Aereo, FilmOn X Cause Reexamination of Copyright License Issues

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Plovnick_Lucy-HolmesBy Lucy Holmes Plovnick


Last summer the U.S. Supreme Court held that Aereo was publicly performing copyrighted works by transmitting them to paying subscribers over the Internet. Aereo repeatedly compared Aereo’s transmission system, which was “made up of servers, transcoders, and thousands of dime-sized antennas housed in a central warehouse” to a traditional cable system — describing them as “substantially similar.” Almost immediately after the Aereo decision came out, Aereo and its competitor, FilmOn X, began defending copyright infringement actions brought against them by claiming that they were, in fact, cable systems.

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