This could be interesting. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-15162241 http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/davidbond/2011/10/pubs_v_premier_league.html
Might be good news, might not be. There could well be a way in which the PL could 'contain' live screenings in the future. The judges said the Premier League could not claim copyright over Premier League matches as they could not considered to be an author's own "intellectual creation" and, therefore, to be "works" for the purposes of EU copyright law. As a bit of an aside I picked this bit out - does that mean when a stream channel is closed due to infringement of copyright - that is not a legal course of action?
As usual, it looks like the lawyers will be winners. Wonder how long this will drag on for and whether I can qualify as a lawyer in time to get a bit of the action <deep in thought emoticon>
About time this was looked at, how Sky and the PL were allowed to behave like this when we are a part of Europe of which the whole point is to have free trade it's just another protectionist racket. Perhaps now Sky could be a little more competitive and if that takes some money out of the game maybe it will eventually also make an impact on the ridiculous wages of some players. Seems to me the whole thing is built in a similar fashion to the economy with the banks and if you give Sky a kick the whole lot is possibly going to come down in a similar fashion but hopefully in a more constructive way. Put it another way how many places have taken out a sub in the UK then moved the whole lot to Spain etc where techinically they're at least breaking Sky's terms if not the law but Sky don't exactly crack down on that in the same way that they crack down on pubs etc in this country. Given the technology now there's no reason why I can't watch every single Norwich game either as a season ticket (online streaming if necessary Sky could do this) or PPV again either via Sky Sports satellite or via their website with a good quality feed. I'd pay say £100 a year for a season ticket to watch all the games that way maybe more as I could then cut Sky Sports off my sub (which im going to do anyway). They have cameras at every match so why not make some investment and go for it at least for the prem to start with maybe more if it works - advantage goes back to Sky
What Sky could and should have done is to reintroduce the 'pay per view' system, whereby anyone wishing to see, say, Man Utd vs NCFC could pay £7.99 or whatever to get the signal unscrambled. Now, of course, it's too late for that, and companies like NOVA and Viasat will clean up the market. If people still prefer to go to games live, they'll be unaffected by this ruling, but as a City fan myself, getting a ticket as a casual spectator is almost impossible due to the "full house" signs at most home games.
Stick that in your pipe and smoke it Mr Murdoch ! ! http://www.skysports.com/story/0,,11661_7222902,00.html .......... ..........
The world is changing very fast. Big will not beat small anymore. It will be the fast beating the slow. Rupert Murdoch
Things were always going to change eventually with there now being so many ways to watch a game anywhere in the world. Maybe, finally, this will put an end to the multi-million pound amounts paid to just the rich few and that we will eventually return to the more level playing field we had back before Sky? My main fear is that there will be less money, but that it will still be held by the few and that many of our less wealthy clubs may be lost.
Sky can sue pub landlords and will, but targeting people watching illegal streams on laptops is impossible........... Like Ryan Giggs and his Super injunction, the lawyers took his money knowing its not possible to go after millions of Twitter users.....
I'm with cromer on this one, i can't understand why this never been done because it would be very profitable for them. I presume there must be some kind of clause within the contract between them and premier/football league to stop them doing it, because by doing it they are taking money out of the clubs pockets.
I think the point is that if a game is being shown live anywhere in the world whether it be pay per view or not, there will be websites streaming it. There is nothing anybody can do about that. The whole foreign satalite issue is only a temporary thing. As the internet improves (and it will) Live streams will become just as clear as a satalite signal.
I wouldn't say it is impossible to target people watching streams, it is just much much more unlikely that any individual will get caught as the sheer weight of numbers makes it statistically in the masses favour. However, if you are one of the unlucky few it would end up being a costly experience - just ask some of the people who got done downloading music from sites - some of them only copied a handful of tracks and got fined astronomically poor buggers.
What I don't get though is how can a stream be illegal? Sorry for sounding Johnny Thicko here but I thought that the Internet was supposed to be free for all for the people to use as they wish. Now don't get me wrong, there are very sensible and necessary laws in place to protect vulnerable citizens and minors in society (prime example being laws against child porn and nobody with half a brain cell would condone that sort of behaviour) but why should there be restrictions on what else you can or cannot watch if it is accessible to all? Can somebody clarify that the streams we... cough,... um... others watch online are actually illegal then? I naively was under the impression that those who watch them did so freely an without recourse as otherwise the sites would have been closed down for infringing certain rights!
It is technically illegal the same way as dancing in restaurants is illegal, in theory if you have a party in a chinese restaurant the owner would need a special license to play music and for the guests to dance... I have flouted these laws without being prosecuted. Technically starting a thread on here to share a live stream would be a crime, and using the stream is a crime.
As for the money in the game I couldn't care less if it all disappeared. People think that having money in the game makes it better - wrong. All the extra money in the game gets passed on directly to the players in the wage packets. Simple economics dictates that if the money dried up then clubs would have to cut their cloth accordingly and if that means that Carlos ****ing Teves has to have a renegotiated pay packet down from £200,000 a week to £20,000 then I don't think too many of us would be too bothered. The only benefit I can think of for Norwich would be the stadium expansion. Hopefully we could see this through then when it all comes crashing down for the others we will actually be in a pretty sound position.
Thank you for clarifying that SN. The rate at which people are using the streams is growing exponentially though. That alone must be very troubling to Sky!
