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October 07, 2005

eTV: Another Attack on Entertainment Industry

Digital Video Recorders (DVRs), such as TiVo are sweeping the country. If you do not have at least one DVR, you are really missing a new way to watch television. When you choose to record your favorite programs, you get to watch what you want, when you want. If you do not own a DVR, you can Rent my DVR. Okay, so it is not my DVR, but that is the name of the site. You can have someone record five shows for a Euro. Of course, you must click a box saying that you have the right to view the programs. If you do not have Discovery, Comedy Central, Showtime, or FX Network, you technically should not ask them to record shows that air on those channels. This is not the only way to transmit recordings from the TV broadcast to a computer. In fact, TiVo ToGo allows transfers to PCs, DVD, or mobile devices.

Another example, wwiTV has 1047 stations listed around the world, and even tells you how to record programs using your computer. I could not find anything talking about permission to broadcast. However, it does seem that most of the stations are local broadcast stations.

While the advancements above are suspect, more clear violations are happening.

Did you know that you can watch ESPN and Discovery Channel without paying? See PPLive (in China), and coolstreaming (in Hong Kong and currently shut down due to copyright infringement allegations). There is little question that this online sharing of premium content violates the owner's copyright. However, enforcement is already difficult. An ipFrontline article discusses the copyright challenges this poses. For example, the server with information about violators may be out of the jurisdictional reach of the copyright owners.

What is an entertainment industry to do?

Posted by Melody Wirz at 10:38 AM.
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