Locast#Legal challenge

Goodfriend was a media legal adviser to an FCC commissioner and an executive at Dish Network.{{Cite web|url=https://www.cnbc.com/david-goodfriend/|title=David Goodfriend Profile |last=Goodfriend|first=David|website=CNBC|access-date=2019-05-31}} He conceived of Locast while lecturing at Georgetown University Law Center on the demise of Aereo, which offered over-the-air television signals via streaming without negotiating with broadcasters for the privilege as required by the retransmission consent provision of the Cable Television Consumer Protection and Competition Act. Aereo attempted to justify its legality by leasing to users an individual antenna typically located in a nearby warehouse. After broadcasters sued, the U.S. Supreme Court ruled in 2014 that the company had violated copyright law. Aereo declared bankruptcy shortly afterward. Goodfriend surmised that a non-profit organization would be exempt from the provision; Locast became his proof of concept. "Locast" is a portmanteau of "local" and "broadcast".{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/01/31/business/locast-streaming-free-network-tv.html|title=Locast, a Free App Streaming Network TV, Would Love to Get Sued|last=Lee|first=Edmund|date=2019-01-31|work=The New York Times|access-date=2019-05-31|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.broadcastingcable.com/news/nonprofit-launches-ny-tv-station-streaming-service-171031|title=Nonprofit Launches NY TV Station Streaming Service|last=Eggerton|first=John|website=Broadcasting & Cable|date=11 January 2018 |language=en-us|access-date=2019-05-31}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.cnet.com/news/aereo-brings-over-the-air-tv-to-the-cloud/|title=Aereo brings over-the-air TV to the cloud|last=Moskovciak|first=Matthew|website=CNET|language=en|access-date=2020-01-06}}

Goodfriend initially funded the service via a line of credit from an undisclosed entrepreneur.{{Cite web|url=https://www.wsj.com/articles/streaming-service-challenges-broadcasters-with-free-tv-feeds-11561986187|title=Streaming Service Challenges Broadcasters with Free TV Feeds|last=FitzGerald|first=Drew|date=July 1, 2019|website=The Wall Street Journal|language=en-US|access-date=2019-07-02}} The site then solicited user donations. In January 2018, Locast went online in New York as a service of the Sports Fans Coalition, a non-profit advocacy group chaired by Goodfriend.{{Cite web|url=https://www.sportsfans.org/bringing_the_public_interest_back_to_sports|title=Bringing the Public Interest Back to Sports|date=January 11, 2018|website=Sports Fans Coalition|access-date=2019-06-01}} The city's television stations were neither notified nor compensated. Broadcast signals were received by a four-foot antenna mounted on the Trump International Hotel and Tower in Manhattan. Locast subsequently expanded the service to other U.S. media markets, as well as Puerto Rico.{{cite press release|title=Locast now streaming local TV channels in Puerto Rico|url=https://www.globenewswire.com/news-release/2020/04/14/2015797/0/en/Locast-now-streaming-local-TV-channels-in-Puerto-Rico.html|location=San Juan, Puerto Rico|publisher=Locast|agency=Globe Newswire|date=April 14, 2020|access-date=2020-04-14}}{{Cite web|url=https://www.locast.org/|title=Markets|website=Locast|language=en-US|access-date=2021-07-30}}

Several television providers directed subscribers to Locast as a way of maintaining access to programming during carriage disputes, such as Charter Communications during a January 2019 dispute with Tribune Media, and DirecTV in a July 2019 dispute affecting CBS-owned stations. Both AT&T and Dish Network added Locast apps to their set-top boxes, including devices for DirecTV, AT&T U-Verse, and Dish via its Hopper set-top.{{Cite web|url=https://www.cnet.com/news/at-t-adding-broadcast-app-locast-to-directv-u-verse/|title=AT&T adding broadcast TV app Locast to DirecTV, U-Verse|last=Al-Heeti|first=Abrar|date=May 31, 2019|website=CNET|language=en|access-date=2019-09-28}} In 2021, Sling TV integrated Locast's channels into Sling TV's program guide listing for some devices with possible future expansion to other devices.{{Cite web|url=https://www.cordcuttersnews.com/sling-tv-expands-locast-integration-to-android-tv-and-android-mobile//|title=Sling TV Expands Locast Integration to Android TV and Android Mobile|last=Barnes|first=Jess|date=April 22, 2021|website=Cord Cutters News|language=en|access-date=2021-05-03}}

By November 2020, viewer donations had offset expenses, sufficient to pay for operations and finance expansion into new markets. Capital costs for each location included leasing space for equipment, an antenna, servers and network services.

In May 2019, New York Times reporter Edmund Lee wrote that Goodfriend's stated intention to quickly expand Locast nationwide "is basically a dare to the networks to take legal action against him. By giving away TV, Mr. Goodfriend is undercutting the licensing fees that major broadcasters charge the cable and satellite companies." In 2019, those fees exceeded $10 billion, according to the research firm Kagan S&P Global Market Intelligence, while adding about $12 to a monthly cable subscription fee.

On July 31, 2019, The Walt Disney Company, CBS Corporation, NBCUniversal, and Fox Corporation – the respective parent companies of ABC, CBS, NBC, and Fox – filed a lawsuit in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York seeking a permanent injunction against Locast for infringing on the copyrights of their programming by retransmitting it without permission and compensation. The suit acknowledged that U.S. copyright law ({{UnitedStatesCode|17|111}}) allows non-profit organizations to freely retransmit programming, charging only for the costs of operations and maintenance of the equipment. (The exemption was originally intended to cover third-party translator stations owned by non-profits and other organizations such as municipal and county governments.) The broadcasters maintained that Locast has undermined its non-profit status, citing Goodfriend's previous ties to Dish Network, a donation of $500,000 made by AT&T, and both companies' promotion of the Locast service as complementary to their pay television services to dodge retransmission fees.{{cite web|url=https://tvnewscheck.com/article/237396/abc-cbs-fox-and-nbc-sue-over-locast/|title=ABC, CBS, Fox And NBC Sue Over Locast|author=Arbel, Tali|date=July 31, 2019|website=TVNewsCheck|publisher=NewsCheck Media|access-date=August 1, 2019}}{{cite web|url=https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/07/abc-cbs-fox-nbc-sue-locast-to-stop-free-online-access-to-broadcast-tv/|title=TV networks sue nonprofit to kill free TV service|author=Brodkin, Jon|date=July 31, 2019|website=Ars Technica|publisher=Condé Nast|access-date=August 1, 2019}}{{cite court|litigants=American Broadcasting Companies, Inc., et. al. v. David R. Goodfriend and Sports Fans Coalition NY, Inc.|court=United States District Court – Southern District Court of New York|date=July 31, 2019|url=https://www.courtlistener.com/recap/gov.uscourts.nysd.520217/gov.uscourts.nysd.520217.1.0_1.pdf}}

On September 27, 2019, Locast answered the claim and filed a countersuit citing the aforementioned exception. Locast argued that it did not obtain any "direct or indirect commercial advantage" from the service, and that the networks were "[using] their copyrights improperly to construct and protect a pay-TV model that forces consumers to forgo over-the-air programming or to pay cable, satellite, and online providers for access to programming that was intended to be free." Locast accused the networks of engaging in collusion to effectively require viewers to use pay television services, including intentionally using low-end equipment on station transmitters to provide signals inadequate for serving the entirety of their market, and forbidding affiliates from streaming their programming online. Locast considered these tactics a violation of the statutory mandate for broadcasters to operate in the public interest. Locast also accused the networks of "threatening business retaliation and baseless legal claims against any current or prospective donors, supporters, or business partners", specifically alleging that YouTube TV had been threatened in this manner.{{Cite web|url=https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2019/09/nonprofit-fights-tv-networks-in-court-to-keep-free-tv-service-alive/|title=Nonprofit fights TV networks in court to keep free TV service alive|last=Brodkin|first=Jon|date=2019-09-27|website=Ars Technica|language=en-us|access-date=2020-01-06}}{{Cite news|url=https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/27/business/media/streaming-locast-sues-abc-cbs-nbc-fox.html|title=Locast, a Free Streaming Service, Sues ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox|last=Lee|first=Edmund|date=2019-09-27|work=The New York Times|access-date=2019-09-27|language=en-US|issn=0362-4331}}

On October 25, 2019, the broadcasters filed a motion to dismiss Locast's antitrust claims, arguing that they were "an attempt to shift focus from Locast's wholesale infringement of the broadcast companies' copyrights".{{Cite web|url=https://www.mediapost.com/publications/article/342611/broadcasters-urge-judge-to-throw-out-locasts-anti.html|title=Broadcasters Urge Judge To Throw Out Locast's Antitrust Claims|last=Davis|first=Wendy|date=October 29, 2019|website=MediaPost|language=en|access-date=2019-11-03}} On March 30, 2020, the Electronic Frontier Foundation announced it was joining law firm Orrick, Herrington & Sutcliffe as defense co-counsel for Locast{{Cite web|url=https://www.tvtechnology.com/news/eff-sides-with-locast-in-copyright-case|title=EFF Sides With Locast in Copyright Case|date=March 31, 2020|first=Michael|last=Balderston|website=TVTechnology|language=en|access-date=2020-03-31}}{{Cite press release|url=https://www.eff.org/press/releases/eff-joins-locast-defense-team-fight-tv-viewers-right-use-free-legal-streaming-0|title=EFF Joins Locast Defense Team to Fight for TV Viewers' Right to Use Free, Legal Streaming Service|date=2020-03-30|website=Electronic Frontier Foundation|language=en|access-date=2020-04-05}} Goodfriend credited EFF, which is working pro bono, with eliminating what could have been Locast's single largest expenditure. In November 2020, Goodfriend guessed that the case could reach trial by mid-2021.{{Cite web|last=Baumgartner|first=Jeff|date=November 6, 2020|title=Locast has achieved operational sustainability, chairman says|url=https://www.lightreading.com/cablevideo/locast-has-achieved-operational-sustainability-chairman-says-/a/d-id/765230|access-date=2021-01-17|website=Light Reading|language=en}}

On April 23, 2021, both parties sent letters to U.S District Court Judge Louis Stanton. The broadcasters asked for a summary judgement in their favor. In their [https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20690914-locast-_-zweifach-letter letter], they argued that Locast didn't qualify for a copyright exemption for three reasons: the exemption was intended for local retransmissions, whereas Locast's use of the internet gave it global reach; the service in fact operated for commercial advantage; and that the donations it requested were in fact charges to obtain uninterrupted service. The defendants in their [https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/20690913-locast-_-hosp-letter letter] asserted that Locast's services were exempt from copyright liability because they met five conditions: they were secondary retransmissions, not made by a cable company, made by a non-profit organization, without the intent of commercial advantage, and without charge other than to defray costs.{{Cite web|last=Gardner|first=Eriq|date=2021-04-26|title=ABC, CBS, Fox and NBC Battle "Freemium"|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/abc-cbs-fox-and-nbc-battle-freemium-4173511/|access-date=2021-05-07|website=The Hollywood Reporter|language=en-US}}

On August 31, 2021, Stanton denied Locast's request for a summary judgment. He noted that Locast donations were used not just for system maintenance and operations, but for expansion of the service into new media markets. "Expansion is nowhere mentioned" in the law, he wrote, "and it is therefore excluded from the short, tightly-crafted grant of exemptions." He also ruled that because a donation is required to avoid service interruptions, it is therefore "not merely a recurring gift to a charitable cause." The opinion, while leaving open the possibility of a trial, represented a substantial legal setback for the service.{{Cite web|last=Keys|first=Matthew|date=August 31, 2021|title=Judge deals blow to Locast in suit brought by broadcasters|url=https://www.fiercevideo.com/operators/judge-deals-blow-to-locast-suit-brought-by-broadcasters|access-date=2021-09-01|website=FierceVideo|language=en}}{{Cite web|last=Gardner|first=Eriq|date=2021-08-31|title=Broadcasters Score Big Legal Win Against Locast, a Popular App Streaming Network TV|url=https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/business/business-news/broadcasters-score-big-legal-win-against-locast-a-popular-app-streaming-network-tv-1235006305/|access-date=2021-09-01|website=The Hollywood Reporter|language=en-US}}{{cite court|litigants=American Broadcasting Companies, Inc., et. al. v. David R. Goodfriend and Sports Fans Coalition NY, Inc.|court=United States District Court – Southern District Court of New York|date=August 31, 2021|url=https://s3.documentcloud.org/documents/21052725/locast.pdf}}

On September 2, 2021, after announcing it would no longer interrupt service to request donations,{{Cite web|last=Barnes|first=Jess|date=2021-09-01|title=Locast Will No Longer Interrupt Programming for Donation Requests|url=https://www.cordcuttersnews.com/locast-will-no-longer-interrupt-programming-for-donation-requests/|access-date=2021-09-01|website=Cord Cutters News|language=en-US}} Locast suspended operations.{{Cite web|last=Provenzano|first=Brianna|date=September 2, 2021|title=Locast Shuts Down Free Online Access to TV Following Copyright Battle|url=https://gizmodo.com/locast-shuts-down-free-online-access-to-tv-following-co-1847606175|access-date=2021-09-02|website=Gizmodo|language=en-us}} The Electronic Frontier Foundation said the ruling "demonstrates once again how giant entertainment companies use copyright to control when, where, and how people can receive their local TV broadcasts, and drive people to buy expensive pay-TV services to get their local news and sports. We are disappointed that the court is enabling this callous profiteering that tramples on Congress’s intent to ensure local communities have access to news that’s important to people regardless of their ability to pay. The court made a mistake, and Locast is considering its options."{{Cite web|last1=Fullo|first1=Karen|last2=Stoltz|first2=Mitch|date=2021-09-01|title=Court Ruling Against Locast Gets the Law Wrong; Lets Giant Broadcast Networks Control Where and How People Watch Free TV|url=https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2021/09/court-ruling-against-locast-gets-law-wrong-lets-giant-broadcast-networks-control|access-date=2021-09-02|website=Electronic Frontier Foundation|language=en}}

The broadcasters called the ruling "a victory for copyright law, vindicating our claim that Locast is illegally infringing copyrights in broadcast television content in violation of federal law."{{Cite web|last=Goldsmith|first=Jill|date=2021-09-01|title=Broadcasters Call Anti-Locast Ruling "Victory For Copyright Law", Will Seek Permanent Injunction Against Streaming TV App – Update|url=https://deadline.com/2021/09/broadcasters-locast-copyright-lawsuit-1234825244/|access-date=2021-09-02|website=Deadline|language=en-US}} On September 15, the plaintiffs won a permanent injunction requiring Locast to shut down.{{Cite web|last=Brodkin|first=Jon|date=2021-09-16|title=Locast's free TV service ordered to shut down permanently after copyright loss|url=https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2021/09/locasts-free-tv-service-ordered-to-shut-down-permanently-after-copyright-loss/|access-date=2021-09-16|website=Ars Technica|language=en-us}}

On October 28, 2021, the plaintiffs were awarded statutory damages of $32 million under the Copyright Act, payable by Locast's operator, Sports Fans Coalition NY.{{Cite news|last=Brittain|first=Blake|last2=|first2=|date=2021-10-28|title=Locast agrees to pay $32 million to resolve dispute with major TV networks|language=en|work=Reuters|url=https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/locast-agrees-pay-32-million-resolve-dispute-with-major-tv-networks-2021-10-28/|access-date=2021-11-29}}{{cite court|litigants=American Broadcasting Companies, Inc., et. al. v. David R. Goodfriend and Sports Fans Coalition NY, Inc.|court=United States District Court – Southern District Court of New York|date=October 28, 2021, 2021|url=https://fingfx.thomsonreuters.com/gfx/legaldocs/jnvwewdoevw/IP%20LOCAST%20COPYRIGHT%20consent.pdf}} However, broadcasters ultimately agreed to settle for $700,000 plus the liquidation of some used computer servers.{{Cite web |last=Curi |first=Maria |date=January 26, 2022 |title=Biden FCC Nominee Settles Case That Spurred GOP Senator's Fight |url=https://news.bloomberglaw.com/tech-and-telecom-law/fcc-nominees-settlement-undercuts-rationale-for-blocking-her |access-date=2023-03-08 |website=news.bloomberglaw.com |language=en}}

As of July 2021, the service was available to 179 million viewers in media markets representing 55 percent of the U.S. population,{{Cite web|date=2021-01-19|title=Locast surpasses 2.3 million users seeking to stream their local TV channels for free|url=https://news.locast.org/locast-surpasses-2-3-million-users-seeking-to-stream-their-local-tv-channels-for-free/|access-date=2021-01-27|website=Locast|language=en-US}} as well as across Puerto Rico. To use the service, a viewer had to be in one of these markets and could only watch channels local to that market.{{Cite web|title=Locast knowledge base|url=https://helpcenter.locast.org/portal/en/kb/articles/can-i-view-programming-outside-of-a-market|access-date=2021-07-31|website=helpcenter.locast.org}}

• LocalBTV
• Puffer (research study)

{{reflist}}

• {{official|https://web.archive.org/web/20211113000759/https://www.locast.org/|Last snapshot of official website prior to going offline in November 2021}}
• [https://www.sportsfans.org/ Sports Fans Coalition] at sportsfans.org
• [https://www.law.cornell.edu/uscode/text/17/111 17 U.S. Code § 111]
• [https://archive.org/details/gov.uscourts.nysd.520217 American Broadcasting Companies, Inc. v. Goodfriend]

{{Internet streaming services}}

{{CATV USA}}

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