We have argued this over and over, in previous threads. which was why I didn't comment on the post above initially, I would rather wait for the court decision.
Originally Posted by dirtydonki  1. The Pub can not be done under any breach of copyright as long as they have paid for a valid subscription. |
Define valid, does valid mean that they have a subscription from somebody who has the right to sell subscriptions/have broadcast rights in the UK?
Could you buy a residential subscription from Sky (probably not much more expensive than a Nova subscription) and show it to a pub full of people without problems? No you couldn't and even on the Nova website, they say that if you want to use the card in a bar, you require a commercial subscription.
Sky and the Premiership don't seem to have a major problem with domestic satellite viewers, it is only the people who are showing the football to an audience for profit, without paying for the privilege.
Originally Posted by dirtydonki 2. The law on the showing of live football at 3pm on a Saturday is not a law at all but a restriction imposed by the FA on British TV companies. |
agreed, it isn't a law, I've stated this on many occasions, but it actually means that nobody has purchased the right to sell subscriptions for those matches in the UK, so anyone using a card from outside the UK can not have paid for the right to view them.
Originally Posted by dirtydonki 3. Civil suits are the only way for Media companies to persue this if they have the bottle but they do not have a case at all. This is all bluff and scaremongering. |
You could be proved very wong, but only time will tell.
Originally Posted by dirtydonki 4. Under EEC law it is legal to purchase and import anything within the EEC freely. Including TV services if the selling company are willing to supply this. |
Does this override International copyright law? The Jury is still out.
Originally Posted by dirtydonki Sky have been actively oposed to the spread of "rival" services for obvious reasons and have been active in promoting making such spread difficult if not impossible. eg: Sky Italia, Premiere and NDS based systems that require a Box Key ID. There are ways around even this now. However, there are still providers who have "open" access systems based purely on card encryption whose cards can be purchased and just plugged & played. eg: ART, Nova, DigitalAlb. |
And your point is?
Originally Posted by dirtydonki In England, virtually every pub I use between Northampton and Swindon and West London at weekends has live 3pm football showing quite nicely thank you very much on a Saturday. |
These have mostly been supplied and very actively marketed (supposedly with legal insurance/guarantee) by a small number of companies who style themselves as crusaders for no TV frontiers (yeah right
), in real terms they have in many cases charged ridiculously over the odds for pretty basic installations.
There were several thousand football supporters who were able to get into the Stadium at Athens for the Champions League final without tickets, as there weren't sufficient checks and security, does this make it legal or right, do you congratulate them?
I don't.
What I will say though, is that if long term there is no control over the abuse of residential overseas subscriptions by commercial entities, then either the amounts bid for the rights by the UK companies will quickly diminish (affecting the Premiership income), or there will be only secondary timeshifted rights sold to the overseas companies
and this will affect us hobbyists.