The suit from the TV networks is a curious one. While the TV networks and movie studios are struggling with what to do regarding the increasing power of the internet for real entertainment. In this case they decided to sue to defend their valuable intellectual property. Unlike past suits, SonicBlue will likely have the cash to fight back. It is hard to say with PVRs (recording devices like TiVo and ReplayTV) on the market for years now, that a more advanced fast forward wasn’t the next logical step in development. And since when did TV viewers sign a contract to agree to watch commercials? If you record an event on your Replay or TiVo and hit fast forward you are skipping the commercials which is the same effect that the networks are upset about. As for the threat of e-mailing or even FTPing (file transfer protocol) entire TV shows through a dialup or DSL Internet connection – good luck.

Even the Gnutella network, which has replaced Napster as the way to swap free music on the net, struggles with painfully slow download speeds. The highly compressed video files on a PVR is far harder to send over the internet. As for the video being a "perfect digital copy" either the network’s lawyers need a new prescription for their glasses or they didn’t actually watch a ReplayTV recording before they filed suit. While the technology is incredibly convenient, it is far from a "perfect" video source. In fact it looks nearly unwatchable on all but the high quality recording setting.