Jenny Levine: Copyright & Intellectual Property

The Death of Digital Rights Management?

“ 'It’s very difficult to sell [digital-rights] technology to companies that are no longer trying to sell content,' observes Schreiber. In a way, it’s a classic chicken-and-egg question: is the digital rights management industry hampered by a failing market, or are e-books floundering for want of better digital-rights technology?" [at Technology Review, via Tomalak's Realm]

How about both are hindered by usability problems and a focus that is decidedly not on the consumer?

"Analysts say the content protection companies left standing, including Alchemedia and SealedMedia, have technologies that may break the usability barrier, finally enabling the serious online sales providers envision. “There are some extremely bright people working in this space who will be able to figure out what the consumer is willing to put up with,” says Letts. Alchemedia’s “Mirage” system, for example, does away with the requirement for special viewer software by making sure the decrypted form of a protected file appears only on-screen, never in random-access memory, where a computer looks for any data it’s trying to print or copy. That way, publishers can put content out in a format compatible with a regular Web browser, and “the fear about the save and copy buttons is neutralized. We don’t have to block those doors because the data in [memory] is still encrypted,” says Schreiber."

"SealedMedia’s system, on the other hand, does require a special two-megabyte browser plug-in, but it stores decryption keys on a central Internet-accessible server, meaning that if you have the right password, you can access content from whatever machine you happen to be using. SealedMedia’s viewer can also handle audio and video content. 'SealedMedia is providing us for the first time with a robust, convenient way to deliver multimedia e-books,' says ipicturebooks’ Preiss."

Here again, I hope they're thinking of more than just B2C sales (business-to-consumer) and that these technologies will work with items circulated by libraries. See why we need to be in on the debate and the development cycle?

That's What I Want

"No single service has a catalog of music from all of the major record labels. Until there is DRM standardization and a sea change in industry attitudes, users will have to patronize more than one service to get an unabridged selection of artists. That means consumers are asked to pay for a service that might carry only half of their favorite artists, or to pay several monthly bills just to have access to the musicians they like. Not surprisingly, many users are unwilling." [at New Architect, via Tomalak's Realm]

This article is an excellent primer explaining why the online music services are failing, covering everything from Digital Rights Management (DRM) to usability issues.

"According to Pew, in the last year, of the users who were asked to pay for something that used to be free online, 50 percent found free online alternatives. Thirty six percent stopped getting the service online, and only 12 percent paid for it. Subscription service providers need more. They must offer a unique value proposition to keep their audiences from walking out."

What amazes me is how many people take advantage of free online services but then forget about libraries. Granted we're not loaning out digital music yet, but I don't think we do a good enough job of marketing our computers, our video & DVD collections, our audiobooks, our CDs, and everything else you can get for free at your local library. Not to mention the free expertise.

Of course, that's nothing new and we say that every year, but now we have to figure out that digital service and delivery part, otherwise known as "shifting." Similar to the concerns raised in this article, we need to work closely with our vendors to make sure our services based on their products don't have that usability barrier that so many of our online catalogs currently have.

One Out of Four Americans Have Downloaded MP3s, Says New Study [at MusicDish]

"Fifty million people, or almost one-quarter (23%) of the American population aged 12 and over, have downloaded a music or mp3 file from of the Net, say findings from a new study examining the influence and effects of online music distribution around the world. By comparison, Napster claimed to have around 40 million users in its heyday, says research firm Ipsos-Reid which conducted the study last November and December. Similar proportions of Americans report having listened to Internet radio (27%) and streamed audio (21%), and over one-third (37%) indicate they have listened to a pre-recorded music CD that was playing in the CD-ROM drive of their PC, Ipsos-Reid found in Tempo: Keeping Pace with Online Music Distribution."

In other words, 50 million Americans realize how inane the record companies are, are tired of being screwed over, and are going elsewhere to get the services they want.

"The firm went on that young Americans continue to lead this Internet music phenomenon, as approximately two-fifths of 12-24-year-olds have downloaded music or MP3 files off of the Internet (44% of 12-17 year-olds, and 42% in the 18-24 age group)."

No surprise there. Think of all that disposable income the record companies are losing....

"Among adults aged 25-34, one-third (35%) have also downloaded music, demonstrating that older age groups are beginning to dabble in the new digital music arena as well. Not only are these individuals trying out music downloading capabilities, they are returning for more, says Ipsos-Reid. Three-fifths of (59%) of Americans who have downloaded a music or MP3 file in the past indicated that they are somewhat, very, or extremely likely to download again in the next 30 days."

Hello, Mr. Record Company, this is your wake-up call.

DMCA Protection at U.S. Border

"U.S. Customs agents have halted shipments from an Asian video game retailer because of concerns over copyright infractions." [at Wired News]

Here's more on yesterday's Kuro5hin story about the Sega serial cable being stopped by U.S. customs agents. I'm still perturbed that no one is asking the bigger questions of how Customs knows what to block from entering the country, how they know (and track) which businesses are selling those items, how they come up with their lists of what is illegal under the DMCA, and who is creating those lists. Hello, bigger story here, folks!

Listened to on the way to work today: the Violent Femmes
Listened to on the way to work yesterday: Herb Alpert

My name is Jenny, and I am a music junkie. Not as much anymore because I got tired of having to buy a whole CD for one song, but I listen to a lot of Internet radio these days. I have more than 1,000 CDs (I stopped counting several years ago), and I should be the ideal customer for the record companies. My music tastes are all over the map, and I like hearing new songs and genres. It's just that now, I do this via the Internet instead of in a store. The overwhelming majority of CDs in my collection were purchased legally, with a small percentage of them being freebies from when I worked at a radio station and a record store oh so many years ago.

And I'm a second-generation music junkie. I learned it from my Dad, including playing my music loud, and I'm already passing that love along to my children. :-) My brother periodically sells CDs he hasn't listened to in a while, but I've kept all of mine since my first one in 1987 because my music tastes have mood swings. One day I have to listen to classical, the next jazz, the next 80s music, the next hip hop, and so on and so on and so on. It's also a catalog of my life. I can remember where I was and what I was feeling when I first became obsessed by this particular artist or that particular song.

I still haven't gotten around to writing about why I don't like radio (not Radio) anymore, but today I thought I should go back and listen to all of my CDs, one-by-one, in alphabetical order. (Because I'm a librarian so of course they're organized.) I wonder when I would finish?

The record companies have alienated me and pretty much lost my business. When satellite radio becomes affordable and usable, I'll give it a shot. Until then, I'll be living in the past.

DMCA Declares Serial Cables Illegal? "I've recently had an interesting run-in with the DMCA... apparently, US Customs has rejected entry of a PC<->Sega Dreamcast serial cable into the US, supposedly due to copyright violations. This cable was to be used for Dreamcast programming for the Real-Time Systems class offered at my university. This seems to be a clear case of the DMCA abridging a perfectly valid educational use of a perfectly legal piece of hardware. I'll be keeping the most recent version of my story here; otherwise see below for what I currently know." [kuro5hin.org]

Yet another instance of the over-reaching effect of the DMCA. What I want to know is how U.S. Customs knew to stop this particular serial cable from entering the country. Is there a master list somewhere of items that are considered to violate the DMCA? And if so, who decides what's on it? I want to see the list, but given John Ashcroft's order to deny FOIA requests, I doubt we ever will.

Entertainment Industry's Copyright Right Puts Consumers in Cross Hairs "The studios and TV networks are also whining about the feature that lets users fast-forward through commercials or skip them entirely. The entertainment companies are understandably worried about this trend, but so what? My employer would like you to read the paper all the way through and at least glance at every advertisement, but the fact that you don't have to is one of the reader-friendly pieces of the transaction." [Dan Gillmor's eJournal]

Hear, hear! More from Dan about the latest lawsuits against Tivo and SonicBlue (the folks that make ReplayTVs). It's a great summation of how ludicrous these lawsuits are, so it's a good printout for the uninitiated. Here's why it will matter to them (and you and me):

"Why should you care if you can't make a copy of a CD to play in your car? Because the industry's attack is much wider. Your rights are intertwined with scholarship, with the public commons of knowledge that the owners of information want to close off. The damage will be far-reaching if they succeed."

Besides the fair use, First Amendment, and criminal prosecution issues surrounding all of this, there is one other thing libraries can take away from this whole debacle, and that is the lesson of not placing barriers in the way of what your users want. Work with them, not against them. It will only alienate your users, and they won't come back.

Copy-protected CDs Slide into Stores "Israeli security company Midbar said Tuesday that it has released more than 10 million copy-protected CDs in the United States and Europe, highlighting the company's ongoing endeavor to combat digital piracy. " [at News.com]

And tick off the record companies' customers. There hasn't been much I've wanted to buy lately, now even more so. Watch those CDs you're buying for your libraries, as you'll have to look closely for the identifying labels.

I talk about this in my Information Shifting presentation, but here's why you need to pay attention to digital audio titles, which right now means MP3s. You may have seen libraries that are integrating bib records for eBooks into their online catalogs (usually for netLibrary). Maybe you're even one of those libraries. All a patron has to do is search the catalog, view a record, and click on the link to the online version, all without leaving their PC.

So take that scenario one step further. Let's say I'm a patron that wants to borrow "Pomp and Circumstance" for a party for my new graduate. What if I can go to your catalog, search for it, click the link, and download it for a two-week loan period, all without leaving my PC. Now I don't have to come in to pick up a whole CD (that you hopefully have); I can just download the one song that I wanted.

Of course, that's if your library has access to digital files such as eBooks and MP3 audiobooks in order to circulate them. Don't ever forget that the bigcos don't want you to have that access.

Why This Link Patent Case Is Weak "It may be a long time before British Telecom knows whether it lucked out or lost big in the legal sweepstakes. But even if it wins its court battle, experts said the British telephone company has already lost the war." [via Scripting News]

This article pretty sums up my chat session with Bruce this morning about how crazy BT is to even bring this up, letting along go to court with it. These guys are de-shifting into the ice age.

All Hail Creative Commons "In a boon to the arts and the software industry, Creative Commons will make available flexible, customizable intellectual-property licenses that artists, writers, programmers and others can obtain free of charge to legally define what constitutes acceptable uses of their work." [via Tomalak's Realm]

Lawrence Lessig puts his money where his mouth is. I'd like to post the whole article here, but that would be a violation of copyright. There are a lot of positive, good concepts in Lessig's plan, but here's the crux of the problem:

"He points out, for example, that when Congress first enacted copyright law in 1790, the protection extended for a term of 14 years, which could be renewed for another 14 years if the author was still alive. Congress has since increased that term to the life of the author plus 70 years. Given current life expectancies, that means a corporation can now bank on preventing a piece of intellectual property produced by a 30-year-old today from falling into the public domain for more than a century."

More power to Mr. Lessig.

Hollywood's Latest Attack on Customers "If Hollywood and the big television networks had controlled Congress 25 years ago the way they do today, you wouldn't have a fast-forward button on your video-cassette recorder. You wouldn't be allowed to tape a program to watch later. You would be allowed to view TV only the way they chose. Period." [Dan Gillmor's eJournal]

Studios Assail ReplayTV Technology "The suit filed by MGM, Fox, Universal Studios and Orion Pictures goes furthest, arguing that it's illegal to let consumers record and store shows based on the genre, actors or other words in the program description. This claim threatens not just the ReplayTV devices, some copyright experts say, but all recorders like it."

"Unlike VCRs, which require users to record shows by time slot or unique number, PVRs record based on a show's name or program description. Users don't need to know when "Friends" is on. They just need to know the name or a leading actor. Once a program is found, the device can be set to capture it whenever it's on the air."

" 'If a ReplayTV customer can simply type 'The X-Files' or 'James Bond' and have every episode of 'The X-Files' and every James Bond film recorded in perfect digital form and organized, compiled and stored on the hard drive of his or her ReplayTV 4000 device, it will cause substantial harm to the market for prerecorded DVD, videocassette and other copies of those episodes and films,' the lawsuit states."

"The fundamental question posed by the MGM suit is whether the financial effect on the studios trumped consumers' ability to copy programs for personal use, said Douglas Wood, a New York attorney who specializes in intellectual-property and advertising law. If MGM wins on that point, he said, 'We'd be left with plain old VCRs.' "

"He's not betting on the studios, though, given the Supreme Court's 1984 ruling that consumers could legally record programs for the sake of watching them later. 'What difference does it make how I do it?' Wood said. 'The dilemma is, the technology is turning the business model upside down. But that doesn't mean it's copyright infringement.' " (emphasis is mine) [via bOing bOing]

I'm quoting liberally from this article because the LA Times link will be gone in a few days. This lawsuit just reeks of desperation. Let's file lawsuit after lawsuit and hope one of them sticks. Yeah, like that worked with Napster and file trading. It's like the bully on the playground who goes tattling on someone that outsmarts him, hoping that someone else will take care of the problem because he can't. I'm all for copyright, but you can't stifle progress just to keep making a buck.

Kazaa picks up the speed with update "The update, called Kazaa Media Desktop 1.5, comes with a new function for download recommendations, faster search results, faster start-up time and an automated feature that lets people communicate with contacts, according to the developer. Like its notorious cousin Napster, Kazaa has been targeted in lawsuits from the recording and motion picture industries, which charge that its peer-to-peer technology enables unauthorized distribution of copyright works. But unlike Napster, which has essentially been forced by the courts to block the swapping of all copyrighted music, Kazaa continues to function as though it's business as usual." [at CNET News.com]

<sarcasm> Good thing the RIAA had Napster shut down and stopped all this silly file-trading business dead in its tracks. Good going, RIAA! </sarcasm>

Copyright Fight Deck "How about a card game where you fight to control the rights to all of humanity's works? RIAA, I choose you!" [More Like This WebLog]

I don't know whether to laugh or cry this is so funny. And you get three "library" cards to boot! I'll be printing this out for the next game night....

I forgot to pass along a link that Bruce sent me explaining why ReplayTV Is Not Another Napster. "SONICblue's Potashner has shown that he has a knack for zoning in on the next big thing. His company's MP3 player has 40% market share and deals with all five major music labels. Isn't it about time the entertainment Establishment stopped wasting time and money trying to use the courts to forestall the future -- and instead embrace the new technology?"

Not only does this article illustrate why I want one of the new ReplayTV 4000s to go with my two older ones, but it hits the nail on the head in terms of the dinosaur broadcasting industry. Just as with Napster, they can start acknowledging the future and working with companies like SonicBlue, or they can stand by and watch helplessly as others jump in to take their place and relegate the bigcos to the backseat.

"CNet. Library radicals targeted by copyright owners. We need to resurrect the "digital divide" debate to make sure libraries remain sacrosanct. It is in the public good to make sure there is an ability for people to get access to information, even if they can't afford it." [John Robb's Radio Weblog]

Even though he's pointing to an article from July, 2001, John gets it. When this article appeared online, I didn't think there was as much of an uproar as there should have been. Had I been blogging then, I would have tried to bring this issue to the forefront, but I'm glad to see that others aren't letting it go unnoticed either. It's up to librarians to educate the public and our elected officials about these issues.

Bigger Not Better With Copyrighted Web Photos "Search engines can display "thumbnails," but not full-sized images of copyrighted works on their Web sites, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled Wednesday. Setting parameters for copyright infringement on the Internet, the court found that reproducing photographs to create thumbnail images is a fair use of the material, but displaying full-sized images violates the copyright owner's exclusive right to publicly display his works." [Library Stuff]

Rush hates TiVoRush "Rush Limbaugh has been taking too many hits off the paranoia bong and has decided that TiVo is an enemy of free people.... My favorite part is that he picked Hollings to pick on, despite the fact that Fritz is responsible for the SSSCA, and is therefore a Real and True Enemy of Free People and technology." [bOing bOing]

$1 films spook Hollywood. "Like Napster before it, the site is more than just an everyday pirate Web site: It's a commercial video-on-demand service that's comprehensive and easy to use. And it works. With the studios' film services still in development, that's a dangerous combination of features....'There's a law of diminishing returns in terms of pursuing and prosecuting these things overseas,' said Aram Sinnreich, a Jupiter Media Metrix analyst. 'It's a lamentable situation for studios, but I think the best thing they can do is develop their own legal alternative to draw people.' " [at News.com]

Here's an article about the impact of the Movie88 streaming video site in Taiwan that I mentioned a few days ago. Notice that the MPAA folks talk about taking the site down, while the JMM guy recognizes that the studios have to grow the grass on their own side of the fence instead. When are they going to "get it" and shift? Probably too late. Shhh - did you hear that? It was the roar of a dinosaur.

This is interesting. In the postal mail today, Web Techniques has become new.architect: Internet Strategies for Technology Leaders. The first cover story, That's What I Want, is about digital delivery of music and the tug-of-war between consumers and the record industry. Also in this issue, a review of Steven Johnson's book Emergence, a guest editorial by John Perry Barlow about The Crime of Sharing, and a couple of articles about digital rights management (DRM). Hot topic, I guess.

Tivo: Super Britney Replays Ruled "While millions of Americans watched the annual pro football championship, TiVo was monitoring the viewing habits of 10,000 of its 280,000 subscribers. The leading maker of digital video recorders used its technology to analyze which football plays or TV ads its subscribers chose to view again or to see in slow motion. TiVo viewers did more instant replays of Super Bowl commercials than of the game itself, and the Pepsi ads featuring Spears were the MVP, said John Ghashghai, TiVo's director of audience research.... When gathering customer marketing research, TiVo says it does not link viewer data to names, gender or age, only into one big database that can identify users by ZIP code." [in Wired News]

Two questions. First, did Tivo users know they were being tracked? Second, did ReplayTV do this? My guess is "no, not really" to the first question, and "no, probably not" to the second. Tivo is explicitly trying to woo over the TV networks and advertisers (I'm sure sharing of market research is in their license agreement), while SonicBlue (the company that owns ReplayTV now) is more focused on the consumer. Does anybody have a definitive answer?

Will we see this kind of tracking technology in eBooks? Counts sent to the publisher for which pages a user bookmarks, which passages are highlighted, how many times a quote is used?

The Right to Read by Richard Stallman "By 2047, libraries offering free public access to scholarly literature were a dim memory.... It was also possible to bypass the copyright monitors by installing a modified system kernel. Dan would eventually find out about the free kernels, even entire free operating systems, that had existed around the turn of the century. But not only were they illegal, like debuggers--you could not install one if you had one, without knowing your computer's root password. And neither the FBI nor Microsoft Support would tell you that." [via MeFi]

I'm really not trying to be alarmist by posting these kinds of links, but I do worry about where all of this is heading. It's not so very different from the link I included in my rant earlier today. In fact, movie studios are already working on watermarking technology that would be implemented in DVD players and PCs.

Let Your PC Turbocharge Your TV: Personal video recorders such as TiVo cost a lot; why not build one yourself? [in BusinessWeek]
"My conclusion: It will cost you a little more than $200, a free evening or weekend, and--geek alert--the guts to open up your computer and tinker a bit to install the special video card. It's easier than you think. If you're still intimidated, I'll suggest a couple of ways to get around it."

The television industry is running scared [in The Boston Globe]
"Adding TiVo-like capabilities to a PC allows for a variety of paradigm-busting applications. Say you've got multiple computers in your home, all networked together. The SnapStream software contains a built-in network server, so you can watch a recorded program on any PC in the house. Suppose you own a palm-top computer that runs Microsoft's Pocket PC operating system. You can download a SnapStream video and watch it during the morning commute."

Ouch. BusinessWeek has an article detailing how to add digital video recorder technology (also known as personal video recorders) to your PC, complete with recommendations for video cards. This link comes from the comments in a Slashdot post called The Napsterization of TV that itself points to a Boston Globe article about SnapStream recording software and what it may mean for digitization of televised content. To paraphrase one of the commenters in the Slashdot article, if you're reading about this in BW and TBL, it's time for the bigco folks to wake up and figure out how to work with these technologies, not against them.

Philips Burning on Protection "But Jeff Joseph, vice president of communication for the Consumer Electronics Association -- a consortium of manufacturers -- says the standoff could require 'a huge education campaign' that could force retailers to segregate copy-protected CDs from those with the logo, something Amazon has already begun doing.... 'The last time Universal and Disney squared off against a major consumer electronics company was the Sony Betamax case,' von Lohmann said. 'They lost....' Philips' patents on much of the technology for CD audio begins expiring this year and next. And newer audio formats such as DVD-Audio already boast far superior sound quality than CDs. Doris thinks the compact disc will be replaced by 'something like what was tried with DVD-Audio, but with better copy protection.' Some of that protection may come from legislation: Senator Fritz Hollings has yet to introduce the Security Systems Standards and Certification Act (SSSCA) into Congress, but drafts in circulation would require all devices sold in the U.S. for playing audio and/or video to include copyright protection mechanisms dictated by the entertainment industry." [in Wired News]

Every "device" would include PCs, too. The SSSCA is just as misguided as the DMCA. How come we don't hear Congress and the bigco copyright holders advocating for the marketplace to work this one out? Because of the money. For a glimpse into one possible future, read A Love Song for Napster. Be afraid. Be very afraid.