Aereo rolls out Internet television service in Denver

[Rob]

From the Denver Post:


Chet Kanojia, founder of Aereo Inc., holds an antenna next to a server array in New York. Aereo is one of several startups created to deliver traditional media over the Internet without licensing agreements. (Bebeto Matthews, Associated Press)

Aereo rolls out Internet television service in Denver

Aereo Inc., a contested service that transmits broadcast signals over the Internet, has entered the Denver market.

The New York-based startup will be available to about 3.4 million consumers across 67 counties in Colorado, Nebraska and Wyoming starting Nov. 4, the company announced Tuesday.

Consumers who preregister online, however, can start using the service this week, said Virginia Lam, an Aereo spokeswoman.

For $8 a month, subscribers will receive local broadcast signals from more than 40 sources via the Internet and storage space for 20 hours of video. The cost is $12 a month for 60 hours of recorded time.

Aereo has leased space at an undisclosed data center where it has placed an array of its dime-size antennas on the roof, Lam said. It won't hire any local employees or take office space.

The service has proved popular with consumers looking for a cheaper alternative to pay television, those with obstructed broadcast signals and people wanting more control in how they view content digitally.

Most networks, for example, delay the online availability of episodes by a day, sometimes longer, after they are broadcast.

"It's clear that consumers want more choice and flexibility in how they watch television, and they don't want to be forced into expensive, outdated technology," Chet Kanojia, the company's CEO and founder, said in a statement.

Broadcasters, which counter that Aereo is pirating their content and should pay retransmission fees, have raised multiple legal challenges and are taking their case to the U.S. Supreme Court after losing in lower courts. Fox TV has gone as far as threatening to take its signal off the airwaves.

Aereo relies on two legal arguments. One is the requirement that over-the-air broadcast signals must be provided for free. The second is that consumers have a right to record broadcast content for their own use, a precedent established in the 1980s.

Aereo, which has the backing of media mogul Barry Diller, has taken those concepts a step further, giving each customer a remotely located antenna and shifting the digital video recorder into the cloud.

Denver, after some delay, joins Boston, Atlanta, Miami, Salt Lake City, Houston, Dallas and Detroit as new markets this year for Aereo.

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