BROADCASTERS ASK SCOTUS TO HEAR AEREO CASE

On the heels of a federal court’s refusal to enjoin the Aereo service from operating in Boston, all of the major network TV owners, including ABC, Disney, CBS, NBCUniversal, Telemundo, Fox Television Stations, Univision Television, Public Broadcasting Service, and Tribune-owned WPIX have taken their case against Aereo to the U.S. Supreme Court. Aereo uses tiny antennas to pick up the signals of broadcasters and relay them to subscribers over the Internet for an $8 monthly subscription fee. “Today’s filing underscores our resolve to see justice done. Make no mistake, Aereo is stealing our broadcast signal,” Fox said on Friday. Aereo claims, however, that its service falls under the heading of a private performance in the same way that Cablevision’s service, which allows its customers to record shows remotely at Cablevision’s site instead of on their own DVRs, is a private performance. Initially, Cablevision had backed the broadcasters’ stand against Aereo, but on Friday it appeared to reverse itself, incensed by the broadcasters’ filing which, it said, appeared “to go after the legal underpinning of all cloud-based services, everything from digital lockers to Cablevision’s own RS-DVR service.” Such an approach, Cablevision said, “can only be seen as a willful attempt to stifle innovation.”