“The idea that broadcasts are “free” to watch once they hit the airwaves is not exactly hard law.”
Yes, it is. It’s a hard and fast rule the FCC has never wavered on, even with the rise of cable and dish services that allowed others to charge for a signal, which had the networks tearing their hair out. “We want to charge for our broadcasts, too!”
Well, you can’t, networks. The FCC has never wavered on this: the networks are renters, who hold scarce and valuable broadcast licenses, at the pleasure of the American people. And the terms of the lease state that the networks can’t charge a fee to anyone who picks up their signal with an antenna and watches their programming.
In exchange for a monopoly on a frequency and the freedom to sell ads, the courts enforce prohibitions against exhibitors charging a fee to broadcast a network signal — hence the war on sports bars charging to show NFL games. The signal itself must remain “free.”
Aereo was charging a fee to capture and rebroadcast the signal. All of this was couched in “copyright violation” language, but that’s what happened.
It matters not to the NFL whether you charge or not. If your screen is too big you can't allow other people to watch it, and you can't have more than a few people watching a small screen.
I'm not saying you are wrong about the broadcast rules in general, I'm just pointing out that the NFL has a special drug deal going on.