Technological Designs Create Legal Significance – Part I

This is part of a multi-blog series to demonstrate that product design may have—and in many areas of Internet law and regulation, will have—a determining factor for how a product or service is regulated. This first part relates the treatment of cloud services.

Breathing a Little Easier in the Cloud

Recently, the Second Circuit handed down its much-anticipated decision in WNET v. Aereo, Inc., No. 12-2786, 2013 WL 1285591 (2d Cir. Apr. 2, 2013). To the considerable relief of public-facing cloud providers, the Second Circuit reaffirmed its core holding in Cartoon Network LP, LLLP v. CSC Holdings, Inc. ("Cablevision"), 536 F.3d 121 (2d. Cir. 2008), that enabling a user to copy a work and transmit that copy to herself does not result in an infringing public performance simply because the means of storage and transmission are located outside of the user's home. More than anything, Aereo makes clear that how you design your technology matters.