I've mentioned this before on HN, I'll say it again: Aereo should now do a pivot, becoming a hardware reseller of TV-signal-receiver/streamer devices like this one: http://www.hauppauge.com/site/products/data_broadway.html - it can stream either over your local Wi-fi, or across the interwebs so you can watch remotely when you're out of the house. Broadband speeds are a bit slow, but they're getting there (slowly) - until then, rely on your friend who has Google fiber or something :). Basically you have Aereo service without the service fees (except the initial hardware cost and internet service cost). I'm especially in favour of this because it's putting back the power in the hands of the end customer -- finally, they own the device, they're not relying on the cloud, they're not facilitating another rentier operation.
Slingbox seems to have a strong position in this market. It's tougher to stream video from a person's home than from a data center. Most homes with broadband have limited upload speed that makes it difficult to stream good quality video. I'm hoping newer compression algorithms such as HEVC will make it possible to get decent quality even on connections with less than 1 Mbps upload bandwidth.
Sony was selling exactly this thing....9 years ago. They made LocationFree base stations which would stream your TV signal to your PSP anywhere in the world over the internet. That was incredibly impressive for 2005.
Does it even need to stream from the house (versus uploaded earlier than requested on my device) ?
Am I as a consumer allowed to store my DVR material on hosted storage then have that stream to me later?
Then can my cloud provider cache and de-dupe content on their environment so that they don't need to have 4 copies of the same episode in cache?
I wonder, can a new company sell set top antennas that perform better than others, because they aggregate signals and can enhance the quality of your dvr material?
Aereo should pivot to be a colocation company specifically for this equipment. Sell the device to the end user for $100, charge $8-12/month for "colocation".
What next? Illegal for a user to colocate their own antenna equipment?
I have the right to receive over the air broadcasts, using public spectrum that broadcasters have been permitted to utilize. Where my antenna is, who owns it, and how I retrieve, view, or store that content is irrelevant.
Sometimes, the law is wrong. This is one of those cases. Aereo attempted to comply with the law, and was told they failed. Fine. Keep fine tuning your business model until you're just within the confines of legality. That is how the law works, no?
When the intent of the law is to take something that's legal to do personally, and make it illegal to outsource, I'm not bothered by going against it by removing juuuust enough outsourcing.
The first person to do so will be a sucker. Seriously, look at how, why, and by whom laws are written. Ignore the marketing, whether it's from politicians or the pundits who parrot them.
From the link: "Any program which they can watch on their TV set, such as live prime time TV programs and sports events"
There are two reasons I paid for Aereo:
1. I cannot receive a digital TV signal over the air where I live.
2. I wanted just local channels, but did not want to pay another $30-50/mo for other channels that I'm not going to watch.
The Hauppauge product solves neither of these problems.
Relocating the receiver to a metropolitan area greatly increases the number of people who can watch the content, and ads, that are being broadcast.
As much as I do not agree with Justices Roberts or Scalia, I agree with their dissent in this case. This decision makes no sense from a legal (or technological) perspective.
