Visit Pluto.tv on a computer or mobile device and you'll see an array of channels that range from essential to entertaining to bizarre. Surfing, skating, and kickboxing each have their own channel. So do Oprah Winfrey, GoPro (GPRO) and CNET. There's a channel devoted to kung-fu movies, and one for hockey fights, and one for pranks, and another for "AnimaLOLZ." There are music channels (each is just a looping feed of music videos from YouTube) devoted to artists like Drake, Kanye West and Rihanna.

These channels are on 24/7, totally free—no subscription or even log-in required. And Pluto launched on the new Apple TV this month. The service says it has 2 million monthly active users in total across all devices, though the name and product is still under the radar. Think of Pluto as "a really cool TV dial that goes wherever you are," says executive chairman Ken Parks, a former Spotify executive. "All you need is an Internet connection."

Television channels, distributed "over the top," for free, on any Internet-connected device— this might sound familiar. Aereo, an over-the-top service that had scored a big investment from IAC/InterActive (IAC), shut down in 2014 after the Supreme Court ruled it was illegally stealing content from television networks. (As Fortune noted, the decision seemed to suggest that, "you can steal something that is given away for free, so long as you use a computer rather than a metal rod.")

Parks says Pluto won't face those issues because it is fully licensed, through direct agreements with each of its content partners. "We obviously watched [Aereo] with some interest. Ours from day one has been a kosher service, we've been licensed."

Los Angeles-based Pluto first launched in March 2014, as a curator only of content available from open APIs, like Vimeo or YouTube. Now that it has shifted to a licensed model, it has more than 100 partners, including NASA TV, Sky News, Complex Media, and even NBC. It might seem strange that a network like NBC would hand content to Pluto, a platform whose entire purpose is to offer an alternative to traditional television, but Parks says, "We're very much partnering with the content community, not trying to disrupt them." (Then again, when pressed, he acknowledges that Pluto's main competitors are probably traditional TV networks, which, he jokes, "a lot of people have forgotten about, but which still does exist.")

Why would broadcasters want to partner with Pluto? For data, of course. Pluto says that from viewing patterns, it can provide audience insights and data to networks, to "make their marketing that much easier."