For you to say it's not a pirate box means you don't think anyone would lose money if the RTV 4000 were to suddenly appear in everyone's home.

Well, its legal status isn't for me to determine. That's up to the lawyers and the judges.

Keep in mind that the revenue problem you cite (the commercial skipping) is a different issue than the piracy one (copying programs to other users on a broadband connection). The copying of the shows is the thing that could be called piracy, yet that's not the thing that gives them revenue troubles.

Video tape recorders were supposed to be a huge problem when they came out. You could skip commercials with VCR's for example. You could even use the Pause button to edit out commercials, then copy the edited tape for a friend.

Guess what? The video tape market has MADE money for the networks rather than cost them money. Plenty of popular television shows are being sold on video tape now. And tape trading has allowed the networks to get people hooked on serialized programs with long-running story threads like Buffy (if you miss an episode, you can borrow your friend's tape of the missed episode). I'm sure there are other benefits that I'm not listing (anyone?).

I don't see the Replay 4000 being any different than this. The only difference is it makes the distribution and commercial-skipping easier.

What the networks should be doing, instead of suing Replay, is to investigate business models that will allow them to offer content directly to Replay subscribers over the broadband link. Here they are complaining about how satellite dishes are robbing them of their over-the-air distribution channels, and here comes a piece of hardware that will allow them to send content to the homes directly again. All they'd need to do is play nice and work with SonicBlue instead of against them. They are so short-sighted.