Big Media and Big Telcos Getting Nasty In Landmark Australian Law Case 77
Fluffeh writes "In Australia, we have the right to record TV and play it back at a later date; we also have the right to transcode from one format to another, so anyone with a media server can legally back up their entire DVD collection and watch it without all those annoying warnings and unskippable content — as long as we don't break encryption (please stop laughing!). Optus, Australia's second largest Telco, has been raising ire though with the new TV Now service they are offering and Big Media is having a hissy fit. The service does the recording on behalf of the customer. Seems like a no-brainer right? Let the customer do what they are allowed to legally do at home, but charge them for it. Everybody wins! Not according to Sports Broadcasters, who made this statement when Optus said they would appeal their recent loss in an Australian Court to the highest court in the land: 'They are a disgusting organization who is acting reprehensibly again and now putting more uncertainty into sports and broadcast rights going forward I'm really disappointed and disgusted in the comments of their CEO overnight.' Is this yet another case of Big Media clutching at an outdated business model, or should consumers be content with just doing their own work?"
There is a similar situation in Canada (Score:3, Interesting)
We have similar rights to record, transcode, and back up media in Canada.
The Harpercrite goobermint is trying to enact a DMCA-type clause, which violates our rights to make backups and to transcode media. The argument against the legislation is that even the use of encryption violates our rights to record and transcode data, never mind how much more of a violation it would be to make it illegal to break the encryption.
Here's hoping both our nations can kick big media's arse once again as we have done repeatedly in the cases over the years that enshrined our existing rights.
Not every legal system on the planet is willing to suck up to big media like the USG.
Re:Broadcast rights (Score:5, Interesting)
A little slippery. The teleco can do one thing that big media fear. They can buy a licence to the content and then distribute it as long as only one person sees it at a time, they only need one licence. Of course they can use computers to slice up the original content into ten of thousands of slices and only distribute one particular slice at a time, one licence thousands of end users, technically legal.
Overiding everything is of course ultimately the true value of that content to society is it a negative or a positive this versus the value of an open internet is it a negative or a positive. On the whole today's content is honestly pretty much a negative all about nothing but greed and PR=B$ marketing no real value at all. An open internet is of course blatantly obviously of immense value, open up politics, enriching democracy, spreading knowledge and education, driving participation rather than spectating, huge productivity and energy savings etc. etc.
So the real decision here is whether todays politicians will sell out the future in order to have their ego's stroked by funder's of the RIA*/MPA*, revolving around sex, drugs, holidays and straight up tax haven bribes.