Thank you for the answer. One of the problems, from my familiarity with the decisors, is that reasoning alone won’t be enough and you need a source, and a reality like this did not exist in the time of the Sages. I thought maybe to bring as a source the Talmud in Shabbat 122, where Rabban Gamliel went down on a ramp that a non-Jew made on the Sabbath, since the non-Jew made the ramp for his own need. Also, just to diversify and surprise, the Shulchan Arukh in Choshen Mishpat 359, that it is permitted to take a splinter from a fence since this is a negligible matter that has no real effect, and the Jerusalem Talmud prohibits it only out of concern that perhaps more people will take and in the end the fence will disappear. I’d be glad to hear your opinion.

Greetings.
I didn’t understand the question. Are you asking me for a source for this permission? That’s the subject of the article.
Taking something that causes no loss is not a good source. There the claim is that if there is no loss, then this is not theft. But here our discussion is not about the parameters of theft.
There is, of course, the reasoning of the Chayei Adam that the prohibition of benefiting from Sabbath labor applies only if there is an object from which one derives benefit.
Obviously, an act done for the doer’s own sake does not carry this prohibition.
I can think about a concrete question if you have one.

I agree, obviously it’s obvious. The problem is that “obvious” isn’t enough, and you need the Noda B’Yehuda to say that it’s obvious 😣
Is there a chance I could attach the article and you’d comment on it? It isn’t long (1500 words).

As a rule, the proportion seems problematic. Out of the five pages, the overwhelming majority is a summary of known facts, and the novelty is found in one paragraph and in the example of waiting the amount of time it would take to do it. You should shorten the summary and background and expand the novel point.
Much success.

Thank you very much!

A. Regarding a lamp on the Sabbath, I had indeed planned to bring that Talmudic passage and forgot (even though I sent it to you earlier as reasoning to be lenient); I’ll add it to the article.

B. Regarding benefit from an object produced by an action: it seems obvious to me that producing news is considered creating a new thing, and is not comparable to transferring from one domain to another (all the more so since he is also not lenient regarding Torah-level prohibitions).

C. Regarding the operators, captives among the gentiles and so on — I don’t really understand how that is relevant to our issue. There is room to discuss that issue when a secular Jew violated the Sabbath without specification, and then one discusses whether he is inadvertent, deliberate, etc. But when the reasoning to prohibit broadcasting on the Sabbath is because you are causing him to violate the Sabbath or he is benefiting from your Sabbath violation, I don’t really see what practical difference his status makes.

D. Regarding the idea that one may use labor if it could also be done without Sabbath violation: that seems more realistic in international soccer matches that are also broadcast on foreign television stations, and less so in news or soccer matches broadcast in Israel (and as an extension of the side of international soccer matches, there is room to discuss whether it is permitted to listen to the Hebrew broadcast of that same game).

P.S. What do you think of the reasoning brought in the name of the Chazon Ish, that one should prohibit this because of desecration of God’s name?

And again, thank you very much and Sabbath peace.

If a captive among the gentiles is considered coerced, then there is room to permit an act done under coercion and not inadvertently.
Desecration of God’s name seems a bit questionable to me in this context. Is every benefit from a transgression considered desecration of God’s name?

A. Even if they are considered, in my view, coerced people (without arguing about that claim, seemingly it is no worse than a Jew taken captive among the gentiles), in any case it sounds strange to me to say that it is permitted to cause them to perform activities forbidden on the Sabbath.

B. I don’t know; they mention it in the context of using electricity generated on the Sabbath.

P.S. I just read your article in Asif (and the expansion on the site, column 344) about the categorical imperative in Jewish law. Correct me if I’m wrong: based on that same principle, one could add in the column you wrote not long ago (about doing activities that involve public Sabbath desecration, like railway work, etc.) that those who use a generator on the Sabbath are, in a certain sense, committing a transgression, since they hold that those who use electricity on the Sabbath are violating a prohibition, and yet they would admit (if they gave you some thought) that a situation in which the whole country runs on generators is impossible, so their stringency in Jewish law is based on everyone else being mistaken.

This is a long discussion, and my view on the matter is that their transgressions are not transgressions, and therefore there is no prohibition against causing them to stumble. But it’s not worth your getting into that, because that itself is a controversial claim. In any case, even without my reasoning, in the case of benefit from Sabbath labor there is room to distinguish between inadvertence and coercion.

As for using a generator, in my opinion this is unrelated to the categorical imperative. A person is permitted, and it is even desirable, to be stringent with himself. Only when his stringency is based on the fact that others do not follow it is there a problem. That is not the case here, since my use of a generator does not depend on others using electricity. True, it is not possible for everyone to use a generator, but my use does not depend on theirs. Whoever can, should use one.

Thank you very much. Just one last thing (without making a vow): first, I’d be glad if you would comment on the attached passage (I added it as a footnote at the end of the article). Second, in your understanding would there be a practical halakhic difference between an act that is prohibited because of the categorical imperative and an act prohibited, for example, because of benefit from Sabbath labor?

Although, as stated in the introduction, this article deals only with the laws of the Sabbath, it is appropriate to mention that there is reason to prohibit using news broadcasts aired on the Sabbath, based on Rabbi Michael Abraham’s article (Tzohar, 31). The gist of his claim is that although when a person performs a private act his deed does not affect the conduct of society as a whole (as in our case, where one viewing more or less makes no difference), nevertheless when examining a halakhic/moral issue one must examine it in a general context: whether that person would want other people to act as he does.
For that reason, in the present case, since in an ideal situation in which all viewers keep the Sabbath, that viewer would not want everyone else to watch Sabbath news on Saturday night (because that would cause the news company to violate the Sabbath), even when there are viewers who violate the Sabbath and the news company therefore violates the Sabbath in any case, it would still be forbidden to watch the broadcast on Saturday night.

It seems perfectly fine to me.
I’m not sure there is any practical difference. One might have thought the question is whether someone who acted this way desecrated the Sabbath or committed some other transgression, and there would be a practical difference as to whether he is considered an apostate (because one who is an apostate with respect to the Sabbath is like an apostate with respect to the entire Torah). But simply speaking, the categorical imperative is an interpretive tool for explaining the laws of the Sabbath, not a law of a different type. In essence, the categorical imperative explains why there is a prohibition of benefit from Sabbath labor here, so there are not really two options here to compare.