Fox Loses Yet Again Against Dish Autohopper; Appeals Court Ignores Silly Aereo Argument

from the innovation-allowed dept

Some good news on the innovation front. Following on Fox's big initial loss in trying to stop Dish's Autohopper DVR feature, an appeals court has upheld the ruling. The main issue? Fox completely failed to show how an injunction is necessary to stop "irreparable harm." The court is pretty sure that any "harm" would be quite "reparable." There isn't much analysis -- the court just clearly is not convinced. Beyond saying that the district court didn't make any legal errors in issuing the original ruling, the appeals court notes that the service has been available for a while already, kinda disproving the whole "irreparable harm" argument.
Here, the district court found that Fox’s lack of evidence that the complained-of technology, available for several years, had yet caused Fox’s business any harm weighed against Fox’s argument that it would be irreparably harmed absent a preliminary injunction. In so finding, the district court did not hold Fox’s evidence to a more rigorous standard than our law requires and so did not abuse its discretion.
Perhaps more importantly, the court totally and completely ignored Fox's ridiculous attempt to argue that the Aereo ruling supports its position. That was a crazy argument from the very beginning, and clearly attempted to stretch the whole "looks like a duck" test beyond the breaking point. As Dish had pointed out in its response, Aereo lost because it didn't have licenses. Dish has licenses, so it's not even close to being relevant. The court appears to have treated it with the amount of respect Fox's argument deserved: none.
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Filed Under: autohopper, dvr, networks, place shifting, primetime any time
Companies: aereo, dish, fox


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  • identicon
    Michael, 15 Jul 2014 @ 11:14am

    What does the FOX say?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Roger Strong (profile), 15 Jul 2014 @ 11:15am

    Oh for Fox's sake. Not having a valid argument has never stopped them before.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    DannyB (profile), 15 Jul 2014 @ 11:26am

    FOX misread the Supreme Court opinion

    FOX thought they would go to the appeals court and try out the "looks like a dick" test. The appeals court agreed.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • This comment has been flagged by the community. Click here to show it
    icon
    techrebel (profile), 15 Jul 2014 @ 11:46am

    Perhaps more importantly, the court totally and completely ignored Fox's ridiculous attempt to argue that the Aereo ruling supports its position. That was a crazy argument from the very beginning, and clearly attempted to stretch the whole "looks like a duck" test beyond the breaking point. As Dish had pointed out in its response, Aereo lost because it didn't have licenses. Dish has licenses, so it's not even close to being relevant. The court appears to have treated it with the amount of respect Fox's argument deserved: none.

    Mike,

    It's hard to imagine how your analysis could be any more sophomoric. Are you seriously arguing that the appellate court didn't touch the Aereo argument because they were giving it "the amount of respect" it deserved? Do you really think that's how these things work?

    The actual reason the appellate court didn't touch the Aereo argument was because Fox was challenging the district court's standard for irreparable harm. Fox's likelihood of success on the merits of its Aereo argument wasn't the issue on appeal. So it's not like the appellate court ignored it because it just didn't think much of the argument. It ignored the argument because it was irrelevant to the actual issue before the court.

    Care to offer a substantive response?

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Ruben, 15 Jul 2014 @ 12:35pm

      Re:

      He wasn't referring to the Supreme Court ruling, rather Fox's application of it.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

      • icon
        techrebel (profile), 15 Jul 2014 @ 12:57pm

        Re: Re:

        He wasn't referring to the Supreme Court ruling, rather Fox's application of it.

        I apologize if my comment was unclear. Mike is arguing that the Ninth Circuit simply ignored Fox's argument on the merits about how Dish is infringing under the holding in Aereo. This is silly because it wasn't just Fox that argued Aereo helped; Dish argued that Aereo supported its arguments on the merits as well. The Ninth Circuit didn't mention the Aereo arguments from either side because it limited its review to the primary question on appeal, which was whether the district court used the correct standard for the irreparable harm analysis. So it's not just that the Ninth Circuit ignored Fox's arguments about Aereo, it ignored Dish's arguments about Aereo as well. And it ignored them all because the issue squarely on appeal was irreparable harm, not the merits.

        link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2014 @ 12:25pm

    The stupid 'looks like a duck' ruling by SCOTUS has sure opened up a can of worms.

    No real basis in law reasoning given yet widely available in it's vagueness to be applied nearly anywhere that the incumbents want to argue or attempt to stop anything they don't give their economic blessing to.

    Yet another landmark screw up decision ranking right in there with Citizens United decision.

    Increasingly the government and it's branches are showing just how out of touch it is with its citizens it's supposed to support.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 15 Jul 2014 @ 5:25pm

      Re:

      And the usual jackass trolls insisted the Aereo ruling wouldn't result in a slippery slope as predicted, then clammed up when this happened.

      What a bunch of morons.

      link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    orbitalinsertion (profile), 15 Jul 2014 @ 5:41pm

    Railed to pass the "looks like a Fox" test.

    eom

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • identicon
    Pixelation, 15 Jul 2014 @ 6:50pm

    Hey Fox, Fuck You and the Anti-Consumer stance you rode in on...

    link to this | view in chronology ]

  • icon
    Whatever (profile), 15 Jul 2014 @ 10:56pm

    proof positive

    Here is proof positive that the recent SCOTUS ruling won't make the sky fall. While noting the decision, the court ruled clearly that this was not the same thing (for many reasons).

    Perhaps now all the chicken littles screaming that sky was falling can sit back, relax, have a coffee and chill.

    link to this | view in chronology ]

    • icon
      That One Guy (profile), 17 Jul 2014 @ 2:46am

      Re: proof positive

      So one court case taking the path of sanity proves that all the worries were overblown, and the concerns from multiple groups were groundless? That's like saying 'Look, that guy pulled the trigger and he's obviously still alive, so clearly all that hype over the 'dangers' of russian roulette are overblown and excessive.'

      link to this | view in chronology ]

    • identicon
      Anonymous Coward, 17 Jul 2014 @ 11:25pm

      Re: proof positive

      That there are people who are around to ensure the idiocy of others does not go out of hand does not absolve the others of their idiocy.

      link to this | view in chronology ]


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