Broadcasters secure a win in their fight against scrappy TV streamer Locast

ABC, NBC, CBS, and Fox have secured a victory in their legal fight against Locast, a nonprofit that re-streams their local broadcast stations at little to no cost, much to the consternation of those networks.

Locast is a service that makes local broadcasts free — kind of, we’ll get to that — to those who may be unwilling to pony up for cable or live TV streaming services, or just don’t want to hook up an antenna in their living room. Those four networks are already broadcast over-the-air for free; Locast then uses a legal exemption in copyright law to re-transmit their broadcasts and put them online for people to more easily access. Locast doesn’t technically charge for its service, but it does ask for donations that start around $5 per...

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