DISH Applauds Copyright Ruling Upholding Rights of Consumers to Use Slingbox and Other Key Hopper Fe

[Scott Greczkowski]

DISH Applauds Copyright Ruling Upholding Rights of Consumers to Use Slingbox and Other Key Hopper Features
Release Date:
Tuesday, January 20, 2015 5:21 pm MST
Terms:

• Corporate

Dateline City:
ENGLEWOOD, Colo.

• Decision is first to apply Supreme Court’s opinion in Aereo to other technology
• Decision Upholds Rights of Consumers to use AutoHop, PrimeTime Anytime and Transfers Features

ENGLEWOOD, Colo.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Today, the United States District Court, Central District of California, publicly released its summary judgment decision upholding the rights of consumers under U.S. copyright law to use SlingboxTM technology and the AutoHopTM, PrimeTime AnytimeTM and Transfers features of DISH’s Hopper® Whole-Home HD DVR.

The following statement is attributable to R. Stanton Dodge, DISH executive vice president and general counsel:

“This decision is the sixth in a string of victories in federal courts on both coasts for the American consumer related to our Hopper Whole-Home DVR platform. We are proud to have stood by their side in this important fight over fundamental rights of consumer choice and control.

“DISH is pleased that the Court has again sided with consumers by issuing a summary judgment decision upholding their rights under U.S. copyright law to use Slingbox technology and the AutoHop, PrimeTime Anytime and Transfers features of the Hopper Whole-Home HD DVR.

“Consumers are the winners today, as the Court sided with them on the key copyright issues in this case. This decision has far reaching significance, because it is the first to apply the Supreme Court's opinion in Aereo to other technology.

“We will continue to vigorously defend consumers’ rights to choice and control over their viewing experience.”

Slingbox technology, which is built into DISH’s second-generation Hopper Whole-Home DVR, provides a DISH customer, once they receive a television signal in their home, with the capability to remotely view that signal from a single Internet-connected device (mobile phone, tablet or PC). Slingbox technology has been available since 2005 and this action was the first to seek to enjoin it.

With the PrimeTime Anytime feature, users have the ability to easily record the primetime shows on up to each of the four broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox) and save them for up to eight days. The AutoHop feature can be enabled by users to play back certain PrimeTime Anytime recordings commercial-free.

With the Transfers feature, a DISH customer can move or duplicate certain Hopper DVR recordings made by the customer to a mobile phone or tablet; and no Internet connection is needed for viewing.

DISH statements regarding prior Court decisions regarding DISH’s Hopper:

July 14, 2014: Court of Appeals Upholds DISH Hopper Ruling

September 23, 2013: DISH Applauds Decision Allowing Consumers to Continue to Enjoy Place-Shifting Technology

September 18, 2013: Federal Judge Denies ABC Call to Bar Hopper Features

July 24, 2013: Court of Appeals Upholds DISH Hopper Ruling

Nov. 7, 2012: DISH Cheers Ruling on AutoHop, PrimeTime Anytime

 

[dare2be]

 

[whitewolf8214]

 

[MikeD-C05]

I'm betting that they will keep the lawsuits going till the Supreme Court either hears them or turns them down, just like they did with the original VCR case back in the 80's.

 

[TNGTony]

The funny thing is Sony is on the other side of the suit this time! I find it so ironic.

 

[StanDarsh]

Why does Sony object to these features / techniques?

 

[TNGTony]

Sony is against any technology that might affect income from their movie properties...properties they did not own when they were on the other side in the 70s.

 

[StanDarsh]

Wow. You would think Sony would want this in order to use similar stuff on ps4 / ps3. I can't think of much that could be better than having some of this on my ps4.

 

[bluegras]

here is a article i found about this also

http://www.hollywoodreporter.com/thr-esq/heres-ruling-foxs-lawsuit-dish-765502

 

[whitewolf8214]

A win for Dish and consumers, a loss for programmers
Jan 21 2015, 13:00 ET | By: Clark Schultz, SA News Editor

Dish Networks (DISH -0.2%) won a significant court battle in L.A. against Fox Broadcasting over the company's Dish Anywhere app.
The ruling from a federal judge applied some of the principles from the Supreme Court's look at the Aereo case.
The opinion from the court indicated that watching content on mobile devices and tablets through Dish Anywhere doesn't qualify as a breach of copyright law.
The use of Dish's PrimeTime Anytime and AutoHop features were also deemed as fair use.
Many programmers seemed to have anticipated the legal decision and already negotiated with Dish to disable ad-skipping for a period of time after a show airs.
The ruling is sure to have been noticed on Madison Avenue where the largest (and smarter?) ad spenders continue to increase digital spending over broadcast/cable TV buys. http://seekingalpha.com/news/223350...n:9241e256fd4ba0fa90eceb01e16022bf#email_link

 

[dare2be]

Programmers will get around the ad-skipping technology. Has anyone noticed on USA the ads for DIG that have snuck in on existing programming? It looks like a signal loss/blip interrupting the entire program for a second or two while the ad displays during that time, then zaps back to the program. ...and it doesn't appear to be an insert, but an overlay. Program dialog is lost. Completely unacceptable.

 

[foghorn2]

Good, now Dish can fix and update the OTA guides and lettuce watch/stream already free broadcast TV all we want.

 

[KAB]

Good, now Dish can fix and update the OTA guides and lettuce watch/stream already free broadcast TV all we want.

How would they update lettuce?

 

[ChadT41]

How would they update lettuce?

Its that GMO everyone is talking about...lol jk

 

[foghorn2]

How would they update lettuce?

Lettuce C U P

 

[ChadT41]

This conversation took a left turn for any food porn fans...

 

[KAB]

Lettuce C U P

CPU? Or a lettuce Bra? Kind of hot, thinking about it!

 

[TNGTony]

Iceberg knows about lettuce. Maybe he can explain it.

 

[foghorn2]

Iceberg knows about lettuce. Maybe he can explain it.

Iceburg's picture looks like he can smash us all with one thumb with a baby voice and a simple brain ("develop your body but your mind is still a slum"), but my experience is that he is more knowledgeable, smart and helpful than anyone else here.

Now back to the ruling...... these "programming providers" need to go back and provide good programming, they are just wasting everyones time and energy that could be put to better use.

 

[DishSubLA]

What the Supreme Court seemed to be saying in the Aereo ruling was that the entity needs to PAY for the content before it hands off any copyright material. In that sense, Aereo was unique in that it did not pay a penny for the content, and all the others who hand off copyright material have agreements in place to do so and as such are NOT part of this ruling. The Supreme Court went out of its way to make clear that the Aereo ruling should NOT be applied to existing technology. The bottom line was that Supreme Court choose to conclude, despite the legitimate loopholes, Aereo as just another MVPD, and MVPD's are required to PAY (or at least negotiate some agreement) for the content. IMHO, Aereo was clearly LEGAL, exploiting the holes in the law. Scalia, et al. who viewed Aereo as "legal" still exhibited clear contempt for what Aereo was doing, but had no choice but to conclude that what it was doing was legal because Aereo met EVERY test. The proper ruling would have found Aereo legal, but made it clear that it is up to CONGRESS--NOT THE COURTS to draft the law making Aereo illegal if Congress saw fit to do so. And I have no doubt that the very next day of such a Supreme Court victory for Aereo, the NAB would have drafted and got a bill passed and signed making Aereo illegal so fast, Aereo would be in the same position it is today. In my opinion, I believe had Aereo offered a streaming ONLY of OTA's for FREE of charge, that would have been morally defensible (and legal) and ONLY charged for the DVR portion of the service. But charging any amount to hand off what are the content on the airwaves owned DIRECTLY by the people was morally indefensible. But, of course, letting people view live streams of their local stations is not a real business model, now is it.

What disturbs me isn't so much the possibility that Aereo may be illegal, bu the WAY Aereo became illegal, by a court ruling that takes on the role of Congress (the Supreme Court has done this a number of times of late from both the left and right). It is always disappointing when the Court rules in that manner. If Congress had been allowed its role to legislate Aereo out of existence, it would have been an affirmation of how things are supposed to done in this country and is far easier to accept, even though the ugly truth is NAB (and other powerful lobbys) seem to always gets its way.