Supreme Court Serves Up Remote-Recording Victory: Via Threat Level.
The Supreme Court on Monday let stand a copyright case testing whether cable operators may permit customers to store television programming on company servers to be viewed at a later time.
The issue concerns an August ruling by a federal appeals court, which lifted (.pdf) an injunction against Cablevision Systems blocking it from offering customers a recording service that stores programming on the cable company’s own servers instead of on viewers’ in-house playback devices.
Hollywood and television programmers maintained Cablevision’s service directly infringes their exclusive rights to both reproduce and publicly perform their copyrighted works. read more... »
Digital Television begins today - 6/13/09: Via New York News and Tri-State News - 7online.com.
NEW YORK (WABC) -- TV shows were replaced by the hiss of static in perhaps 1 million U.S. homes Friday as stations ended their analog broadcasts and abandoned the transmission technology in use since the days of Milton Berle, Sid Caesar and Howdy Doody.
Channel 7 turned off its analog signal and switched to digital at 12:30 p.m. following Eyewitness News at Noon. read more... »
Into the DTV era, with no broadcast flag mandate: Via EFF.org Updates.
Today (June 12, 2009) marks the completion of the U.S. transition to digital television, as TV stations switch off their analog transmitters.
Just a few years ago, some broadcasters and movie studios argued that this transition couldn't happen without a DRM mandate -- a legal requirement for devices to obey the broadcast flag and apply DRM restrictions to free, over-the-air broadcasts. And they said they would hold up and obstruct this transition unless they got their way.
The DMCA has already been used to restrict the ability to produce innovative, useful products that copyright holders disapprove of. read more... »
Hollywood drives us into the "Analog Sunset": Via EFF.org Updates.
As Blu-ray.com reports, the AACS licensing authority has released the "Final Adopter Agreement" it plans to enforce against consumer electronics companies that make BluRay players (and any other AACS devices that come along). Buried inside that 188 page document is a plan to eliminate analog video... forever. BluRay device makers will have to restrict analog outputs to low resolution first:
2.2.2.1 Analog Sunset – 2010. With the exception of Existing Models,
any Licensed Player manufactured after December 31, 2010 shall
limit analog video outputs for Decrypted AACS Content to SD
Interlace Modes [composite video, s-video, 480i component video and 576i video] only. read more... »
EFF comments on Child Safe Viewing Act: Via EFF.org Updates.
Recently, EFF filed comments with the FCC in connection with the Child Safe Viewing Act of 2007, which requires the FCC to conduct a study of V-chip-like blocking technologies that might apply to media other than television – such as Internet access, perhaps. The law requires the FCC to study these "advanced blocking technologies" and report back to Congress, which might then take some further legislative action based on the report's contents. Our comments emphasized First Amendment issues, but there turns out to be a copyright angle lurking here too (which we'll discuss in a separate blog post). read more... »
The Child Safe Viewing Act and another DMCA victim: Via EFF.org Updates.
In an earlier post, we mentioned that EFF filed comments with the FCC in connection with the Child Safe Viewing Act of 2007. This process unexpectedly drew our attention to a copyright issue, which we discuss below.
The comments of one blocking technology company, TVGuardian, reveal an interesting angle: TVGuardian and companies like it are unexpected victims of DRM and the DMCA! read more... »
"Wake up and smell the converter box": FCC talks DTV switch: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
"Let's do it, man. Lock and load," declared
G.W. Green, aka "Offender #576" just prior to his execution by the state of Texas in 1991. One sensed a somewhat similar esprit de corps here at the Federal Communications Commission, where a mid-sized platoon of government, industry, and technology types gathered on Wednesday to stare DTV Day version 2.0 in the face—it's coming (yes way; for real) on Friday, June 12. read more... »
S.G. to Supreme Court: Don’t Revisit “Remote Storage DVR” Case: Via CDT - PolicyBeta.
The Solicitor General filed a brief with the Supreme Court on Friday that is good news for anyone who likes the idea of being able to record digital television without having to acquire and install a digital video recorder (DVR) box in the home. More importantly, the brief significantly reduces the chances of a decision that could cast a legal cloud over a wide range common network and computing technologies. read more... »
Sorry for the second outage in two days.
The data center I currently use (but may move when my contract is up. Any recommendations? Good network and a reasonable price.) is going thru a network upgrade. read more... »
FCC will run nationwide DTV "soft test" on May 21: Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.
The "end is near," declared Federal Communications Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein at Tuesday's Open Commission meeting. Adelstein was referring to the DTV transition, scheduled to conclude on Friday, June 12, one month from now. There are still 927 full power television stations that have to make the jump from analog to digital by then. To get a sense of who is or isn't really ready for this apocalypse, the agency has called upon those broadcasters to run a "soft test" of the switch three times on Thursday, May 21.
Read Original Article:(Via Law & Disorder Section - Ars Technica.)