Opinion Of The Court In ABC v. Aereo
Aereo’s Internet Transmission System Is Illegal
The Copyright Act of 1976 gives a copyright owner the “exclusive right” to “perform the copyrighted work publicly.” The Act’s Transmit Clause defines that exclusive right as including the right to “transmit or otherwise communicate a performance … of the [copyrighted] work … to the public, by means of any device or process, whether the members of the public capable of receiving the performance … receive it in the same place or in separate places and at the same time or at different times.” This case requires us to answer two questions: First, does Aereo “perform” at all? And second,…
