legality

**hezkyden** · #1 01-08-2007, 07:15 PM

Can anyone help me to sort out the legality of watching p2p football. I understand the arguments regarding the 'morality' of football media operations pricing fans out of the market and deserving everything they get in terms of being ripped off, but what is the actual legal situation, if I live in a EU country. Also, without being too technical, how does FSi 'work'?

**tange** · #2 01-08-2007, 07:30 PM

it's simple m8ee it's free and u won't be done for watching footie on the net

**Dr_Jae** · #3 01-08-2007, 08:07 PM

This is my understanding. Please don't take this as gospel, or legally binding, it's just my humble interpretation.

The rights to show live football in the UK are owned by Sky and Setanta. However this only covers broadcast rights for channels specifically and solely intended for the UK market.

The channels that are available on the Peer-2-Peer programs that this site provides links for have the rights to broadcast live premiership football in their own countries. They make their channels available over the internet and this means they are available in the UK.

It's the equivalent of taking a portable sattelite dish to France, plugging in your sky box and watching the footie in your caravan. It's not intended for the French market (French channels have the broadcast rights in France), but it is available there. There is nothing illegal about watching a foreign TV channel that happens to be available to you, even if it isn't intended for the area you are in. Because FSi only provides links to information in the public domain, and doesn't actually broadcast anything itself, the site is perfectly within the law.

Like I said, I wouldn't take that as absolute.

As for how it works (and again I make no guarantee to the accuracy of this!) it goes something like this. The programs you download in the software section are Peer-2-Peer programs. They effectively create a network of people watching the same channel. Whilst watching a channel you are receiving the video from the other users on the same channel, and also sending the video onto others. There is more detailed info here:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peer-to-peer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_sh...reams_over_P2P

The clever people behind FSi are pointing you in the right direction to a) download the software you need and b) find the right channel for the game you want to watch. You could find all the software/information yourself, but it would take a lot of web-crawling/translation/headaches to do so. In that sense they offer a free service that provides publicly available information in an easy to use, convenient form.

Hope this helps.

#4 01-08-2007, 08:09 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hezkyden

Can anyone help me to sort out the legality of watching p2p football. I understand the arguments regarding the 'morality' of football media operations pricing fans out of the market and deserving everything they get in terms of being ripped off, but what is the actual legal situation, if I live in a EU country. Also, without being too technical, how does FSi 'work'?

I'm sure you will get a more thorough answer from the FSI crew but, FSI does not stream anything, it provides ONLY links to where to find the streams of which you can avail yourself if you'd like.

**mad-dog** · #5 01-08-2007, 08:28 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by grasshopper

I'm sure you will get a more thorough answer from the FSI crew but, FSI does not stream anything, it provides ONLY links to where to find the streams of which you can avail yourself if you'd like.

yes just as dr_jae says

**radicaljack72** · #6 01-08-2007, 09:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dr_Jae

This is my understanding. Please don't take this as gospel, or legally binding, it's just my humble interpretation.

The rights to show live football in the UK are owned by Sky and Setanta. However this only covers broadcast rights for channels specifically and solely intended for the UK market.

The channels that are available on the Peer-2-Peer programs that this site provides links for have the rights to broadcast live premiership football in their own countries. They make their channels available over the internet and this means they are available in the UK.

It's the equivalent of taking a portable sattelite dish to France, plugging in your sky box and watching the footie in your caravan. It's not intended for the French market (French channels have the broadcast rights in France), but it is available there. There is nothing illegal about watching a foreign TV channel that happens to be available to you, even if it isn't intended for the area you are in. Because FSi only provides links to information in the public domain, and doesn't actually broadcast anything itself, the site is perfectly within the law.

Like I said, I wouldn't take that as absolute.

As for how it works (and again I make no guarantee to the accuracy of this!) it goes something like this. The programs you download in the software section are Peer-2-Peer programs. They effectively create a network of people watching the same channel. Whilst watching a channel you are receiving the video from the other users on the same channel, and also sending the video onto others. There is more detailed info here:-

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peer-to-peer
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File_sh...reams_over_P2P

The clever people behind FSi are pointing you in the right direction to a) download the software you need and b) find the right channel for the game you want to watch. You could find all the software/information yourself, but it would take a lot of web-crawling/translation/headaches to do so. In that sense they offer a free service that provides publicly available information in an easy to use, convenient form.

Hope this helps.

Yeah.

What he said.

**hezkyden** · #7 01-08-2007, 11:32 PM

Many thanks, Dr Jae, for the information.

**stuben1980** · #8 01-08-2007, 11:59 PM

well guys lets be honest evan if it was illegal we`d still watch footy online if its free. who gives a shit if we got caught doing so [they should be more interested in catching the sicko`s crawling the net than worrying about a few good everyday folk watching 22players kicking a bag of wind about getting paid millions of pounds for doing so .... let the games begin

#9 19-08-2007, 12:24 PM

could you tell me how to work out the pstream one its all obviouly in japanese not sure where to go once downloaded and does this damage computer

**pepsisi** · #10 19-08-2007, 01:19 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by michael devenish

could you tell me how to work out the pstream one its all obviouly in japanese not sure where to go once downloaded and does this damage computer

Just click on the highlighted boxes when asked, it'll load it all for you. Top boxes left hand side have the channels.

**GaryD** · #11 20-08-2007, 11:18 AM

I know for a fact pubs can get into alot of trouble for showing live games using foreign satellite equipment. A pub near me has the equipment to show games live on the big screen at 3 on a saturday but he has stopped showing them cause he can get done for doing so.

**julioarca** · #12 20-08-2007, 12:44 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GaryD

I know for a fact pubs can get into alot of trouble for showing live games using foreign satellite equipment. A pub near me has the equipment to show games live on the big screen at 3 on a saturday but he has stopped showing them cause he can get done for doing so.

That helps a lot, cheers

**Dr_Jae** · #13 20-08-2007, 01:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by GaryD

I know for a fact pubs can get into alot of trouble for showing live games using foreign satellite equipment. A pub near me has the equipment to show games live on the big screen at 3 on a saturday but he has stopped showing them cause he can get done for doing so.

There's a big difference between watching something in your own home, and showing something in public with the intention of drawing people into your business.

If he was showing DVDs in there on a big screen he could get done, but you wouldn't doubt the legality of sitting down to watch one at home.