Wednesday, June 25, 2014

Aereo asks: Are we moving towards a permission-based system for technology innovation?

Today the Supreme Court handed down a copyright ruling against internet company Aereo, whose business model was to "rent" small antennae to subscribers so they could watch over-the-air tv via their computer, laptop, smart phone or tablet. The company also provided DVR-type cloud storage for its customers.

The heart of the matter seemed to be, to the justices, that Aereo looks a lot like a cable provider, re-broadcasting content from the TV networks. This author agrees. Getting someone to pay you for someone else' content, without paying a royalty, is copyright infringement. Cable firms pay "re-broadcast" rights to the networks for their content; so should Aereo.

The internet is clearly a medium for content distribution; any ISP (be it COMCAST, AT&T or T-Mobile, or Verizon, here in the U.S.) should be classified as a "common carrier", as content providers such as XFINITY, Aereo, or even your local TV station's web page, are providing you quality (ha, we hope) content via the pipes that are the internet.

However, the founder of Aereo is right in asking, why should entrepreneurs ask permission to innovate? However, if they piggy-back on someone else, they should pay. That was this author's experience with Apple and SAP when we launched Bluedog as an application service provider in 1998 -- license WebObjects and R/3, to produce innovation and value for the customer. If there's money to be mad with an idea, everyone wins.

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