blog AFL chief Andrew Demetriou has reportedly stuck the boot into Optus in its appeal in the ongoing legal drama over the telco’s TV Now Internet TV recording system, labelling the company “a disgusting organisation” which was undermining the rights of sports companies. The AFL’s own media outlet AFL Media, in an article published late last week, quoted Demetriou as saying:

“They are a disgusting organisation who is acting reprehensibly again and now putting more uncertainty into sports and broadcast rights going forward … I’m really disappointed and disgusted in the comments of their CEO overnight.”

Demetriou’s comments came after Optus last week revealed it would appeal its Federal Court loss over the TV Now service, taking the case to the High Court. At the time, Optus chief executive Paul O’Sullivan said Optus believed the TV Now case was “extremely important in deciding the future for innovation, consumer choice and competition”.

He added: “This is a very important public policy issue that needs to be determined by the highest court in the land, to give clarity to both consumers and the industry. As innovations like TV Now are readily available in other parts of the world, Australia must remain globally competitive and embrace the rapid convergence of technologies as we head towards an NBN world.”

The Optus TV Now service allows customers to have free to air television programs recorded when broadcast, using Optus’ centralised systems, and then played back at the time of a customers’ choosing on their Optus mobile device or PC. This technique is known as “time-shifting”, and attracted the legal ire of the NRL and other groups such as the Australian Football League, which had granted Optus rival Telstra an exclusive licence to make their broadcasts available online.

Frankly, I think both organisations are acting a little immaturely here. Optus can’t have expected that the AFL and NRL would take its cloud-based PVR service lightly, considering their multi-million-dollar deal with Telstra. Football is big money. But the sports codes are also acting in a silly manner; trying to deny Australians from accessing sports content through any medium they wish, and at the time of their choosing, is an exercise in futility. In a few years, when global intellectual property laws are finally re-worked to reflect real-world Internet usage, we will look back on this spat as a bad joke born of a flawed understanding of the digital environment, I would bet.

Image credit: Flying Cloud, Creative Commons

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1. @Matt_Phipps
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 4:25 pm | Permalink | Reply

   Global IP laws re-worked to reflect real-world Internet usage?!?

   For that to happen you need:
   - international agreement, at least in all developed countries;
   - lower court judges who understand how and why technology works;
   - ditto for politicians and lawyers;
   - political processes without the influence of lobby group money/bribery.

   Maybe I’m cynical, but I can’t see that happening in my lifetime, let alone a few years.
   In the meantime I’ll just work with what laws we have, and welcome a High Court judgement to give some small measure of certainty to the issue of IT service provider liability.

   • Renai LeMay
     Posted 14/05/2012 at 4:37 pm | Permalink | Reply

     hey Matt,

     I suspect you believe “global IP laws”, in the context of my article, to be a technical term. I didn’t mean it that way ;)

     All I meant was that IP law is going to have to gradually change to reflect the nature of the Internet. We’re already seeing this in Australia courtesy of the iiNet judgement and the review of digital provisions of the Copyright Act, to cite two high-profile examples.

     Cheers,

     Renai

2. seven_tech
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 4:31 pm | Permalink | Reply

   “In a few years, when global intellectual property laws are finally re-worked to reflect real-world Internet usage, we will look back on this spat as a bad joke born of a flawed understanding of the digital environment, I would bet”

   In a few years?? This is ridiculous now! Ok, I’m not the most un-biased person to be talking about this- I’m not a fan at ALL of football and I think the current forward 5 year broadcast rights being worth $1 Billion to the AFL and NFL is absolutely disgusting. Sport has its place, but that amount of money is ludicrous.

   But this sort of legal stoush has been taking place across the world and the broadcast companies and their clients are refusing to put the old horse of Free-to-air and live broadcasting out of its misery and get into the 21st century of On-Demand TV.

   Live sport will always have a share of the market, but as modern Australians have more work, longer hours and less time to sit in a loungeroom and watch live streams, on-demand will rapidly start overtaking live. If broadcasters and sports clubs don’t accept this…..well, we’ve already seen what piracy can do to movies and tv shows…..

   • Renai LeMay
     Posted 14/05/2012 at 4:37 pm | Permalink | Reply

     “Live sport will always have a share of the market, but as modern Australians have more work, longer hours and less time to sit in a loungeroom and watch live streams, on-demand will rapidly start overtaking live. If broadcasters and sports clubs don’t accept this…..well, we’ve already seen what piracy can do to movies and tv shows…..”

     +1

3. Rod
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 4:56 pm | Permalink | Reply

   Methinks the Vlad-y doth protest too much…

   Seriously, AD, pull your head in. This is not an issue to be decided via blinkered whinging, but that is exactly what we’ve gotten from AFL House since the story first arose.

4. Glenn
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 5:10 pm | Permalink | Reply

   “undermining the rights of sports companies”

   Thats right, these poor underprivileged sports companies do it so hard, they have to collect all the money the spectators pay to watch sport, organize trips to America so they can compare d*ck sizes, persecute club members for making negative comments.

   Never mind the spectators or the athletes, wont somebody think of the sports companies !!

   • seven_tech
     Posted 14/05/2012 at 5:15 pm | Permalink | Reply

     Glenn- “Won’t somebody PLEASE think of the sports companies!!??” in a Helen Lovejoy whining voice :D

     +1

5. Tony Healy
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 5:47 pm | Permalink | Reply

   If Optus is pretending their motivation was to advance innovation, choice and competition, I think Demetriou is right.

   Bear in mind Optus would have been in the negotiations to acquire the online rights, but I bet they never mentioned their intention to come over all freetard if they lost. Pathetic.

   • Bob.H
     Posted 14/05/2012 at 6:45 pm | Permalink | Reply

     I think that the only motive for Optus with TV Now was profit. I am not sure that they were ever in the bidding to broadcast the football. Users of the FTA recording service seem more interested in recording shows apart from sport. Sport didn’t even make the top four requests for recording according to Optus. It is possible that Optus didn’t even bid for the football rights. They seem to have gone for tennis.

     The whole thing smacks of arrogance by the sports rights holders in thinking that the only shows being downloaded were sport. Why the NRL, AFL and Telstra should have the right to dictate how I am going to record a FTA game is beyond comprehension. Next they will be requiring that all recordings of their games must be done on VHS tape.

     I have one word for these cretins but I can’t use it here unfortunately.

6. Cam
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 5:50 pm | Permalink | Reply

   The only thing that is disgusting is the greed and arrogance of the AFL. The players are paid too much and generally lack self discipline off the field. What will they do when financial austerity finally hits Australia? Will aussies still have their heads in the sand watching the game when that happens?

   • Noddy
     Posted 14/05/2012 at 6:04 pm | Permalink | Reply

     I’d be happy to see AFL disappear. Didn’t mind playing it or watching it when I lived out of Melbourne. But now I live here and have been unfortunate enough to go to places footballers frequent… What a pack of wankers. The AFL is one big arsehole factory. Occasionally I will hear an interview with a player and be shocked that he seems intelligent. They aren’t the tossers who you see gropping girls and picking fights for fun.
     Sorry about the language, but we are talking AFL here and I can assure you a footballer’s girlfriend can string together far worse in every sentence that leaves her mouth.

7. seven_tech
   Posted 14/05/2012 at 6:49 pm | Permalink | Reply

   I find it funny that you guys are saying that about AFL; I think NFL is about 10 times worse!

   I see some of the AFL guys and think “wow, that gentlemen enjoys bashing the crap out of other men on the field, but actually seems as though he has some other opinions important to society”

   When I think of NFL? “Wow…….that guy can still talk??!! Who would’ve thought how little intelligence it takes to string a reasonably coherent sentence together”

8. Graham R
   Posted 15/05/2012 at 12:48 pm | Permalink | Reply

   What I find really concerning is the attitude and behavior of Andrew Demetriou regarding this issue. He is behaving more like an AFL (or NFL) player than a CEO of a billion dollar company. I originally thought he was a poor choice for CEO, and he is doing nothing to change my mind.

   A few Optus users watching the footy on their smartphones is hardly going to kill the AFL!

   AFL (or should we call it VFL while Andrew is it’s CEO?) is being ruined by this almighty dollar quest.

9. David S.
   Posted 16/05/2012 at 11:14 am | Permalink | Reply

   I think the AFL have rather more serious beams in their own eyes they need to be dealing with than criticising Optus. The idea of the head of an organisation infamous for the appalling and often illegal behaviour and greed of many of its very public representatives having the gall to claim a company like Optus is “disgusting” shows out totally out of touch and money obsessed the AFL (like the NRL and many other sporting bodies) is.

   The fault is the pernicious and now almost universally accepted notion that sport is, and should be, a business, one who’s sole aim is to make money. It isn’t and it should never have been allowed to become one.

   • Bob.H
     Posted 16/05/2012 at 12:22 pm | Permalink | Reply

     +1

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