In the ongoing battle against broadcasters, Chet Kanojia, head of cloud-based DVR company Aereo said in a statement the company would “not oppose the broadcasters’ petition for certiorari before the United States Supreme Court.” If the Court decides to hear the case in 2014, Aereo could possibly benefit from freed-up resources to expand nationwide. As is, broadcasters’ stand on cloud-based services by Google, Amazon and Apple could threaten those services’ very existence.

“Kanojia echoed much of what Cablevision itself expressed in a white paper earlier today, saying that he believes the end goal of this court battle could ultimately strike down a 2008 ruling in favor of Cablevision’s cloud DVR tech, which laid the groundwork for many of the cloud-based services we enjoy today,” reports Engadget.

The article notes that Aereo and Cablevision “sit on opposite sides of the fence when it comes to retransmission fees,” but adds that both agree that innovation is key, and that the “broadcasters’ suit, if successful, could reverse much of that technological progress.”

A white paper by Cablevision explains its stance: “The broadcasters’ expansive interpretation of the public performance right casts doubt on numerous accepted technologies, particularly in the cloud computing sector. Under the broadcasters’ theory, for example, if two consumers both independently purchase the same recording from Amazon’s MP3 Store, upload the song to their own personal storage space on Amazon’s Cloud Player, and then listen to the song by streaming it back to themselves, Amazon would be engaging in a public performance.”

The white paper goes on to add that this interpretation by broadcasters threatens widely accepted cloud services that “represent a key driver of economic growth in the technology industry.”

Related Stories:
Aereo Will Not Fight Broadcasters’ Effort to Get Supreme Court Ruling, The Los Angeles Times, 12/12/13
The Switchboard: Aereo is Itching for a Supreme Court Fight, The Washington Post, 12/13/13