Telstra has revealed the addition of almost one million new mobile services in the six months to December 2011, but Sensis revenues plummeted 24 percent in 12 months.
The ‘old media’ owners of one of the web’s hottest new media properties, MySpace, say they’ve solved the problem of copyright content being reposted to a site once it has been taken down the first time. Will YouTube offer the same?
MySpace has launched the first content protection system that ensures copyright content can’t be re-loaded onto a website once it has been detected as infringing and removed. MySpace say they are the first to offer this feature to copyright owners and claim to be “the leader in copyright protection on the Internet.”
The new technology is called ‘Take Down Stay Down’ and MySpace describes it as a “ground-breaking tool to prevent users from reposting unauthorized copyrighted content”, as well as being “a comprehensive solution to identify and remove any unauthorized user-posted content in a manner that is more efficient and effective than any solution previously available to them”.
MySpace say that once infringing content has been identified, the audio is analyzed with technology called ‘Audible Magic’ to create a digital fingerprint which is used in identifying it when a user tries to upload the same content again.
This immediately makes me wonder if it will soon be adapted to prevent users from posting unauthorized copyrighted content in the first place. It’s also a sign that MySpace wants to be seen to be taking copyright seriously, as it seems to solve the problems that YouTube was facing in removing copyright content only to have it re-appear soon thereafter by another user.
“Take Down Stay Down” technology comes in three parts – audio filtering, video filtering and the “Content Take Down Too”’. Audio filtering screens audio files uploaded by users to hinder any unauthorized music uploads and is offered free to all music copyright owners.
Video filtering screens video files uploaded by users to hinder any unauthorized video uploads while the “Content Take Down Tool” is an automated tool that makes it easier and more efficient for copyright owners to request removal of any user-posted content they claim is unauthorized.
Michael Angus, EVP and General Counsel for Fox Interactive Media, said in the MySpace statement that: “We have created this new feature to solve a problem that has long frustrated copyright holders and presented technical challenges to service providers – how to prevent copyrighted content from being re-posted by the same or a different user after it has been taken down by the copyright owner. MySpace is pleased to be the first website to implement a more effective solution to this challenging problem. This is a ground-breaking and unprecedented benefit for copyright owners that re-enforces MySpace's position as the leader in copyright protection on the internet.”
So, it is the panacea and the answer to all copyright problem on websites such as MySpace, YouTube and all the rest? The ‘audio fingerprinting’ technology sounds, if you’ll excuse the pun, as though it will be tough for users to get past.
If the aim is for users to pay for songs and video clips they want to play and/or display on their MySpace pages, as they’ll no longer be able to upload content that is deemed as infringing copyright, it will work, if the songs and video clips are priced at cheap enough prices that people will gladly pay to have several pieces of favorite content featured at their site.
Few true pirates would use MySpace or even YouTube to truly get pirated content out onto the Internet. The fiddling you need to do to copy content or the low video quality experienced is easily beaten by other illegal downloads available through p2p, bittorrent and other media sharing services.
Even so, plenty of short clips that are ‘fun to share’ in a social manner are shared by YouTube, along with TV shows uploaded in 10 minute blocks. Both types of content are ones that traditional content owners want to be paid for when shown online.
If the theories of micropayments for content and the long tail come true, being able to legally share a video clip from CBS or Viacom’s library could become possible on YouTube if the user had to pay a few cents for the privilege, leading to many millions of users paying a few cents each (some will say even less, others will want to charge more).
The question is, will companies be able to generate more than enough cash flow from a small profit multiplied by the volume of sales, or will they go for a higher price?
Truly being able to control copyright on the Internet is, at present, still largely impossible. The moves from MySpace are a good first start to ensuring the latest Web 2.0 lifestyle and content sharing sites won’t have unauthorized content continually re-uploaded – at least until someone figures out a way around it.
But it does nothing to stem the flow of unauthorized content on p2p sharing networks, and until YouTube adopts it or something similar, is but a cyber slap in YouTube’s face.
The fight over copyright will rage on for some time yet. The move from MySpace is but old media showing YouTube – and Google – what old media thinks YouTube should already have done. The ball is back in YouTube’s court!
David Bass
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