In fact, we're in the Wild West stage of the content economy.
Without a system to give content creators and publishers visibility into where and how their assets are re-used, there can be no effective accountability and copyright infringement proliferates.
While much of the focus has been on copyrighted video, text content remains the core navigation and advertising currency of the Web, powering billions of dollars in contextually served advertising. "Sploggers"--essentially plagiarists--duplicate text content to increase keyword density and optimize their sites on search engines to boost ad dollars. Rightful content owners experience a lower ranking in search engines, fewer visitors and less revenue.
Images are the eye candy of the Web, yet the explosion of image search sites translates into millions of photos being re-used without permission every month. Photographers lack the tools to understand which sites are publishing their work without permission or to calculate the resulting revenue impact.
As a result, publishers of all sizes are either holding back much of their content or releasing it under tight restrictions. And who can blame them?
Media companies cannot compete when they must bear all costs of production while others profit from it. Photographers are smart to be cautious when unauthorized use is just a right-click away. Think of the advertising and transaction revenue opportunities if publishers were able to push their content out as far as the Internet would take it. Add to this the consumer benefit of a higher-quality selection of content without silos, and then we are much closer to fulfilling the Internet's original promise.
Unleashing the broad syndication and licensing frameworks necessary to achieve a vibrant content economy may present a challenge in terms of complexity and scale; however, the industry must provide all publishers with solutions that fully exploit the Internet's reach. Filing suit for every copyright infringement is not the answer, nor are point-to-point solutions that force publishers to play whack-a-mole with every site that lets people upload content.
June 1 marks the eighth anniversary of Napster's launch. Since then, we've seen terrific growth in the online-content economy. The next eight years can be even more amazing, but only if publishers of all sizes have visibility into how and where their content is being used and flexibility to pursue new business opportunities that leverage the distributed syndication potential of the Internet.
Biography
Jim Brock is the CEO and co-founder of
For to long content providers have been exploiting consumers with inflated prices and misleading advertising. For instance how many times have you bought a music cd based on the song you heard on the radio or TV? Only to find that the album sounds nothing like the single and then the cd just sits in your collection unloved and you paid $20 or $30 for a few songs.
The same goes for DVD's. Buy a new movie only to find months later that there is a special collectors two disc edition released that you will have to buy again.
You may think that this is just part of business but I think you will find a lot of people are sick and tired of this content exploitation.
These are NOT (as, continually, FALSELY suggested) traditional "copyright" powers. In fact, MOST of what so-called "content creators" (actually, primarily, "content" re-packagers) are NOW, actually, calling for... are entirely NEW POWERS (to control consumers, and forcibly extract revenue). And, this level of after-sale control was, previously, actually ILLEGAL under numerous traditional "Fair-Use" judgments.
In short, this is an attack against the most fundamental RIGHT of private property-ownership. When someone pays for a "traditional" individual-copy of an "Intellectual Property"... they can sell it, give it away, quote it, loan it to someone, give it to a Library, or, personally, "use" it as many times, or in as many ways, as they wish... without being continually tracked, controlled, or billed, for its continued-use. These personal-rights HAVE been, rather painfully, legally-established over centuries.
Furthermore, mere "unauthorized" use of such "copyrighted material" IS NOT automatically, necessarily, a form of "copyright infringement". Most often, it CANNOT, in any way, be demonstrated to, actually, decrease the value of the original "property" (the foundation of "copyright" law, which is based upon "tort" law). And, simply, "indexing" it (much like "educational institutions", and "public libraries", have done for hundreds of years", by the way) DOES NOT harm the value of the "property", either.
However, now, "content" sellers are DEMANDING absolutely-obscene levels of control, forever. The level of control that they are demanding has, in actuality, NEVER existed before. It is ABSOLUTELY-ASININE. And, in fact, it is demonstrably injurious to both individual-rights, and, thereby, society as a whole. This is doubly insulting when you realize that the "industries" that are actually making the biggest SQUAWK... are, in fact, some of the most profitable businesses in the world (...and that includes, the "illegal drug trade").
In short... if the BILLIONS of DOLLARS in PROFITS that are made, by the, current, system... just arent enough. Dont expect me to believe that, "art", "literature", and "music", themselves, will cease to be made. If the, current, "motion picture", "television", "recording", and "publishing" industries, that exist today, are THAT STUPID... they deserve to go out of business. And, they should stop throwing TANTRUMS just because they cant have, even, MORE...
This was possible in WMP 6.1 with jscript and a GUID that was turned on, and really hasn't been there since.
The privacy pressures on the internet created a push to remove the guid from windows media player, which made unduplicated content more difficult to measure, and the various security lead to the pressures on script events. I think Hollywood had an exaggerated influence as well, focusing DRM on sale and rental models since that worked offline, completely ignoring Ad supported models found online. I still feel my blood pressure rising when I recall conversations I had with ITunes begging them for anonymous audits.
So this lack in WMP has lead to the emergence of flash video, where multiple vendors can agree to share security and authors can see what happens to their content. It remains to be seen how Silverlight will affect it.
Good luck with Attributor. Starting Lightningcast was brutal back in 99, and the technology has only gotten more diverse since then.
Oh and to the teeming masses that will no doubt say "Content wants to be free"; let me help: a frictionless distribution system exposes the underlying unit price economics, it doesn't put bread in a video producer's mouth. The youtube world may be expanding what is meant by fair use, but at the end of the day, it won't replace the team of writers, directors and everyone else that make the content we all enjoy.
If their content is worthless, that's what they will earn. Just like the CD example. The hit is worth 99 cents. The rest of the CD another 99 cents.
Content creators and perhaps more importantly Corporate Hollywood types need to realize that nobody is paying extra for digital ink than the real thing. Content is now like actors. A dime a dozen at the starving stage. Only the stand out and lucky few get rich.
Maybe they expect too much?
Sure, any creator -- content originator -- wants something for his/her effort, hopefully money and fame, too. Ask any writer, photographer, whatever, and you will surely find they've been ripped off by editors and publishers. It's not uncommon to have to chase a book publisher for your royalties.
'In the day', a freelance writer could sell 'first serial rights' to an article and 'secondary rights' in multiple markets. Then the suits discovered buying 'all rights' made them a greater profit. The content providers/owners became the first thieves of intellectual property.
All the major book publishiong houses now are owned by the five media congolmerates.
There's hardly an editor worthy of the name; better to call themselves operators of the sausage machine, controlled by their masters: lawyers, accountants and a CEO who prefers not to read as even magazines make his lips hurt.
Other lurks now abound on the wonderful world of the internet. For instance, The International Library of Photography, a vanity publisher in disguise, with something like 15 separate websites. They also operate a poetry scam. In most cases, it is in the guise of contests. Oh yes, and everyone wins. The amateurs who fall into the trap end up paying premium rates for trash publishing. Which typically takes 2-3 years for the coffee table book to appear. Which it isn't.
And it turns out one might never even know of this sleaze company. Some users of betterphoto.com, a legitimate outfit, have had photos filched from their galleries by ILP/picture.com and first they know of it, is unsolicited email telling them their photo won, was selected for the next "Endless Journey".
It took about 3 years of multiple complaints by many people, to the Better Business Bureau, to get ILP downgraded. The BBB is only interested in incoming business fees, until the stink gets too bad.
Concurrent, there have been lots of complaints to the Maryland Attory General about this scam outfit. But it's still going strong and will continue to do so. My take is, likely a money laundering front.
- I'd like to see a professional content creator...
- by ahickey May 9, 2007 3:04 AM PDT
- I'd like to see a professional content creator comment they are happy to not maximize their earnings from their work.
- Like this Reply to this comment
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(7 Comments)To me most of the comments here have been from people who gain from access to ?free? content, so very one sided. They have nothing to lose from the free access and everything to gain.
If I spent time and money building a bicycle business I know I wouldn?t be happy if people came into my shop and took my stock and just gave it away. To me this is exactly the same as illegally using content from the web. Why would I buy a bicycle if I can get it for free? My business would be destroyed.
On the other hand if I am producing content for fun then I wouldn?t mind it being accessed and shared.
We all want top quality content but it sounds like a lot of people aren?t willing to pay for it. Now that?s a double standard. How about if your employer decided that your work was worth nothing and stopped paying you. I bet you would fight that cause, but it is OK not to pay other people for their hard work just because it is creative work, or published on the internet.
For me to have quality content requires a big investment of time and money.
How many 10 minute people falling down videos can you watch compared to the Hollywood movies. I know I would prefer the professionally produced work that cost 100s of millions over a bunch of short movie made by people with their camcorders.