On Wed, Feb 16, 2005 at 02:55:00PM -0500, Gabe Rubin wrote: > > Sounds great, but probably not legal. MythTV aside (it could > > just as well be a VHS tape), I believe that recording TV programming and > > replaying it for an "audience" is a no-no. > > > Wouldn't this mean that anyone who had a superbowl party at their > place, with over a certain amount of people, violated the law if they > watched it with their mythtv or tivo? You are displaying a recorded > program even if it is almost live. > >
There are two major rights. One is the right to make copies of videos. Another is the right to do public performance of them. If you play a video for your family, or guests at your private party, or in your minivan, you can argue it's not a public performance though as the size of the crowd grows it gets more interesting. Certainly, however, when they play DVDs on the airplane it's a public performance and they pay the studio for that. You are allowed to record shows in order to watch them later, which is copying, not performance, and the supreme court has said that's cool. However, there is constant arguing from both sides about just what that means, and how broad or narrow it is supposed to be. People ask if the surpreme court was saying you can build a library of recordings, for example, or whether you can skip commercials (they begged off that question in the original decision because it didn't happen much in 1978) We've been in lawsuits about these questions, and we're in a big one before the supremes this spring over just what the betamax case means. As far as we believe your MythTV is fully legal, though if you start making DVDs for others or doing public performances of them, it starts to get on unknown ground.
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