[Discuss-gnuradio] FCC Overstepped Authority on Digital TV

[Eric Blossom]

http://www.reuters.com/newsArticle.jhtml?type=businessNews&storyID=7703873&src=rss/businessNews

FCC Overstepped Authority on Digital TV
Tue Feb 22, 2005 03:07 PM ET

By Peter Kaplan

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. appeals court on Tuesday said that
regulators had overstepped their authority by imposing a rule designed
to limit the copying of digital television programs.

"You crossed the line," Judge Harry Edwards told a lawyer for the
Federal Communications Commission during arguments before a
three-judge panel of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the D.C. Circuit.

"Selling televisions is not what the FCC is in the business of,"
Edwards said, siding with critics who charge the rule dictates how
computers and other devices should work.

But it was unclear whether the judges would strike down the FCC's 2003
rule, since doubts were also raised about whether the American Library
Association and other opponents had legal standing to challenge the
rule in court.

After hearing arguments, the court usually takes several months to
issue a ruling.

The FCC rule aims to limit people from sending copies of digital
television programs over the Internet. The FCC has said copyright
protections are needed to help speed the adoption of digital
television.

Under the FCC rule, programmers can attach a code, or flag, to digital
broadcasts that would, in most cases, bar consumers from sending
unauthorized copies of popular shows over the Web.

The rule requires manufacturers of television sets that receive
digital over-the-air broadcast signals to produce sets that can read
the digital code by July 1 of this year.

The rule has been criticized by some consumer groups, who say that it
could raise prices to consumers and that it sets a bad precedent by
allowing broadcasters to dictate how computers and other devices
should be built.

Edwards and one of the other two judges, David Sentelle, agreed with
the critics and told FCC lawyer Jacob Lewis that the law does not give
the agency specific authority to dictate how electronic devices must
be made.

"It's never been done before," Sentelle said, agreeing with Edwards
that the rule could set a precedent for a wide range of other new FCC
regulations.

But Sentelle also said he had serious doubts about whether the library
association and other critics had standing to sue.

Courts have long held that parties have standing only when they can
show that an agency ruling will cause them a unique, "particularized"
harm, Sentelle said.

"The harm to us is the harm to consumers," responded Pantelis
Michalopoulos, an attorney for the petitioners in the case. "Our
members are consumers."

Sentelle was unconvinced, saying it's not enough to argue that the
rule will raise the price of Internet content to consumers in general.

Neither Edwards nor the other judge on the panel, Judge Judith Rogers,
indicated whether they agreed with Sentelle on the issue of legal
standing.

[snip]