefore, this is more like TV over the internet than it would be if I, say, made a high-quality movie file of "Dawson's Creek" or yesterday's NBA game or whatever, and put it up for download. (of course, that would also be expensive or time-consuming to copy for most people)

    Anyhow, my point is, this stuff isn't easy to redistribute on the internet. And the people paying for this service are essentially paying for watching Canadian TV. It's about as dangerous as streaming a RealAudio radio station from England. (My favorite is Virgin Radio)

    Feel free to reply, without the silly age comments that make you sound so young. :)
    ---
    pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate [152.7.41.11].
  • Um OK first: they're rebroadcasting public airwaves. The content is absolutely unedited by iCrave. People do not say "hey, did you see what was on iCrave last night?!" anymore than they say "hey, did you see what was on the airwaves last night?!"

    Secondly, this has a direct analogy to cable companies. AFAIK, cable companies in Canada do not pay anyone to rebroadcast publically available signals. Once again, people do not say "hey, did you see what was on Shaw last night?!" (Shaw is a Canadian cable company). They would instead say "hey, did you see what was on CTV last night?!"
  • At least part of the original broadcasts were from Pittsburgh area TV stations. The video capture was done there, and forwarded to Canada. So the original theft was in the United States.
  • First of all, the iCrave situation is very different from early cable TV, since early cable TV systems didn't insert advertising at the bottom of the screen while you were watching Ed Sullivan.

    Later, when cable took off, they made financial arrangements with the TV stations to buy air time on those channels (by inserting commercials for the cable system).

    iCrave, on the other hand, slapped ads on the screen when those shows were running.

    The iCrave folks make a big deal about how this is supposed to be okay under Canadian law, when that's almost certainly not the case, due to Canada's participation in several international copyright treaties.
  • Seriously though, Canada is pretty messed in a few ways. We've crippled our public broadcasting by cutting all of its funding, then we make regulations that it can't have nearly as many ads (nice double way to make sure it goes belly up), then we mismanage 3 billion dollars in government human resources programs. And yet out of all of these things people are most offended by the fact that out government is thinking of giving hockey teams 3 million each. Ohhhh nooo. Not $3 Million. That'll be what busts the bank. Not the 108 senetors for 27 million people, each of whom (the senetors) has to be a rubber stamp, work a MINIMUM of 7 days a year (this is actually flexible) and make upwards of $100,000 a year.

    Heh! If this is the worst you can come up with, I'd have to say the Canadian government is doing pretty well. Look across your southern border for some really screwed up government...

    --

  • 's called Nielson ratings.

    Exactly. Like I said, no real way to count viewers...

    --

  • But the networks can't count those netcasts when they figure in how many people are watching the show and the ads, so they can't charge more to the advertisers.

    Actually, it's a lot easier to count Internet viewers than broadcast viewers.

    --

  • By your naive argument, cable operators should be able to rebroadcast anything from the airwaves that we normally get on "free" tv.

    Umm, yes. That's absolutely true. Cable operators should be able to rebroadcast anything from the airwaves. Whether that can or not in your country does not alter the fact that they should be able to. If they can't, that's a bug in your laws.

    This is of course absurd.

    In what way?

    Cable operators have to negotiate fees with broadcast operators to redistribute their content. Why should internet operators be held to a different standard?

    They shouldn't be held to different standards. Neither cable operators nor internet operators should need permission to stream out what's currently available on the public airwaves, which belong to the people, and we only license to TV stations to make use of our air.

    If it weren't something out in public, I would agree with you, but the public airwaves are, after all, public. If a singer decides to sing a song in the Capitol Mall or some other public park, anyone ought to be able to point a camera at them and broadcast it for free. It's occuring in a public area, on public property. Same should apply to the publicly owned airwaves. Whether it does or not is a matter of local law, so depends on what country you're in, but regardless of where you are, I maintain that it should apply.

    --

  • I say scrap the over-regulated Canadian 'cultural protectionist' bull regulation and re-establish property rights properly!

    I find it humorous that you're calling the Canadian system over-regulated while arguing that it is in fact under-regulated, and needs additional regulation. (You're saying Canadian broadcasters are currently allowed to do something they shouldn't be able to do and recommending they be denied to ability to do this. By definition, that's an increase in regulation, not a decrease.)

    --

  • Actually, if you have a more disagreement with copyrights, you shouldn't waste your time GPLing anything. ... Because if you don't agree that copyrights should exist, you don't believe in the copyright protection that the GPL provides.

    This is wildly bad logic. That's like saying that because I don't believe wild tigers should be allowed to roam the streets of downtown Minneapolis, if I happen to run into one, I should just go about my business as if it isn't there. This is likely to get me eaten. Just because someone doesn't believe copyrights should exists does not mean they should act as if they don't.

    As for what that has to do with the GPL, I'm not sure, since the whole point of the GPL is to make sure your code is only used in the way you approve of, which is also the whole point of copyrights. No one who uses the GPL thinks copyrights are a bad idea. I think you're getting the GPL and BSD licenses confused...

    --

  • You could say that I own a percentage of the public roads because I pay taxes for them. They're public in the sense that anybody can use them, but in reality that's because we all jointly own them. The airwaves are not owned by anybody otherwise I would have the right to broadcast what I want (if I did this in the US, the FCC would be after me)

    Not anyone can get onto the public roads and drive on them, only licensed drivers may do that; anyone else will have the highway patrol on their asses. Likewise, not anyone can get onto the public airwaves and broadcast on them, only licensed broadcasters can do that; anyone else will have the FCC on their asses. These cases are in fact identical, the only difference being that due to bandwidth limitations, we grant far fewer broadcast licenses than drivers licenses. But your rights to both are roughly the same, and they are both examples of public property. (Incidently, the fact that you pay taxes for them has nothing to do with it.)

    --

  • Correct me if I'm wrong, but these airwaves are auctioned off and PAID FOR by the networks

    You're wrong. The airwaves aren't paid for by the television stations, TV stations pay for licenses to broadcast on them. This is much like how you pay for licenses to drive on public roads. The roads remain public, despite the fact that you're paying for the license.

    --

  • there's no real way for the content producers and distributors to tell how many people are watching their shows on icravetv, and adjust their rates accordingly.

    There's no real way to do this for broadcast television, either. This changes nothing...

    --

  • What about cyclists? Although banned from some roads for safety reasons, they need no licenses elsewhere.

    What about CB radio operators? Although banned from some frequencies, they need no licenses elsewhere.


    Besides, licensing for the roads is about safety and ensuring that others don't get hurt.

    Licensing for the public airwares is to ensure two stations don't broadcast too close to one another or otherwise interfere with other broadcaster's rights.

    Ok, I'm sorry, I'm just taking this discussion further into irrelevance.

    Actually, no, these are valid questions that deserve answers. And the issue at hand is quite relevant. As another poster pointed out, too many people want you to forget that YOU, the public, own the airwaves, not them.

    --

  • The only problem is that, indeed, here in Canada, at least, you can do just that. A TV station -can- take any publicly avialable broadcast and simply rebroadcast it, as long as they do not alter the content of said broadcast... I guess, most importantly, not remove original brodcaster's logo and such, and even more critical, not remove the commercials and sponsors announcements.

    This is where you only fall unto sementics. Is ICraveTV rebroadcasting? Surely, although the method is adapted to the digital medium, that is what they are doing.
  • They are not runnig a signal on a line they own to a TV they own. They are re-broadcasting (with IP) a signal produced by a local TV station. The TV station payed royalties on the content to the copyright owners. If iCraveTV wants to do the same thing they must pay the royalties also.

    If they would redistribute a movie by recording it on a VCR tape and the sell copies that would be illegal redistribution also.

    This is so obvilouly illegal it is hard to believe that they thought they would be allowed to continue for any length of time.
  • Man!

    With all the IP lawsuit news - it's now
    "Slashdot -News about alleged IP theft..."

    Sheesh!
  • So long as the content isn't altered, like another broadcasting company did on new years, I have no objections. Infact, I'd say it's fair use - I can tape the evening news broadcast, right? Why can't I show it to other people? It's not like I altered it or sold it for a profit. And therein lies the problem - iCrave is a commercial entity. Just imagine if somebody grabbed your web content, slapped a banner ad across the top, and redistributed it. I'd be pissed, wouldn't you?
  • Most cable networks allow local cable companies to cover up their commercials at specific times with crappy local advertising. This is to make those national commercials, like the one featuring www.hampsterdance.com, look like high-quality stuff in comparison.

    Seriously now - those are known in the cable biz as 'local avails' and make networks attractive to cable companies because the cable co. can bring in some advertising revenue from the local bait shops, who otherwise could not afford to be on TV.

    The cable company is NOT allowed to cover up ads from the local broadcast TV stations, who have their own crappy ads for furniture stores and used cars.

  • I think you need to touch up your facts, Soc...

    So you own these programs?

    Yes. ( No. I have a license to show them in my own area, but only here)

    And you broadcast them for free?

    Yes. (got one right)

    And companies pay you to get ad time on the programs?

    Yes. (that's two right)

    And I can buy a television from ANYONE, and watch one of these programs?

    Yes. (3 , you're on a roll!)

    So, let's say you have a big enough transmitting antenna to reach 100,000 viewers, and I came to you with an antenna that lets you reach 10 million viewers. Would you pay me a lot for that antenna?

    You bet. And my advertisers would pay me more in turn. (Um, no! The height of the antenna and how far it can send a signal are part of the station's license that limit the station to my local area. If I buy a better antenna, I have to reduce the power I put into it so that I still reach the same viewers)

    A typical program producer pays his rent by selling his program in several cities under an exclusive agreement in each. The web threatens the producer and the station's exclusive agreement.

    This is not to say I agree that webcasting is damaging to them; I think its free publicity. If I saw a good program on real player, I'd check to see if it was on TV and watch it there instead of 1/4 screen with motion artifacts. If it was on a Toronto station, I'd email my local station and tell them they ought to get it on the air in my town too.

  • Come on, can we fill the article space on index.pl completely with stories about people suing each other 8-)?

    ObTopic: Doesn't Canada have some sort of rebroadcast law that makes this alright?
  • Yeah, Kevin is being released soon.

    Hopefully the 60 mins interview will help clear up the misconception that he stole credit card numbers and commited malicous acts.

    Even if you have a negative opinion of Mitnick, the abuses that the media and government and prison officals made against him make this an important case.
  • Well it's young. But as bandwidth increases, and they start carrying more channels, people will just go to iCrave, or a copycat site. The broadcasters are trying to make sure that doens't happen. Because once they're carrying more than one channel, no one has any assurance as to how many eyes are watching their shows.

    I Crave also is making money from their efforts. It takes many eyeballs to sign up with Doubleclick.net. So, they are directly profitting from other people's broadcasts.
  • i think that the "adding content" thing doesn't imply-- the banner ads are more a totally seperate content stream than something actually being added to the tv signal itself.

    as to the deradation-through-streaming thing.. well, that's an _extremely_ good point, and we can only hope the courts will decide to view realvideo as legally no different than a really bad television set.

    on the other hand, if having the signal degrade in quality is "changing" the signal, then _any_ usage of the canadian law is illegal. after all, due to the very nature of analog signals, it is literally impossible to make a pristine copy-- there will _always_ be some degradation of quality. _always_. It may be possible for that degradation to be so small as to be indetectable to humans, but it will be there. So really any system where you capture and rebroadcast the signal is not going to be putting out exactly the same signal-- it's just the signal will appear the same to any human watching for all practical purposes.
    i'm not sure the courts will take a different view of the icravetv situation just because the difference in "signal" is rather extreme.
    but it's hard to tell.

    -mcc-baka
    INTELLECTUAL PROPERTY IS THEFT

  • The real issue here is that the broadcasters and the MPAA have some very nasty plans for how to handl streaming over the Internet and want to snip any expectation of free public viewing in the bud.

    This is very similar to the networks sueing DirecTV for rebroadcasting a chosen local affiliate nationally. Ultimatly, DirecTV was forced to stop that practice and carry many local area broadcasts and allow them to be recieved ONLY by people who could also recieve the signals conventionally. Thus I may subscribe to the Atlanta stations, but not the LA stations.

    I find that annoying personally, before the suit having an east and west coast channel, I could resolve scheduling conflicts easily. Now, I'm SOL.

    I can only conclude that the networks must make some of their profit by charging some sort of affiliation fee to the local affiliates. That or they quietly own the affiliate stations.

  • How much responsibility is it of theirs to make sure only people in Canada access their servers?

    Unless the Canadian law specifies that they must prevent access from outside of Canada, I argue that they have no responsability at all for that. The alternative is to claim that all laws from everywhere apply everywhere. That's simply not reasonable.

    If anything, the plaintiffs would need to take action against the people in the US that recieve the broadcasts, except that the US has no law against that (that I'm aware of), so I guess they can either quit sending their signals into Canadian airspace or live with it.

  • Once they've started (stealing) drawing sizable portions of the broadcasters audiences, what's to stop them from inserting their own ads?

    THEN sue them. You can't (in theory anyway) sue someone for damages they could cause in the future Otherwise I could sue everyone who drives a car because "what's to stop them from running me down one day"? Thus, you can only sue for damages resulting from something that was done or that is being done.

  • We watch as the American Legal System suffers from gravitational collapse, under the weight of Internet lawsuits, as executives and accountants realise that the world -didn't- end on January 1st.

    We also talk to the glue manufacturer who hopes to make a deal with Microsoft, if it gets split into teensy little pieces.

    And finally, how to make an entire high-performance, multi-platform Operating System for every architecture under the sun (and several that aren't) out of cardboard and squeezy lemonade bottles.

    (P.S. If you're American, and have never seen Blue Peter, you've missed a large chunk of reality. :)

  • No, no: you've missed the point. If you're in LA then you're not supposed to be watching iCraveTV! ;)
  • "Or does the public own your car, because you used it on public roads? "

    You could say that I own a percentage of the public roads because I pay taxes for them. They're public in the sense that anybody can use them, but in reality that's because we all jointly own them. The airwaves are not owned by anybody otherwise I would have the right to broadcast what I want (if I did this in the US, the FCC would be after me) - so what if the broadcasts leak elsewhere, why should I do anything about it until the TV/Radio/etc companies stop their transmissions leaking into my space.
  • What about cyclists? Although banned from some roads for safety reasons, they need no licenses elsewhere. Besides, licensing for the roads is about safety and ensuring that others don't get hurt. Ok, I'm sorry, I'm just taking this discussion further into irrelevance.
  • "On Thursday, 10 film and three broadcast organizations filed a complaint in a U.S. district court in Pennsylvania, accusing iCraveTV of copyright infringement, trademark infringement and unfair competition. " - From CBC's web site" [cbc.ca]

    How does filing suit in Pennyslyvania help them? The company is based in Ontario! Would somebody more knowlegeable about the law please enlighten me. Perhaps they need a court ruling in the US so that they can use some provision of NAFTA or some other international agreement?
  • The trick will be: does the law cover 'retransmit' or 'rebroadcast'? They don't presently broadcast, because you have to explicitly request that their server send you the data.

    But why should you have to be Canadian to view it? I'm sure Americans near the border can pick up signals from our neighbors to the north and no one cares. As long as the server is in Canada and people outside Canada don't re-retransmit the signal everything should be gravy.

    Mmmm.... gravy.

    Personally, I don't want to have to stoop to the level of pretending to be a Canadian ;)
  • I wonder how they justify their suit against iCraveTV when they themselves repackage and modify other broadcasters' content?

    I refer, of course, to the TV media practice of adding and modifying the billboards that get into the scenes they broadcast. (Original slashdot story here [slashdot.org].)

    They don't compensate the billboard owners when they do this. After all, it's not their job to give the billboard renters free advertising in their medium. How, then can they logically justify going after iCrave, who's offering people who don't live within broadcast range of their stations the ability to watch the TV shows? It's legal to make recordings of television programs, and to share them with others, which is all that iCrave's doing. If they modify the advertising contained in those shows, what of it? It's legal to have a recording device which snips out the commercials, and after all, the networks do it to the billboards all the time!

    Of course, the real difference, in this case, is that the networks have lots of money and lawyers at their disposal, unlike the billboard owners. Since might and money makes right in today's world, they'll probably win, too.

  • If that local station is selling locally targeted advertising (e.g., state lotto, local franchise specific ads, Ritas waterice, etc.), then the advertising is essentially useless out of the region. Of course, if those same out of region viewers choose to watch the internet instead (though doubtfull) of their own local stations, that would have the effect of reducing the fees that the owners/producers of the content (e.g., movies, news, sitcoms, talk shows, etc) can collect. Also, how are the producers/owners/licensors supposed to price the TV station that is getting rebroadcasted? Perhaps the state is regulated differently, and hence can't put certain high paying ads on (e.g., alchohol). Or perhaps that state costs less to do business in, and simply doesn't need to put in as much ad time as others. There are lots of different potential reasons.

    In your last sentence, do you mean licensee (local affiliate station) or licenser (The plantiffs: Fox universal, etc)? For the licensor, my argument makes lots of sense. The rebroadcasted licensee (local station) would either not care, or might like it. That is not to say, however, that the other licensees (the rest, who are only being distributed via public TV) would like it, which can, of course, ultimately hurt the licensor.

    In either case, I haven't thought of all the issues, but i'm sure there are more. In such a case, i'm inclined to side with the OWNERS of that intellectual property, until I can say I've exhausted all possibilities (reasons why they'd object), and that they're simply being unreasonable and uncharitable (to those who live in the true boondocks). I, as everyone else on slashdot, has yet to hear their arguments. Because they are the owners, I extend them leeway. Clearly, if these studios' interests could only be furthered, they would probably realize it, and they would not be taking this small fry company to court.
  • The issue here is not the local TV stations, it is the original CREATORS of that content; copyrights are very much at issue here! As it said in the article, "Copyrighted programs and films don't fall from the skies; they evolve from creative artists, supported by considerable financial investments." These sitcoms, movies, talk shows, news, etc. cost money to create; the producers recoup their money by selling/licensing their works to the TV stations to be broadcast. The TV stations in-turn recoup this money by selling advertising space. The mere fact that that content is delivered in a certain format over a public medium does not mean that it is public property. All of the listed plantiffs (e.g., Fox, ABC, NBC, Disney, Orion, Universal, etc) in this case are the CREATORS of the content, who are, evidently trying to protect their work. Besides the fact that it is THEIR intellectual property, in which they should be allowed to determine how it is displayed and sold, allowing ICrave to get away with this DOES pose a possible threat to their profitability. ICrave isn't paying them a dime, yet ICrave is selling their own ads and otherwise profiting.

    It would seem as if you believe, that, since it is being rebroadcast over the internet it is OK. Let us imagine for a second that instead of being rebroadcast over the internet, it is rebroadcast on another TV station, only this TV station doesn't have to pay anything (like ICrave). Now how many TV stations do you think are going to pay the producers? Not only does it cost them more to pay for it, but it could also put them at a competetive disadvantage, in that the freeloading/rebroadcasting stations don't have to rely on advertising dollars nearly as much, allowing them to put fewer and fewer ads up. Would you still argue this isn't a threat either? This entire argument is silly to begin with. Being able to view something on public airwaves doesn't give you the right to do anything with it. Just like purchasing a video cassette doesn't give you the right to broadcast it. These are basic intellectual property questions, and they're not nearly as new as you would have us believe.

    Regarding political airtime, I agree with you to a degree, however, your view is again overly simplistic. The first point i'll make is that in most every city, I believe, there are more than enough channels available for the public to use. Secondly, politicians aren't just paying for their ads to be broadcast to people who'd like to tune in. Quite the contrary, the politicians are putting them IN FRONT of viewers who'd otherwise not tune in. In otherwords, they're putting them between shows during prime time, and what not, on heavily watched stations. These stations aren't heavily watched just merely because they are licensed to broadcast on station X; they're watched because they have CONTENT there (not just once, but on a regular basis. They've bought that userbase's eyeballs, in a way). Which brings me to my next point. It costs money to create that content, and it costs money to broadcast it. Mandating the insertion of any political ads takes away the industry's opportunity to recoup their costs. I'm not sure exactly how much they can afford, but please understand that it doesn't come for free.

    Additionally, as you mentioned, how do we keep the screwballs off (such as Buchananon) to prevent an utter crowding out? Should only the "most popular" should be allowed? Many pay before they're "popular". Based on polling results? Based on some stuffed shirts that decide who's electable? How? I don't see any sterile way to handle it. This market based system of purchasing ad slots does serve as an equalizer of sorts, it prevents both gluts and shortages. We can atleast be sure that those who can buy a significant # of ad slots have their act together to a degree (a sort of natural selection) The question is, is it desirable that society makes it a necessity for politicians to raise millions of dollars? It would appear that that is how lobbyists turn political ears these days. I'd be half tempted to ban all privately political ads (despite the constitution). Instead, force all such ads to be paid for by a select FEW government grants, and create a giant government (megabandwidth) website of sorts...call it election.gov, or something. Allow each politician to put as much material as he needs up there, for as many people wish to see it. If they just want to "speak" to the people, that seems to be to be the ideal way to do it anyways....relatively cheap, accurate, it would force more meaningful discussion (better than most all political TV ads that are mere soundbites), etc etc etc....
  • Referring to your top 5 lines, sure both that local broadcaster and the advertizer aren't hurt. But they're not the plantiffs in this case, the movie studios are. They are hurt, as I've made relatively clear. If viewer's are to watch this ICrave instead of their local TV stations, and they watch ads that are ineffective, that would have to effect of reducing the number of licensing fees that the creators can collect....
  • Oh... whoops. Took the wrong tack on my previous posts. May I point out that... Public owns airwaves -> Public owns content implies AT&T owns phone lines -> AT&T owns phone conversations Slashdot owns servers -> Slashdot owns your comments University owns dorm rooms -> University owns content of dorm rooms Medium !=== content.
  • Billions of dollars of Internet infrastructure, and I'm using it to watch Oprah in a 1-by-1 inch window on my screen.


  • Good point. As for 'iCrave should lose'.. well.. I don't know. I think all parties have to own up to it.
    I, for one, feel that none of our current laws specifically dealing with 'broadcasting' should apply to the internet, it's just such a totally different medium. The CRTC seems to see this as well (gee. they kind of .. MAKE SENSE! that's been happening more and more over the past few years.... I like it)
    IT is logical.
    Originally, the law allowing rebroadcasting was to allow others to take over... with things such as radio repeaters, when they felt like it, without fear of penalty. You could hop Toronto TV across the country if you had the technology... or bring it in on cable to a remote location.. and charge for it.. but you could not modify the programming. This was beneficial to all... the network got more coverage, and people got to see more TV when they otherwise couldn't.
    Now.. this is different. Though.. I must say....

    If I look at this in a true geek hacker way (which is not how the courts work...)
    Technically, they *could* put repeaters all over the country, and broadcast to everyone in the country, and nobody could say shit.. they are doing it legally... so how is that so different than sending it over the net? Well.. the CRTC says it right.. .the internet is a media that would complement, not simply replace the programming. And they are right....
  • Well.. I believe how it works is this.
    Either the US copany files charges in a Canadian court, or vice-versa.

    Presuming it is filed in a US court, the reason the execs would show up is....
    if they don't, they could be declared guilty in absentia, and could never enter the US again, under penalty of arrest.


  • As someone pointed out, it's legal to 'rebroadcast' the signal. Sending the live video over the net will not necessarily qualify as 'broadcasting'.
  • Hunh?
    I doubt they are that stupid.
    They are probably picking it up in Toronto, or whever their receiving station is.
    Hell.. if you don't want us to pick it up, don't broadcast it into our sovreign airspace!
  • There is no way for them to tell how many people are watching when they broadcast over the airwaves *either*.
  • And as some have said, this doesn't imply we own the material *on* the airwaves.. but it does imply something similar.
    We take for granted, in Canada, that something broadcast publicly, using standard modulation, over public airwaves was *meant* for everyone to see and hear, and we reserve the right to extend those broadcasts as we see fit. Now.. we may not *modify* them to our own ends.. and we can't *steal* them for profit.. we don't own the work... we can't record it(well, we can, but we can't then broadcast it at a later time).

  • Is it? What if your local laws said "Anyone who wants to may re-publish their own copies of your paper, so long as it is reproduced in it's entirety, and is placed on the shelf at rougly the same time as your own paper, and pulled also at the same time?"

    The issue here isn't *stealing* anyone's content. It's rebroadcasting.. which is explicitly covered by our wonderful Canadian law. And unfortunately for those who are bitching (notice how none are the canadian companies who's broadcasts are actually being copied verbatim?), our courts and our laws tend to favour the individual over the bullshitting huge companies.
  • No. I cannot copy it. I *can* AMPLIFY THE HELL out of it so that everyone for 100 miles can hear what you are saying. As Canadian law goes, one may not use a listening/amplification device to hear a conversation that they could otherwise not hear, but they *can* use such devices to amplify/aid in listening conversations they *can* already hear.


    Also, as you said it loud enough for me to hear it, I can repeat it as often as I like, to whomever I like. I cannot, of course, claim it to be my original work, as it isn't, and I know it.


    And we mean RF, not 'vibrating air' when we say airwaves.. though, of course, I would say that sound is most definately an 'air wave'....
  • But whether or not they make money is not an issue, the issue is whether or not they modify the broadcast.
  • Running a line from an antenna toa TV is also 'rebroadcasting' even if you don't think of it thwat way.
    You are converting a signal from radio to electricity for the last leg of it's journey.

    Also.. as for royalties, the issue is clearly covered in Candian law. It is permissible to rebroadcast any TV signal you can receive over public transmission (ie: the entire RF spectrum), so long as you rebroadcast it in realtime, and do not modify it. (modify is defined, simply causing a change in signal quality or some such thing does not constitutemodification.. they mean modifying the broadcast with advertisements, your own video, etc...)

    So.. the reason they even *started* it is because canadian law very explicitly makes what they are doing *completely legal*
  • Yes. Except.. it was *already* broadcast ona *public* medium where *anyone* could watch it... they just devised a method to extend that range.
    Had they simply developed an Uber-antenna that would let anyone in canada watch the station... nobody would have a problem.
  • Actually.. here in Canada.. there *are* laws stating that we may not receive american movie programming off satellite. It is *technically* illegal in Canada to subscribe to HBO.
    This happened during the 80's satellite TV craze.

    See.. for a while, it was perfectly legal to descramble american programming off satellite without paying. You were allowed to receive it.. you could descramble it, as the american channels technically did not have license to sell you that programming... and at some point, it became illegal to *watch* it.

    This is why so many canadians have US P.O Boxes where they send their satellite dish payments to, and have their codes/cards/whatever mailed back to.

  • When you are named in a lawsuit with this list at the top:
    The plaintiffs filing the complaint are the Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp.; Disney Enterprises, Inc.; Columbia TriStar Television, Inc.; Columbia Pictures Television Inc.; Columbia Pictures Industries, Inc.; Metro-Goldwyn- Mayer Studios Inc.; Orion Pictures Corp.; Paramount Pictures Corp.; Universal City Studios, Inc.; Time Warner Entertainment Co. L.P. (Warner Bros.); ABC Inc.; CBS Broadcasting Inc. and Fox Broadcasting Co.
    it's about time to get some plastic surgery and move to Venezuela.

    -B
  • I don't really understand the hostility here. TV networks get their revenue from adveritizing, right? Ad revenue is somehow based on the number of people watching the show, right? iCrave gets more people watching.

    I'm not so naive as to thing that's the end of it. It's a control thing, the same way the MPAA/DeCSS issue is.

    What I don't see here is the economic loss. For DeCSS, a monopoly is lost and revenues go down. With iCrave, so what? There are more people watching--tell the adveritisers that--make more money.

    Greg

  • I agree, the people who are running this thing have the common sense of a large carrot if they didn't think they were going to get the hell sued out of the them post haste.

    Maybe if they weren't trying to make money off ads on their pages they would have more of a case but as it is they are just signal stealing and trying to make a buck.
  • But that wouldn't stop them surrounding the 'set' in their own banner ads...
  • ... because it is. It's theft of property. Whether it's the original film, or stealing the transmission, it's still theft. By your analogy, jacking into the power or phone network wouldn't be stealing, because no-one actually loses the power supply.
  • Of course not, they're Yanks. They're like the Flatworlders of the 16 and 17th century. The world stops at the Mexican and Canadian borders :) *dons flameproof vest* :)
  • So if I compose out loud a poem and you hear it, you can copy it because the airwaves were vibrating anyway?
  • Take this with a grain of salt because it's word of mouth, but....

    I believe in Canada it's legal to re-broadcast signals as long as the "signals" are unmodified.

  • What if someone offered to print millions of copies of your whole paper and distribute it for free? Even if they included a flyer in the middle advertising some local record store, I still image you'd be happy at inreasing your reader base by an order of magnitude - as should your advertising base.

    That's what really boggles my mind about complaints on the part of broadcast TV companies - it's like someone is giving them a giant transmitter with worldwide reach.

    Now the content providers, who were only paid for rebroadcast in a small market, I can understand the issue they have.
  • Maybe you misunderstood. The question was, "Or does the public own your car?" _not_ "Or does the public own the roads?" - you simply argued that you own some of the roads, which is tangential to everything under the sun.

    You just made his case for him. You suggest that roads and airwaves are in the same category. I'll buy that. By the same token, your car on the road is owned by you, and the content on the airwaves is owned by its respective publisher.

    Don't worry about nit-picking his arguments (e.g. "if you think about it backwards and upside down, I sort of own the tires that touch the road", etc.) It's really simple: if I make a movie and put it on TV, that doesn't give anyone else permission to redistribute it in another format (i.e. VHS, streaming video, etc.).. or does it?

    That's the question. I, for one, don't think it's necessarily cut-and-dry.
  • This is a real threat to the networks. As it is right now, they charge the cable companies to rebroadcast their content and get to brag to their advertisers about how many more people the ads are getting to.

    If iCraveTV wins, it could really change things. You might start seeing extra channels on your cable box with little Coke and Nike logos and slogans scrolling along the edges. Or you might see local stations showing popular prime time programming, then cutting to some owned/licenced broadcast, hoping people are too lazy to change the channel.
  • you say:

    It would seem as if you believe, that, since it is being rebroadcast over the internet it is OK. Let us imagine for a second that instead of being rebroadcast over the internet, it is rebroadcast on another TV station, only this TV station doesn't have to pay anything (like ICrave). Now how many TV stations do you think are going to pay the producers?

    Maybe you were caught up in your point, that or you do not understand the station's revenue model. The viewer is not the customer, the advertiser is (discounting for the moment non-commercial broadcasters). By doing what you say the real effect on the broadcaster is that more people see the commercials. That's a Good Thing. If I were an advertiser it would make me particularly want to broadcast ads via Buffalo etc) stations. particularly if I want to target the geekish early adopter type that has a high speed net connections at this point in time.

    From their own selfish point of view I can't understand why every radio/tv station does not simulcast over the net. Eyeballs are eyeballs. the NY CBS affiliate probably has agreements not to compete with the LA CBS affiliate in the LA market or they all would. None the less if someone like icrave does it for me it's my (the NY affiliate) best interest to let them get away with it and sell it to my customer as an additional reason to place ads with me.

    you argument makes sense (though I still don't agree) from the point of view of the content licensee. If I sell the NY affiliate the right to broadcast my movie I don't want it showing up in France where it's still int he theatres.

  • If that local station is selling locally targeted advertising (e.g., state lotto, local franchise specific ads, Ritas waterice, etc.), then the advertising is essentially useless out of the region

    Useless? If that's all the ads are maybe, but there's no downside for the advertiser. The fact that a few people in Thailand now know that I'm the Buffalo NY King of Pillow Slipcovers does me
    no harm, who knows, maybe I'll expand someday? so it's either good or it's harmless - never bad.

    In your last sentence, do you mean licensee (local affiliate station) or licenser (The plantiffs: Fox universal, etc)?

    hmm.. yea rereading it, it's confusing - sorry.
    I meant licenser in the context you put it. but
    look at your example, Fox Universal. Fox sells
    eyeballs, Universal sells content. when they
    merged together they though they had compimentary businesses. Perhaps they were wrong and need to
    rethink what they really do and how they make $$.


    In either case, I haven't thought of all the issues, but i'm sure there are more.

    Testify, brother! Couldn't agree more. I write
    from LA - home of all the IP attorneys (actually
    Santa Clarita, home of most stunt men and camera
    truck operators). I'm caught here between the rights of the owners of the IP and the fact that they put out in the ether, where it speeds towards
    the cosmos at 186,00 miles per second despite the efforts of the attorneys.

    If I get an antennae that will pick up local broadcasts 3000 miles away is that wrong? No. If I can make such an antennae for $0.50 and sell
    them to everyone in the world? I kick the wind out of these same companies and they will try to sue me into the ground, but they seem to be clearly wrong.

    Where is this? Somewhere in between. I lean a little to the way Canadian law handles it, but it's a wobbler.

    garyr
  • At the start of the Outer Limits, it says "here is nothing wrong with your television set. Do not attempt to adjust the picture. We are controlling transmission. If we wish to make it louder, we will bring up the volume. If we wish to make it softer, we will tune it to a whisper. We can reduce the focus to a soft blur, or sharpen it to crystal clarity. We will control the horizontal. We will control the vertical. For the next hour, sit quietly and we will control all that you see and hear. You are about to experience the awe and mystery which reaches from the inner mind to... The Outer Limits."

    However, despite this announcement, they actually have no control over your TV or you.

    Similarly, in Canada, they have no rights to prevent retransmittion. We're Canadians. We're not from that backwater country where it's citizens have no useful rights.

  • Funny you should say that.

    Fox 29 broadcasting from Buffalo often has adverts targeted directly towards Ontario.

  • I often watch the Scottish news, even though I live in Canada, to keep up with what's happening back home.

    The BBC puts these programs on their Web page [bbc.co.uk]

  • All the channels broadcast by Icrave are freely available over a (Big enough) antenna in Toronto.
  • Except the stations and content producers _aren't_ getting any extra money from these. What the advertisers get is more advertising than they paid for; but there's no real way for the content producers and distributors to tell how many people are watching their shows on icravetv, and adjust their rates accordingly.

    Put another way, it's like if you mirrored a yahoo.com page, including the ads, but didn't link the ads back to them. Then the advertisers get more advertising, but yahoo dosen't get any more money, because the impressions are not generated by them.

    Finally, it is worth pointing out that icravetv is not licensed to redistribute the TV signals. So the content producers have every right (under current law) to refuse to sell icravetv their content.
  • Here's my view (correct me if I'm wrong or your point differs):

    Advertisers get more bang for their buck. Networks get nothing. I think that allowing this company to freely rebroadcast is a slippery slope. If anyone can rebroadcast, they have no internal method of determining how much to charge advertisers -- and they therefore lose money.
  • I believe that was an ad for one of Michigans sleaziest personal injury lawyers, Daniel Burton.. He shares a building with a cronie of mine, and trust me; my first bachelors pad was nicer than his office. If you saw that ad, what about the horribly annoying 'Spirit of Detroit' commercials playing about the same time?
  • nielsen.
  • MPAA movie ratings are displayed at the end of the film. Ignorance is not an excuse for breaking the law.
  • Here's why:

    broadcasters want to make money off advertising revenue. the more people that watch their stations, the more their advertising is worth. if 50% of their audience is suddenly bootlegging their telecast, the value of their advertising drops sharply even though the same number of people are watching.
  • You can read more about this at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation [cbc.ca]'s news service here [cbc.ca]. There is a bit more information here then at the yahoo article referenced in the original posting. Along with some related site links.
  • Cable TV started out in around the early 50's when people got the idea of building a big antenna that would receive stations from far away and sharing the signals with their neighbors. Eventually, people started charging for this and the companies became larger and larger. Back then, these early cable companies didn't pay for their signals. Why should iCraveTV pay for content when all it is doing is re-broadcasting signals taken from a TV antenna, signals that are free for anyone to receive.

    The people who are angry at iCraveTV should realize that they represent a paradigm shift in cable/broadcasting and should help it along. As we all know, advertising is the real player behind TV today and one goal of ads is to get to as many people as possible. Why blow against the wind?

    I've tried iCraveTV and I've found the quality to be pretty good. Since I have a TV next to my computer, I don't really need it and I realized that the iCraveTV feed is about 22 seconds delayed. :)

  • Canadian copyright law ALLOWS icravetv.com to do its live rebroadcasting. These companies should be suing the Canadian government if they think somethings wrong with this (harmless) approach, not http://www.icravetv.com [icravetv.com].
  • Ok, maybe I'm missing something.....but what jurisdiction does a US Federal court have over a Canadian company?
    Did the US anex Canada while I was sleeping?
    Why would ICrave executives even bother to show up?

    I think the following quote sums up MPAA's small mindness and ego-cenetric thinking.

    "this kind of cyberspace stealing must be stopped, wherever it occurs, because it violates the principles of US copyright law." said Jack Valenti, president and chief executive office of the Motion Picture Association of America in a statement.

    Maybe someone should show Jack a map of the USA and then show him a globe.

  • Hmph. (Score:3)

    by Anonymous Coward on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:25PM (#1353827)
    SueDot. Lawsuits for Nerds. Stuff no one cares about.

  • The president of the MPAA is a fool (Score:3)

    by Malc ( 1751 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @01:53PM (#1353828)
    "Jack Valenti, president of the Motion Picture Association of America, accused the Canadian Internet service of "one of the largest and most brazen thefts of intellectual property ever committed in the United States." " - From CBC's web site [cbc.ca]

    Is this guy on crack or something? It's quite obvious that he's talking out of his arse! Canada is still an independent soverign state - nothing has happened within the United States: what is Valenti talking about?

  • Short term v Long term (Score:3)

    by um... Lucas ( 13147 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:30PM (#1353829) Journal
    Yes, in the short term, rebroadcasting a broadcasters signal could potentially reach more viewers. But then the broadcaster, which paid millions of dollars for the exclusive right to air such and such, suffers from Brand dilution. People may not necessarily look to them the next time one of their exclusive shows is aired, as they will suspect they can watch from iCrave instead. Once they've started (stealing) drawing sizable portions of the broadcasters audiences, what's to stop them from inserting their own ads?

    That would ultimately be very damaging for the people whom they are rebroadcasting, as it'd turn out to create a smaller audience for themselves and their advertisers.

  • Medium != Content (Score:3)

    by Jerf ( 17166 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @01:38PM (#1353830) Journal
    The airwaves may be owned by the public; and if you could somehow re-broadcast "airwaves", maybe you'd be right.

    But sorry, ICraveTV isn't rebroadcasting "airwaves"... they're broadcasting "movies", "shows", and "advertisements", none of which "belong" to the public just for the use of a public communications vehicle. (Or does the public own your car, because you used it on public roads?)

    And they do offer advertising arrangements [icravetv.com]... sounds like alteration to me if you're adding ads, even if they're not "in the program"... I sure don't see banner ads on TV when I watch it.

  • NEWS FLASH: CRTC has no control here! (Score:3)

    by Mr. Piccolo ( 18045 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @03:52PM (#1353831) Homepage
    #define IANAL
    #define IANAC

    Since this is an Internet enterprise, the CRTC is not regulating it. There is an entire news release [crtc.gc.ca] on the subject, but here is the important bit:

    Broadcasting

    Regarding whether content on the Internet is broadcasting as defined by the Broadcasting Act, the CRTC has made the following points:

    1.Everything transmitted over the Internet that is predominantly alphanumeric text is by definition not broadcasting under the Broadcasting Act.
    2.Material transmitted over the Internet, which is significantly "customizable" or capable of being uniquely tailored by the individual user, does not involve the transmission of programs for reception by the public and is, therefore, not broadcasting.
    3.The remaining material would fall within the definition of broadcasting under the Broadcasting Act, but will be exempt from regulation for the following reasons:

    (in part) The new media complement, rather than substitute for traditional broadcasting. Before the new media could substitute for traditional media, key technological and other developments would have to take place.

    This case may force the CRTC to reexamine its position, however, since iCrave's business is doing just that!

    The bottom line is that standard copyright law should take over, and iCrave should lose IMHO.

    In any event, even if the CRTC did have control, iCrave would need to get a license before it could distribute those TV programs.

  • iCrave's cool... and legal (Score:3)

    by ODiV ( 51631 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:21PM (#1353832)
    iCraveTV is a great idea that someone had the guts to implement.
    Great thing is, because of Canadian law, it's perfectly legal.

    How much responsibility is it of theirs to make sure only people in Canada access their servers? I'd argue that they're doing enough, but does anyone know for sure? Certainly an interesting question. Another one would be if Canada should change its laws to outlaw this sort of thing.

  • Re:How can this even be news? (Score:3)

    by gomi ( 57888 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:30PM (#1353833) Homepage
    If you had a TV antenna in Canada and a few thousand miles of antenna cable, and hooked it up to a TV set in Arizona, to watch the Canadian freely-available public TV stream, ads and all, would that be 'theft'?

    No. Of course not. That's exactly what iCraveTV is doing -- they're not charging for it (except in the form of a frame with banner ads), and they're not modifying the content or even removing the TV ads. All it does is let you watch Canadian TV wherever you are. The signal is freely available. The MPAA is doing stupid things again, just as it has throughout its existence. IP doesn't even really enter into it.

    gomi

  • Re:Not another one! (Score:3)

    by vyesue ( 76216 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:40PM (#1353834)
    ok, you know how when you watch baseball, at the end of the game it says:

    "This telecast is the exclusive property of Major League Baseball. Any retransmission or rebroadcast without the express written consent of TV38, Major League Baseball, and the Red Sox is prohibited."

    That pretty much says it all. The entities involved own the television broadcast and you are not allowed to retransmit it. I dunno about movies and tv programs, but I know the NFL's issues with iCrave are based on this.

  • Time Warner and... (Score:3)

    by brumby ( 93242 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @03:18PM (#1353835)
    The plaintiffs filing the complaint are the [....] Time Warner Entertainment Co. L.P. (Warner Bros.); [...]

    Upon hearing this, AOL lawyers also filed a complaint saying "ME TOO!!!"

    :-)

  • Re:Not another one! (Score:3)

    by retep ( 108840 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:40PM (#1353836)
    This sounds like a discussion we've had before on slashdot. As a consumer, *I* think I'm paying for the content. *They*, the people selling it to me, think I'm paying for a license to watch it, and forget about it forever after until I want to pay for it again. If I can tape shows off of TV, I should be able to do this.

    Such useage is covered by fair use provisions. Fair use doesn't apply to corporations trying to make a buck through ad revenues, even if those corporations are small.

    iCraveTV is trying to make money by giving viewers access to TV that they normally wouldn't be able to watch. This isn't your Mom taping shows you loved in your homeland. This is a company trying to make a buck. There is a big differnce between small-scale distribution and the massive distribution iCraveTV provides.

    I think iCraveTV should go the legitimit route and pay broadcasters the same way your local cable company does.

  • An attempt at Facts (Score:3)

    by DMuse ( 108888 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @02:18PM (#1353837)
    After watching the beginning of this thread and getting annoyed by clueless posts I'm going to make a stab here.

    First off lets get some definitions straight.
    Patents and copyrights are two very different things. Patents apply to a specific method of doing some task. They need to be applied for in order to receive one. Copyrights apply to artistic/creative works. Somehow source code is covered as an artistic work. So here, movies and TV shows are covered by copyright. Copyright is much easier to obtain than a Patent. Any discussion of patents with regard to iCraveTV is probably irrelevant.

    In general copyrighted material is completely controlled by the holder. The copyright holder can allow anything they want. A license is just another contract.

    In the case of an average TV program, the producer sells a license to the station or network allowing the network to broadcast the show. The network pays for this privilege and in return hopes to get ad revenue.

    Now the broadcaster must follow the rules of the regulator. In the case of Canada this is the CRTC. In the US it is the FCC. I don't know how conflicts between the broadcaster's governmental license and the copyright license are resolved. I guess that would be the interesting part of these law suits. When the broadcaster transmits a signal under license of the CRTC, they are agreeing to play by the rules of the CRTC. This is another key point.

    Under Canadian Broadcasting rules people are allowed to rebroadcast other transmissions in their entirety. Unfortunately I have not been able to find the exact regulations that permit this however I am yet to see anything contrary. This is the single most important part of this lawsuit so don't forget it!

    So what do we have? An agreement between the producer and the original broadcaster. An agreement between the CRTC and the broadcaster and rules published by the CRTC that allow iCraveTV to rebroadcast. Strictly speaking iCraveTV is following the rules.

    It is also very important to note that the President of iCraveTV is no slouch. From the iCraveTV original Press Release [icravetv.com] it states how the leadership of iCraveTV is well experienced in the TV broadcast industry, including Government (CRTC?) experience.

    What I don't understand is why the US objectioners filed the lawsuits in Pennsylvania. AFAIK Pennsylvania has no jurisdiction over iCraveTV. If anyone can answer this I would be interested.

    Bottom line is that we have a Canadian company following legal Canadian actions that conflict with the copyright licenses of traditional broadcasters. The interesting part will be how this conflict will be resolved.

    Ryan

  • Not another one! (Score:4)

    by pb ( 1020 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:21PM (#1353838)
    It says on ICraveTV's site that the programming "are those freely available to Toronto, Canada", and there's a comment about that in the previous slashdot thread, too.

    I see nothing wrong with rebroadcasting over the internet what's already on the airwaves. If I captured jpegs from my TV capture card and posted them on my homepage (as I've seen many people do), is that illegal? I'm paying for the signal, the TV card, the internet connection... aren't I paying for the content, too?

    This sounds like a discussion we've had before on slashdot. As a consumer, *I* think I'm paying for the content. *They*, the people selling it to me, think I'm paying for a license to watch it, and forget about it forever after until I want to pay for it again. If I can tape shows off of TV, I should be able to do this.

    Now, selling it is another matter, but if it's mine, shouldn't I be able to show it to people? It shouldn't be a perfect copy anyhow. And if they're willing to pay for it, isn't that just a transaction between us, they get my property, etc.?

    On the internet, if I view a copyrighted image, I guarantee you many copies of it have just been made in various places due to the technology at work. Are you going to sue me, Netscape, Microsoft, or the routers in between?

    Of course, I also am not a lawyer, but I'd be happy if one of those could enlighten us about where this falls between "fair use" and "theft", because the line is pretty gray.
    ---
    pb Reply or e-mail; don't vaguely moderate [152.7.41.11].

  • But it _IS_ IP Theft (Score:4)

    by Hubec ( 28321 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:19PM (#1353839)
    I'm all for dissing multinationals who stomp on an innovative new comer. But in this case what iCrave is doing is clearly illegal. Everyone know that you can't redistribute copyrighted material without permission. What the heck did they expect to happen?

    Maybe they figured they'd broadcast for a short time to boost hits, then drop it when the lawyers begin to take notice.

    Anyway, it's not very ethical in my opinion.

  • Re:But it _IS_ IP Theft (Score:5)

    by eyeball ( 17206 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @12:33PM (#1353840) Journal
    But in this case what iCrave is doing is clearly illegal.
    But not in Canada... From the Original CNET Article [cnet.com]

    Under Canadian law, any company is allowed to retransmit public television signals, as long as it is a live stream and the signal is not changed in any way. iCraveTV fulfills both of these conditions, transmitting commercials and programs without cutting or adding any new content.

    To view the programming, you have to be a Canadian resident. Of course you can lie.

    On the Internet, nobody knows you're a Canadian. /grin/


  • Socratic contradiction time. (Score:5)

    by re-geeked ( 113937 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @01:39PM (#1353841)
    So you own these programs?

    Yes.

    And you broadcast them for free?

    Yes.

    And companies pay you to get ad time on the programs?

    Yes.

    And I can buy a television from ANYONE, and watch one of these programs?

    Yes.

    So, let's say you have a big enough transmitting antenna to reach 100,000 viewers, and I came to you with an antenna that lets you reach 10 million viewers. Would you pay me a lot for that antenna?

    You bet. And my advertisers would pay me more in turn.

    And if I made a television that could pick up your signal from 1000 miles away, could I charge you?

    Of course not.

    But I could sell it, right?

    Yes. And I would likely charge my advertisers more.

    So why are you suing iCraveTV?

    Oh, that's simple. Because I'd like to sue the TV makers and control that market, too, but I'd never get away with it.

    Oh, well, I guess you can't catch everyone on the horns of a logical dilemma ;-)

  • Not Stealing (Score:5)

    by smack.addict ( 116174 ) on Thursday January 20, 2000 @01:15PM (#1353842)
    When I first saw this, my initial thought was "thieving bastards". But when I looked closer, rebroadcasting PUBLIC airwaves should be a right, not something that sends you to jail. Canada has this one right.

    People have to keep in mind that broadcast television is not the same as going to a movie in a movie theatre or watching something on cable. The airwaves have a finite bandwidth, and they are thus allocated to television stations to serve the public. Unfortunately, broadcast media in the US have convinced nearly everyone that they own the airwaves. They do not. The airwaves are owned by the public and we grant the TV stations the privilege to use that bandwidth. They seriously abuse this privilege.

    Consider, for example, politics. It is absurd that TV stations charge money to candidates to run campaign ads. IMHO, they have absolutely no right to do so. While they need to have a solution that prevents any dork from getting in front of the camera, they need to realize the people own the airwaves and we need to use those airwaves for events such as elections.

    In the case under consideration here, I believe that broadcasting an unaltered, real time transmission enables the public (in this case, ICrave), to benefit from its airwaves without damaging the people who have been granted the privilege of its use. To hide behind copyright law here is to use the absurd power of the entertainment industry to squash anything which might challenge its non-broadcast plans.

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