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The Best Educational Streaming Shows for Preschoolers

March 15, 2020 by Lazy Man 5 Comments

For years ago the day (and the hour), I published much of the article below. I’ve updated for 2020 with schools all over the United States closing due to COVID-19 (coronavirus). Parents need to stay home, but education never stops. Parents need a break some times, and there’s some valuable educational material on television. Now my kids are 6 and 7 and at the top of their private school’s class. I’m a fan of educational screen time, even at an early age! I just remember to have moderation in everything Also, don’t forget to turn on the closed captioning.

When my first son was born more than 3 years ago, I made it a point to not make this a parenting blog. While children change everything when it comes to money (and I’m happy to write about that), I simply didn’t want to give parenting tips. That’s not my strong suit anyway.

Over time, I’ve found myself, looking for more educational television for my 2 and 3 year old. I know some parents don’t believe in television for children, but I’m equal-opportunity when it comes to all learning formats. There’s a time and a place for books, television, tablets, and good old crayons and paper to teach letters, numbers, shapes… even foreign languages.

There was a time when parents had to accept whatever was on PBS at the time or buy VHS or DVDs of what they like. Fortunately, today we have on-demand, streaming media. Our Netflix and Amazon Prime subscriptions provide a ton of options at a great value.

I tried to find lists of the best educational shows online and couldn’t find any that I’d consider complete. Almost all of them get the obvious Daniel Tiger, but there are so many hidden gems. This list is going to focus on Netflix, because that’s where the majority of the best shows are. However, I’m going to slip in a couple of Amazon series that I think are top-notch as well.

I’d also like to add that Common Sense Media is excellent and often my first stop to read about a show. There’s almost too much information on the website that it is hard to best stuff. Admittedly, this is (obviously) one man’s opinion and shouldn’t be a substitute for the great work Common Sense Media does.

    Netflix

    All of these may not be on Netflix anymore. They change their programming. However, you can usually find these ideas streaming somewhere. For example, Amazon Prime (through a PBS Kids subscription) is perfect for WordWorld

    Reading

  • Super Why! – This is one of the only shows I’ve found to focus on reading. You can find shows on letters, but this really brings the whole words and reading to life. This isn’t exactly a hidden gem as it is still being regularly run on PBS.
  • Math

  • Monster Math Squad – I found this simply by searching Netflix for “Math.” What a hidden gem! The monsters appear to be knock-offs of Pixar’s Monsters Inc., but I don’t care. These monsters teach math concepts! And when I was looking around to write up this article, I found there’s even an extensive teacher’s resource guideline online.
  • LeapFrog (with LionsGate) – LeapFrog is known for its education material. The DVDs it produced a few years back are no exception. They are focused on letters, numbers, shapes, but extend to some math like simple adding and subtracting. I’m a big believer in STEM, so the math is a welcome addition.
  • Life Skills

  • Special Agent Oso – The episodes are cleverly titled after Bond movies (but kid themed). The special agent bear teaches basic life skills in “3 simple steps.” I’m not sure my 3-year old is ready to mail a letter yet, but it was helpful for learning to brush teeth. Sadly, there’s Spanish as the Oso name may indicate.
  • Curious George – The majority of what you’ll find are the television shows. They are great, but it’s hard to pin down what they are really aiming to teach from a skill point-of-view. I’d say they teach life… if you happen to be a monkey where everything always comes up roses at the end. There’s a lot of problem solving and discovery which is priceless.

    The real gem is the original movie with Will Ferrell and Drew Barrymore with music by Jack Johnson. For a kids movie, there’s a lot of entertainment for adults. They let Ferrell improv, his strength, and drew the movie to match it. It isn’t just his voice. Drew Barrymore is a voice of reason with the appropriate amount of Jessica Rabbit mixed in. (Was that too much information?) When I’m pulling apart pyramid schemes, I’m singing Upside Down and Talk of the Town. This is a top recommendation even if it doesn’t entirely focus on learning.

Team Work

  • Animal Mechanicals – The focus is on 5 mythical animals living in a fantastic mechanical world. They solve very basic physic problems by working together and using their unique abilities (strength, stretching, flying, gizmos, and speed). Each of the characters have their own distinct personalities. My sons and I ended up loving this so much that we bought the DVD because it had episodes that weren’t on Netflix.
  • Amazon Prime Shows

    Amazon Prime has some great shows as well. Many people have a Prime subscription for free shipping, so these come at no additional cost. As a extra bonus you can download them to Amazon Fire tablets and take them with you. (… Or so I am told. I haven’t tried this yet, but I’m going to look into it today.)

      Problem Solving

    • Go, Diego, Go! – I went looking for this because I wanted to introduce the kids to Spanish. They are much more interested in rescuing animals, but we’ve learned a little Spanish while watching it. Besides counting to ten, they can speak about 5-10 other words. If nothing else, Rescue Pack is 100x better than Dora’s lame Backpack.
    • Tumble Leaf – This Amazon exclusive is almost entertaining enough for parents to watch. The animation is incredible. The main character Fig the Fox, finds a new item each episode and figures out how to use it. The item could be a mirror for reflecting light, a flashlight for creating shadows, or a sponge for soaking up water. There’s a reason why it has won 5 daytime Emmys.
    • Math

    • Peg + Cat – Another math show… but I like this more than my kids. Maybe they aren’t old enough for the math concepts. At least once a week, I break an imaginary ukulele and sing this:


    • Other Streaming Services

      Reading

    • Wallykazam! – This is one of the few other shows that I’ve found focusing on reading. The kids love it! It’s on NickJr., so you might have DVR some episodes or get the Noggin app.
    • WordWorld – This is one of the most clever shows that will help kids read. The cartoon characters and objects are animated with the words themselves. So a couch is actually spells couch. You’ll find many seasons of this on the PBS Kids’ application. I subscribe through Amazon Prime Video, because it is easier for us to watch on a TV that way.
    • How do you feel about educational television? What are some of the favorite shows you and your toddlers have enjoyed? Let me know in the comments.

    Filed Under: Family Tagged With: Kids, learning, television

    Looking for a TV? Get this deal, now! (Today Only!)

    August 30, 2016 by Lazy Man 3 Comments

    I very rarely write an article about good deals, but today I’m making an exception. (Also, this will give me a little more time to work on the EpiPen article that had been trying to get finished last week.)

    Amazon’s Deal of the Day is on this LG 55-Inch Curved Smart OLED TV. I’m going to make a case that many people looking for a television should jump on this.

    For those who aren’t tech junkies, OLED is new television technology that has critics raving that it’s the best picture they have ever seen. What makes it so special? It has the ability to turn off pixels completely, so blacks are… well black. It doesn’t sound like much, but if you see it in person it can make a big difference. It seems to cause the other colors to “pop.”

    Back in 2013, an equivalent version of this was $15,000! Today it is $1100. I’m going to let that sink in for a bit.

    I’ve been watching the prices on these and it has never gotten this low. It was around $1300 a few months ago, which was a fantastic price then. It’s probably not going to get much cheaper. This seems to be them clearing out the older stock. It might be the last time you can any kind of OLED for ANYWHERE near $1000… as they’ve moved to even higher end televisions in recent years.

    I’ve been wanting an OLED TV for about 3 years now. A few months ago, I wrote about how I’m starting an OLED TV fund. Today that fund has around $200. Hmmm…

    There are some caveats to consider. First, it’s “only” 55 inches. Second, it’s 1080p, not 4K. Those are probably deal-breakers for some people. However, because the television picture itself is “smaller”, you might not be able to tell it’s not 4K… especially if you are sitting far enough away. Also, this television is curved. I’ve been reading that the curve is so subtle that you don’t notice it. It’s worth reading the reviews if that’s a concern of yours.

    The OLED television I had my eyes on was 65-inches and 4K. That television is $3000. This one is $1100. Is it worth the sacrifice to save $1900? Let me know in the comments.

    Naturally, by “Deal of the Day”, the deal is for today only. This is perfect timing for showing off to your friends who come by to watch football games on Sunday, right? Tell them to bring the pizza and beer and you might even save money with this deal. (Okay, maybe that last one is a stretch.)

    Filed Under: Spending Tagged With: OLED, television

    Buying a Television? Read this first…

    October 21, 2015 by Lazy Man Leave a Comment

    Happy Back to the Future Day. For those who haven’t read the news in the last week, this is the day that Marty McFly traveled into the future in Back to the Future II.

    Back to the Future Day
    Back to the Future Day

    There might be some theaters showing the movie around the United States, but chances are if you are going to watch it, you’ll watch it on a television. You can stream it, but I’ve found the best quality is usually the Blu-Ray version. It just doesn’t seem as compressed.

    And that brings us around to watching the best quality television. In 1985, I was only 9, but I seem to recall my father buying a 36-ish” Fisher television. It was awesome because it was big. We might not have hoverboards, but television technology has come a long way, right?

    In just the last year or two, televisions have taken another jump. Not only have they gone from HD to 4K, but technology like Quantum Dots and OLED are making pictures better than ever. One of these alone would be revolutionary, but two at the same time is something else.* I was hoping this would revolution would happen faster as I bought a bargain Element television in 2010 with the idea of saving money for this new technology.

    I was a few years early, but in the last year, things have changed dramatically. It was just last September when I wrote that I was, budgeting for the next television revolution (4K OLED). Here is how the pricing has dropped on OLED televisions in the last 3 years:

    DateResolutionSizePricePricing Source
    August 20131080P (HD)55"$15,000NBC News
    September 20141080P (HD)55"$3,000Lazy Man
    September 20144K65"$7,000Lazy Man
    October 20151080P55"$1800Amazon
    October 20154K55"$3,000Amazon
    October 20154K65"$5,000Amazon

    Two years ago, you could have spent $15,000 for a television that was smaller with worse resolution than what $5,000 will buy you today. Of course $5,000 for a television is still a lot of money. However, this has pushed the price of the 55-inch 4K down to $3000. Even better… a 55-inch 1080P OLED screen that was $15,000 is now a relatively reasonable $1,800.

    (Side note: These are all LG televisions. LG is not paying me any money for this, it’s just that they are the only company to bring the jaw-dropping OLED technology to the masses.)

    Let’s assume you have some spare money and wanted to buy one of these televisions. You almost need a web-based calculator or a personal advisor to figure out which is likely to be the best for you. I’ve covered this before: Getting a Television on Black Friday? Read This First, but here’s an abbreviated version of that.

    The first thing to consider is room size. If you have a big room, you are going to want a larger television. This is simply a factor of sitting further away. Even an average size room should have a fairly large television according to experts. So you may be tempted to cross the 55-inch off your list. I think that’s a little weird, because I have a 55-inch television now and it’s fine. It is all relative to what you are accustomed to.

    The difference between 4K and 1080P on small screens isn’t that noticeable. The differences in the technology is more obvious as screens get bigger because good eyes can differentiate the pixels better. If you have poor vision, the 4K and thee 1080P may look exactly the same to you… so why spend more money?

    Furthermore, there’s not a lot of 4K content available. Netflix and Amazon has some content, but cable and satellite providers are behind. And not much content is shot in 4K. Not even sports which would really take advantage of it.

    At some point 4K will come, but it might be a few years. In the meantime, prices will continue to drop, so it may be worth waiting to take advantage of that.

    Usually, when I see such great price drops, I think, “It’s time to take advantage. This is the sweet spot, where I’m early, but not paying top, top dollar.” My finances don’t allow for a $5,000 television, so the 65-inch isn’t in the cards. A $3,000 television is still stretching the budget, but I’m not sure if I want to stretch it for something at 55-inches and a feature (4K), which isn’t rolled out yet. Finally, the $1800 television is still on the high-end of the budget, but would probably be the best value right now. If my television broke today, this would be what I’d buy.

    It looks like I’m going to be waiting another year or two for the price drops to level off. However, your situation may be different. I can definitely see the case to jump in and buy these now.

    * A third technology, HDR, is new this year and also looks to be revolutionary. I don’t have the space to get into this, but many of these televisions feature HDR as well.

    Filed Under: Spending Tagged With: 4K, OLED, television

    Getting a Television on Black Friday? Read This First.

    November 24, 2014 by Lazy Man 7 Comments

    To get a television or not? That is the question.

    Just two months ago, I wrote about the next television revolution which combines two upcoming technologies OLED and 4K. OLED is a huge improvement for everyone with typical 1080P televisions (yes even those with plasmas). We’ll get to it in a bit, but 4K isn’t likely to make as big of a difference.

    So if you are looking to buy a television this season, you’ll want to keep the following in mind: You probably shouldn’t, unless you should, and it doesn’t matter, unless it does and it doesn’t matter, except for when it does.

    Confused? You should be. This is the most confusing time to buy a television I’ve seen in decades.

    Is 4K (Ultra HD) Worth It?

    I’ve been seeing some 4K televisions in the Black Friday ads this year. Since everyone remembers the huge improvement in going from SD to HD, the expection is that it will happen again with the switch to 4K televisions.

    Unfortunately, 4K is mostly marketing. Most people (those with 20/20 vision) can’t tell the difference at a certain distance. It depends on your eye sight, where you sit and the size of the television. The bigger the television, the better your vision, and the closer you sit, the more it matters. There’s no point in getting a 30″ 4K television and sitting 15 feet away from it. However, if you are 7 feet away, you can probably tell the difference on a 70″ 4K television.

    Fortunately there’s a great 4K television calculator here.

    You want to start by figuring out your viewing distance. Most likely that’s going to stay constant unless you are planning to move or do room redesign. Let’s assume you aren’t going to do that. Most people sit around 9 feet away from their television… or at least that’s the popular Lecher distance median number.

    The next question is how big of a television should you buy. CNET answers this question directly. THX recommends a 90″ television for that 9 foot distance. The Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) recommends a 68″ television for 9 feet. CNET’s recommendation was for a 72″ television. Since you can’t buy 68″ or 72″ televisions, let’s just say that most people would be best suited with a 70″ television.

    I’m going to send to my wife the above paragraph.

    Now that we know where most people sit and we have an idea of what size television they should (optimally) buy, we can plug these numbers into the handy aforementioned calculator to decide if 4K is worth it. Plugging in a 70″ television with a 9′ foot viewing distance and 20/20 vision, there is only a 29% improvement for 4K.

    As if there weren’t enough factors to consider, there is this. There isn’t a lot of 4K content out there. In fact, there is almost none. So any kind of benefit you might see, may be masked by the source you are watching.

    So in the typical case, even if you are spending a lot of money for a large 4K television, you aren’t getting much benefit. If you drop the television size down to 55″ (the most common 4K television size marketed on Black Friday) there is zero benefit.

    However, if you have a nice little man (or woman) cave where your viewing distance is close and/or you have better vision than the norm, a 55″ 4K television can make sense.

    What About OLED?

    As I wrote in the beginning of the article, OLED is where the best picture is. The problem is that only one company, LG, has been able to figure out how to make them efficiently enough to bring them to the audience. That’s why a search for OLED televisions on Amazon gives you only choices by LG.

    It’s fun to read the reviews on the LG 55″ Curved OLED TV… everyone is screaming about how incredible it is. You simply don’t get that with all the 4K televisions. Of course, those 4K televisions don’t cost $3,500 either.

    If you are looking for something in the 55″ range and want the best picture, you are better off skipping the 4K exercise above and going with this television. Of course it’s going to cost you twice as much, but another way to look at it is that it would have cost you $15,000 last year.

    And if you want the best of both worlds, you can get a LG Electronics 65-Inch 4k Curved OLED TV for only $9,999. I’d say that’s my dream television, but there’s a 77 inch version coming that’s only $24,999. If you are wondering that’s a better fit for my room size and seating distance (obviously not so much for my wallet).

    What Do You Do?

    It’s impossible to give blanket advice on televisions. I can’t say what’s right for everyone.

    However, the impossible hasn’t stopped me before, so here’s my two cents (which you get for free!).

    The price of 4K televisions that are going to be big upgrades for most people is still too high – especially given the lack of content. OLED is really exciting, but again, the price is very high. I’m not sure Lazy Man and Money readers are the type to spend that kind of money. If you are, hopefully it’s because you’ve been reading my site for years and made ridiculous amounts of money (if so, please share it with me).

    If you have an older and/or smaller television and you can get a good deal on an upgrade that will keep you happy for the next 4-5 years (or longer) it might be worth taking that plunge. (As a preview for my next post, I am thinking of doing such a crazy thing!)

    Otherwise, my best advice is to sit on the sidelines and wait for technology to do what technology does… get cheaper.

    Filed Under: Smart Purchases, Spending Tagged With: television

    Aereo TV: Why Waste the Supreme Court’s Time?

    August 30, 2016 by Lazy Man 1 Comment

    [Editor’s Note: I wrote this article a couple of days ago before news of how the trial had occurred. I deemed it more important to go with the Solar power article on Earth Day. So I’m publishing this today, with an update at the end.]

    There was an interesting article on CNET yesterday that I think leads to an interesting thought exercise: Why the Aereo Supreme Court case over TV’s future is too tough to call? I encourage you to click that link which will open up in a new tab/window, read it or follow along. Ms. Solsman makes the big bucks explaining the issue and does a wonderful job. I don’t want to take up the space here to do what she has done so well. Instead, I intend to continue making the little bucks for flexing my large logical cortex and solving the problem.

    This is more of a legal/technology debate than a personal finance one, but if you stick me for a bit, I promise you some definite personal finance thoughts. Why would I tackle this on a site about personal finance? I simply have a natural interest in the role of legal nuances play. That’s why I write about how MLMs attempt to blur the lines of pyramid schemes to remain legal. It’s why I’ve written about promotions and seemingly illegal lotteries here, promotions vs. lotteries, and here.

    Have you read the article? Good. Here’s a very basic rundown of the conflict, because I know a few people won’t click over and read the article.

    Aereo TV runs a subscription service were people can stream and record broadcast television (CBS, ABC, NBC, Fox, etc.) over the Internet. They pay these broadcast companies nothing. Currently these broadcast companies charge cable and satellite providers billions for access to these channels. The companies either want Aereo to pay the same fees or have it declared illegal. They fear that cable and satellite will construct similar services (or even subcontract Aereo) to avoid paying billions for access to the channels. Broadcast companies are protecting their revenue stream and you can’t fault them for that.

    Aereo gets around paying for access to the broadcast channels by having individual antennas for each subscriber. The company argues that they are simply conveniently harnessing the free over-the-air broadcast signal for its customers. From a technology perspective, it isn’t much different than a company setting up a bunch of solar panels at its facility and selling me the energy from them.

    Create Your Own Aereo at Home

    One of the important things to note is that consumers can create their own Aereo service with currently available technology. For under $10, you can get a Mediasonic HomeWorx Indoor HDTV Antenna that is highly rated. Got around $50 and you can get RCA Compact Outdoor Antenna that is almost flawlessly rated. For another $65 or so you can bring that signal through this Hauppauge WinTV Tuner Stick into a computer such as the SEXY Intel NUC. Pair that with some simple DVR software/program guides (MythTV, Windows Media Center, etc.) and use the HDMI output to view on your television. Add the Remote Potato application to stream it all over the home and on the road.

    A set-up like this is tempting because there are no subscription fees. If you watch broadcast television most of the time (as most people do), this solution is a one-time charge of around $600 for television for life. Of course you can get more bells and whistles, but that’s an article for another day. In fact, the details are probably best suited for websites specializing on such set-ups.

    If all that got confusing and sounded like a lot of work, welcome to the club. Fortunately, devices like Simple.tv’s Network Tuner DVR combine the computer, streaming, and conversion into one box. With that you need to add an antenna and a hard drive. Same goes for this highly rated Channel Master DVR+ (though there are few reviews). A company called Tablo is making another device that you can buy directly from its website (but I would wait for the four tuner model myself).

    Aereo’s subscription service does all this at its facility very efficiently for you. You don’t have to have an antenna or install one. From a frugal perspective, it doesn’t really compete with the above in the long run, because over time the subscription fees add up. However, it does help those who want to cut the cable do it a lot more cheaply and efficiently.

    Public and Private Performance Confuse the Issue

    Let’s get back to the debate of Aereo’s legality. The issue gets a little more complicated when viewed under the Copyright Act of 1976. That makes a distinction between public performances and private performances. Private performances aren’t subject to copyright rules, while public ones are. For some reason it was decided that watching broadcast television in your living room was a private performance. However, a “cable or satellite company funneling channels to its customers en masse” (a quote from that CNET article), is considered a public performance.

    I don’t understand the basis of this distinction and why it exists. With the exception of NFL Sunday Ticket and some Pay Per View fighting events at bars, almost all the performances are indeed private, people watching television in their living rooms.

    In fact, one could easily argue that a local NBC affiliate that funnels the channel via an over-the-air antenna en masse to its customers is just as much a public performance.

    Such a distinction is arbitrary at best. At worst, I’d say it is completely unnecessary.

    Most importantly, I’d go as far as to say that it is the cause of the issue here. If such a distinction was never made, broadcast channels wouldn’t have been able to charge cable and satellite companies fees. This was a completely new revenue stream that came from technology changes. NBC didn’t create cable or satellite companies but they benefited from being able to charge them fees. They no longer was as dependent on advertising as they were in the days of “rabbit ears.”

    So now the broadcast companies are upset that their benefit may get taken away from them. I say, “tough break. Go back to supporting your business on advertising revenues as you did the past. You still have the vast majority of Americans watching your shows, so it shouldn’t be difficult.”

    Aereo’s Side of the Story

    Aereo has put up a website Protect My Antenna, which tells their side of the story. Essentially, it’s a story of how they make the Create Your Own Aereo at Home paragraph above easier by doing most of it at their facility.

    The website has one line that I think sums up the whole case, “Broadcasters should not be able to use the Courts to drive forward what they believe are their most lucrative business models.”

    The way I see it, it doesn’t make any more sense for Aereo to pay fees to the broadcast companies any more than it makes sense for individuals to pay monthly fees to use an antenna on their own roof. And if you start make Aereo pay the fees you get into the dangerous territory of making Simple.tv and Tablo charge monthly fees with its product when they simply make using an antenna with DVR technology easier. If you make Aereo pay fees and not Simple.tv, you are essentially saying that putting an antenna in a remote location requires paying broadcasters fees. This not only doesn’t make sense, it doesn’t keep with the public and private performance guidelines of The Copyright Act of 1976.

    Save the University of California Berkeley Law Students!

    To bring this full circle, let’s get back to the beginning of the article:

    “On a final exam, University of California Berkeley law professor Pamela Samuelson asked her copyright class to answer whether Aereo is, essentially, a true technological innovation or just a legal one… ‘”My poor students were suffering enormously.’ Samuelson said, after they complained about the difficulty of the Aereo question.”

    I feel terrible for what these law students at a top university have had to endure by trying to answer this question. I hope that I never have to hire them, because I certainly wouldn’t want to trust them with even a tiny amount of my money or freedom.

    Here’s the simple answer: It is both. It is a minor technological innovation that disrupts the current legal precedents. It essentially points a finger at the nonsensical division between public and private performances in the legal system that simply shouldn’t have existed in the first place.

    So there you go… In under 1500 words I’ve:

    1. saved the Supreme Court a ton of time
    2. solved a problem that baffled law students at the University of Berkeley
    3. showed you a few solutions on how to save money cutting the cord

    Since I’ve got nearly 100 words left, I humbly suggest that the Supreme Court use this saved to time to turn their attention to preventing million of people from getting scammed by unregulated pyramid schemes pretending to legitimate multi-level marketing businesses. Fair?

    Update

    Well it looks like I was wrong. Aereo looks like it is going to get railroaded by big business. Forbes had a pretty neutral article which included some of the questions that the justices asked and statements that they made. Here’s a sampling:

    “Justice Breyer still appeared unconvinced that the court could disentangle the Aereo verdict from the larger cloud-computing industry. ‘I don’t see how to get out of it,’ he lamented.”

    “Chief Justice Roberts didn’t appear to buy it. ‘I mean, there’s no technological reason for you to have 10,000 dime-sized antenna, other than to get around copyright laws.'” (I would have loved for the lawyer to respond with, “This is what happens when you make nonsensical, arbitrary laws.”)

    “Justice Breyer continued to display anxiety. ‘What disturbs me is I don’t understand what the decision for you or against you, when I write it is going to do to all kinds of other technologies. I’ve read the briefs fairly carefully, and I’m still uncertain that I understand it well enough.'” (This is always an encouraging sign for a lawyer. Gotta love when your fate is in the hands of someone who admits ignorance.)

    “‘That isn’t [Aereo’s] problem,’ [Justice Breyer] continued. ‘But it might turn out to be.'” (Just when you thought Breyer embarrassed himself enough, he finds a new level of embarrassment.)

    There’s more from CNN Money’s coverage:

    “‘This is really hard for me,’ Justice Sonia Sotomayor remarked early on in the hour-long hearing.” (Not that you want it to be easy, but it’s not comforting to know that the Justices themselves are admitting difficulty.)

    “Justice Antonin Scalia, on the other hand, seemed not to understand the difference between television networks that are beamed over the public airwaves, like ABC, and those that are only available through cable subscriptions, like HBO.

    Scallia’s hypothetical question to Frederick — in the future, ‘you could take HBO, right?’ — earned him some ribbing on blogs after the court session.” (I’ll pile it on. Clearly HBO is not broadcast television and available with an antenna. Can we recuse Scallia and get someone like Mark Cuban to sub in?)

    It gets worse when you read the NY Times coverage:

    “‘Your technological model,’ Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. told Aereo’s lawyer, ‘is based solely on circumventing legal prohibitions that you don’t want to comply with.'” (So if they’ve circumvented the legal prohibitions why are they even in court? Isn’t that admitting that no law has been broken?)

    “Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg said Aereo’s business was built on taking content without paying for it. ‘You are the only player so far that doesn’t pay any royalties at any stage,’ she told Mr. Frederick.” (I don’t believe this to be true. I doubt that Simple.TV, Tablo, and ChannelMaster pay any royalties on broadcast content at any stage either.)

    “‘I’m hearing everybody having the same problem,’ [Justice Breyer] said of his fellow justices. ‘I will be absolutely prepared, at least for argument’s sake, to assume’ that Aereo’s service is unlawful.

    ‘But then the problem is in the words that do that,’ he said, referring to the decision the court will issue, probably in June. Justice Breyer went on to express concern that a ruling against Aereo might limit other innovations ‘that will really change life,’ such as the cloud.”

    (So the assumption is that it is illegal, but they really don’t know why or how to word something clever enough to only impact Aereo’s business. This is some kind of weird dream, right? It can’t be real life, can it?)

    Filed Under: Save Money On..., Technology Tip Tagged With: aereo, cutting the cord, frugality, legal, television

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