Media Critics Warn of Neutered Broadcast Critiques in TVEyes Support
Given that TVEyes is used by -- among others -- media critics who comment on and criticize Fox programming, the service's functions merit copyright law protection, a group of media critics said in an amici curiae brief filed with the…
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2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Wednesday. The brief was in support of TVEyes' appeal of a U.S. District Court decision that said the company's archiving function is fair use, but emailing, downloading and date/time searches aren't, and a subsequent injunction (see 1603180007). Fox News Network, which sued TVEyes in 2013, has a June 15 deadline for its brief in the appeal. In their brief, City University of New York professor and liberal blogger Eric Alterman, Brave New Films, and Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting said TVEyes' functionality constitutes transformative fair use of content, and that its use of recorded news coverage doesn't have a substantial adverse effect on any markets for Fox. They also said the TVEyes downloading and sharing features "are essential to full, accurate criticism and reporting." A conclusion that obtaining the clips from Fox is an adequate substitute for TVEyes would permit Fox and other broadcasters to effectively silence or blunt many of their critics," they said. "This Court should decline Fox’s offer to guard the media criticism henhouse." Fox didn't comment. TVEyes also has netted amici curiae brief support from such parties as the Computer & Communications Industry Association, the Electronic Frontier Foundation, Google, Microsoft, Public Knowledge, numerous intellectual property law professors and library associations (see 1603250016).