[mythtvnz] Sky->smart card reader->MythTV ???

[Sam Hadley-Jones]

> Date: Sat, 28 Feb 2009 22:20:49 +1300
> From: Aaron Whitehouse <lists at whitehouse.org.nz>
> Subject: Re: [mythtvnz] Sky->smart card reader->MythTV ???
> To: MythTV in NZ <mythtvnz at lists.linuxnut.co.nz>
> Message-ID: <49A901F1.6010706 at whitehouse.org.nz>
> Content-Type: text/plain; charset=UTF-8
> 
> yuri wrote:
> > Cut the paranoia.
> > If it's not mentioned in the Terms and Conditions then it's not a problem.
> > If the ToC does forbid it, it's a contractual matter, not a criminal matter.
> > Pay TV providers are not legislators.
> 
> Haha... if only that were true.  This isn't legal advice, but in a
> one-line summary, the issue is with "Technological Protection Measures":
> http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1994/0143/latest/DLM346899.html?search=ts_act_copyright_resel#DLM346899
> http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1994/0143/latest/DLM1705876.html?search=ts_act_copyright_resel
> 
> "A person (A) must not provide a service to another person (B) if?
> (a) A intends the service to enable or assist B to circumvent a
> technological protection measure; and
> (b) A knows or has reason to believe that the service will, or is likely
> to, be used to infringe copyright in a TPM work."
> 
> "A person (A) must not publish information enabling or assisting another
> person to circumvent a technological protection measure if A intends
> that the information will be used to infringe copyright in a TPM work."
> 
> Even that is not that straight-forward.  What constitutes infringing
> copyright is really wide when it comes to time-shifting and format-shifting:
> http://www.legislation.govt.nz/act/public/1994/0143/latest/DLM346229.html?search=ts_act_copyright_resel#DLM346229
> may help as only those with "lawful access" to Sky could use the
> techniques and they are likely to use it for time-shifting.
> 
> As with all these things, even if you get legal advice on the point and
> think you are okay, are you going to risk it for helping strangers on a
> mailing list?  It certainly isn't the first time that DRM etc. has been
> used to protect monopolies and stifle competition.
> 
> Welcome to NZ's DMCA.
> 
> Regards,
> 
> Aaron

I'd have to side with Yuri on this. There's no circumvention of TPM *if*
you're just using the sky feed like any other in MythTV. Now, if the
*intent* was to then set up card sharing (distributing the ECM keys to
people without a Sky subscription), that would be an issue.

To put it another way; the idea of decoding sky digital on your mythtv
box is replacing the sky decoder hardware. One still requires the
subscription card in order to watch only the channels that have been
subscribed to. There is no breach of copyright. Your Sky contract may be
breached but that is irrelevant in the context of instructing others.
There's no law against telling someone how to break a contract.

At a guess I'd say that there would be lots of individuals on this list
who would like to integrate Sky into their mythtv setups merely to save
quality loss capturing from an analogue card, transcoding, ir blasting,
etc.

On that note, if anyone has Sky and would like to test Mythtv
integration, I have a spare phoenix serial card reader (the jaycar $60
kit) that can be borrowed for a month or so.

Sam.