## Facts

- The National Football League (NFL) produced and copyrighted televised game broadcasts, making recordings and registering them with the U.S. Copyright Office.
- PrimeTime 24 Joint Venture (PrimeTime), a satellite carrier, captured U.S. network broadcasts over the air and retransmitted them by satellite.
- PrimeTime relied on the Satellite Home Viewer Act (SHVA), 17 U.S.C. § 119, which provides a limited statutory license for satellite retransmissions to certain “unserved” U.S. households lacking adequate over-the-air reception.
- PrimeTime also retransmitted NFL game broadcasts to subscribers located in Canada without obtaining the NFL’s authorization.
- The transmission chain involved signal capture and uplink from U.S. facilities to a satellite, with downlink and viewing by customers in Canada.
- The NFL demanded that PrimeTime stop the Canadian transmissions; PrimeTime asserted that transmissions to Canadian recipients did not infringe U.S. copyrights and that its Canadian service complied with Canadian law.
- The district court granted summary judgment to the NFL and issued a permanent injunction barring PrimeTime from transmitting NFL games to Canada.

## Issues

1. Whether satellite retransmissions initiated in the United States but received by viewers in Canada constitute an infringing “public performance” under the U.S. Copyright Act.
2. Whether the SHVA statutory license in 17 U.S.C. § 119 authorizes or shields retransmissions of network programming to subscribers outside the United States.

## Decision

- The Second Circuit affirmed the grant of summary judgment for the NFL.
- The court held that PrimeTime’s transmissions to Canadian subscribers infringed the NFL’s U.S. copyrights because the relevant “public performance” occurred in the United States where the transmission was initiated (including the uplink).
- The court held that 17 U.S.C. § 119 does not extend to Canada and does not authorize retransmissions to foreign subscribers.
- The permanent injunction prohibiting PrimeTime’s retransmissions of NFL games to Canada was upheld.

## Legal Principles

- The exclusive right “to perform the copyrighted work publicly” includes transmitting a performance “to the public” by any device or process. 17 U.S.C. §§ 101, 106(4).
- For cross-border satellite transmissions, the locus of an infringing public performance may be determined by where the transmission is initiated (place of origin), not solely by the location of the receiving audience.
- The SHVA’s compulsory license is geographically and textually limited to retransmissions to qualifying “unserved households” within the United States; it provides no authorization for foreign retransmissions.
- Compliance with foreign law and the foreign location of viewers do not defeat liability when the infringing act (the transmission’s initiation) occurs within U.S. territory.

## Conclusion

The Second Circuit concluded that a satellite carrier that initiates retransmissions of copyrighted U.S. broadcasts from within the United States commits a domestic public performance even when the audience is abroad, and it held that the SHVA statutory license does not permit retransmissions to foreign subscribers, justifying injunctive relief barring transmissions to Canada.


Nat’l Football League v. PrimeTime 24 Joint Venture, 211 F.3d 10 (2d Cir. 2000)