Sunday, May 06, 2007

Publishers Hear Digital Fingerprinting Pitch

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"The man who acquires the ability to take full possession of his own mind may take possession of anything else to which he is justly entitled."
Andrew Carnegie (Scottish born American Industrialist and Philanthropist. 1835-1919)

Publishers Hear Digital Fingerprinting Pitch
by Karlene Lukovitz
http://publications.mediapost.com/index.cfm? fuseaction=Articles.san&s=59820&Nid=30069&p=204 904

WATCHING GOOGLE AND VIACOM DUKE it out in court is interesting, but in the real world, publishers and other site owners are more interested in finding a practical way to monitor who's using their content and either get some reimbursement or get it off the Web.

As the business world read about Google/YouTube filing for a dismissal of Viacom's $1 billion copyright infringement suit earlier this week, a group of publishing executives gathered at a Magazine Publishers of America "Meet the Innovators" session to hear a pitch for one potential answer.

Attributor Corp., a privately held Redwood City, CA company started by Silicon Valley executives, is testing technology that scans and captures digital "fingerprints"--or identifying characteristics--of text, images and audiovisual content and then continuously scans its index of the Web to pick up matches.

The company claims that the system can spot content reuse within just about any Web area/format, including RSS feeds, self-published sites, social networks, advertising networks, search engines and aggregators, based on a few text sentences, bits of an image, or seconds of an audio/video clip.

Attributor doesn't claim to know exactly what is and is not "fair use" under the evolving legal precedents surrounding the Digital Millennium Copyright Act; rather, the system employs a site owner's own specified criteria to generate automatic responses to identified instances of reuse, explained CEO Jim Brock, a former Yahoo copyright counsel who co- founded Attributor in 2005 with Silicon Valley entrepreneur Jim Pitkow.

Depending on the scenario (the percentage of content used, whether it's being used for commercial purposes, etc.), a content reuser might, for instance, receive a request to remove content, or a proposal to allow continuing reuse of the content in return for giving the originator a portion of advertising revenue or licensing fees. A single console provides the site owner with ongoing monitoring of each issue's status until there is some kind of resolution.

Site owners can also employ a searchable public registry that allows anyone wishing to republish content to identify the owner and seek a licensing agreement.

In short, Attributor may present a more streamlined and wide-ranging solution than existing content monitoring systems like Indigo Stream Technologies' Copyscape, which relies on Google's search engine to seek out unauthorized uses.

Attributor is now in beta with several "large, international publishers," and is taking requests to generate free trial reports for interested publishers while the development phase continues, Brock said. Between 40 and 45 million Web pages per day are being added to the system through RSS feeds and periodic content scanning/conversions, he added.

In December, the company announced that it had received $10 million in funding to date from investors including Sigma Partners, Draper Richards LP, First Round Capital, Amicus and Selby Venture Partners.

Where does Brock think digital fair use definitions are headed? "At this point, nobody can say that a certain percentage of an article equates or does not equate to fair use," he says. "It's still subjective under the law. But once we have the systems in place for transparency, we believe those standards will evolve."

Meanwhile, he says, "if from a business standpoint, it's not fair use by your standards, you can address that, negotiate, respond as you see fit." For example, if no attribution is provided, a significant portion of a given piece of content is being used, and it's being used for commercial purposes, "then you've got three indicators that might set off a 'ding, ding, ding,'" Brock notes.

Original Source Link


Responses to all Articles and Bo-Rants are greatly encouraged and may be included in " BoSacks Readers Speak Out"

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Print, Publishing and Media Consultants Contact - Robert M. Sacks 518-329-7994 PO Box 53, Copake NY 12516


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    E-Media, Postal Rates on the Minds of Western Publishers

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    "Heard on the Web" Media Intelligence:
    Courtesy of BoSacks and The Precision Media Group
    America's Oldest e-newsletter est.1993
    BoSacks on the Web
    The BoSacks Blog Spot
    Click here to forward this email
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    "It is easy when we are in prosperity to give advice to the afflicted."
    Aeschylus (Ancient Greek Dramatist and Playwright known as the founder of Greek tragedy, 525 BC-456 BC)

    E-Media, Postal Rates on the Minds of Western Publishers
    By Tony Silber
    http://www.foliomag.com/viewmedia.asp? prmMID=7662


    Is the postal-rate hike scheduled for July really as bad as it seems? Not according to several of the participants in a Western Publications Association seminar held last week for executive-level magazine managers.

    In the session, which was part of the association's annual Two-Day Publishing Conference, the topic of postal rates came up as part of a wide-ranging discussion that included sales compensation, flex- time, partnerships and, of course, e-media. Although it was brief, the postal-rate discussion was telling: With rates for b-to-b especially likely to increase by as much as 15 percent to 18 percent, many of the publishers in the room saw it only as an unpleasant cost of doing business. "It's an increase of 15 percent in a cost that is usually less than 3 percent of your total cost structure," said Joe Hanson, CEO of Professional Media Group and one of the speakers. Other speakers spent some time debating whether the cost savings provided by such techniques as co- mailing and co-palletization were offset by the fees charged by the supplier to do them.

    Overall. this year's WPA conference, the key regional event for publishers on the West Coast, was focused mostly on e-media, at least in the general sessions. For example, 1105 Media CEO Neal Vitale and BPA Worldwide CEO Glenn Hansen gave powerful presentations at the annual VIP panel. Vitale offered an eight-point framework for a successful e-media strategy.

    · Make sure the sale is integrated. "It's better to have one person talking about our products than having separate sales teams that potentially compete," Vitale said. He did make an exception for live events, noting that the sell is fundamentally different.

    · Have an in-house e-media guru. "You need a chief catalyst within the organization," he said. This also helps to cross-pollenate ideas within the organization from division to division."

    · Experimentation is a good thing. "Things like mashups and other online applications-you have to be talking about these things," Vitale said. "You may not succeed with some of them, but you should be part of it-and you also have marketers that want to try new things."

    · Be wary of the quality of back-end support. "A lot of this looks easy," Vitale said. "It's not. It's not easy to be up to speed on content-management systems and technology capabilities and needs, while also running a publishing company. It's also an interesting question whether you can build a CMS and other capabilities in house and also provide value to the marketplace. The jury is out."

    · Band-Aids don't work. You'll be doing makegoods galore, Vitale said.

    · Online is NOT a value-add. "It is a fundamentally important part of the marketing program," Vitale said.

    · Markets and industries develop at different paces. "You really need to keep pace with the markets you serve and act accordingly," Vitale said.

    · The business has not changed. "This is still the same old business," he said. E-media is a new medium, but it's the same song."

    For his part, Hansen stressed two things: Integration and developing analytic skill with all the new database information being collected through online channels. "No one is taking the time to think about how we are going to integrate the back ends of these things and develop intelligence about who's seeing what," he said.

    Beyond that, he said, traditional media metrics are eroding, underscoring how the whole media landscape is changing. "You're not a print product competing with another print product in the same SRDS category," Hansen said. "You're competing against all sorts of media you never thought about."

    In terms of tracking media, even the seemingly highly measurable world of online is not infallible. "You're seeing conjecture posing as fact," Hansen said, quoting a media director he'd heard recently.

    What's more, he said, the younger generation does not look with the same perspective as you do regarding your "near-and-dear" brand. "Your key to success is getting the old guard up to the level of the new guard, and the new guard down to the old."

    Many of the WPA attendees seemed to be somewhat early on in their e-media strategies, something conference chairman Peter Çraig acknowledged. "My sense was that they are as concerned as anybody else about e-media, but I guess they're not early adopters for the most part. And at the same time, some of the panelists [who focused on e-media] were representative of the industry, but they're not representative of the whole industry," Craig said. "The point is, you have to get into the game. The biggest mistake is not playing."

    That said, Craig added, publishers need to be wary about their revenue mix as they move online. "If you take 20 percent of your readers add move them online, do you take 20 percent of your revenue with you? I don't think so. If you get on the digital train, it may not be going where you think it's going. You'll end up in Poughkeepsie."

    The WPA conference traditionally ends with the Maggie Awards for design and editorial excellence. And one of the staples of that ceremony is the opening speech by Craig, usually a highly political commentary that is one of the unique moments in the magazine industry. This year, he toned it down, exhorting the audience to get involved in e-media, but also asking whether the rise of e-media and citizen journalism is symptomatic of the decline of traditional journalism. "It seems like journalism has lost its real purpose and sacrificed its sacred trust," Craig said. " Fair and balanced journalism in this country is suffering from loss of its real purpose in exchange for entertainment value and slanted reporting. It is no wonder that public confidence in traditional news sources has eroded and the public has a perception of bias and partisanship in the press."

    Original Source Link


    Responses to all Articles and Bo-Rants are greatly encouraged and may be included in " BoSacks Readers Speak Out"

    "Heard on the Web" Media Intelligence: Courtesy of The Precision Media Group.
    Print, Publishing and Media Consultants Contact - Robert M. Sacks 518-329-7994 PO Box 53, Copake NY 12516


    Publishing Links and News
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  • BoSacks Blog
  • The New BoSacks Archives
  • Publishing Executive Magazine
  • The Official Site of Samir "Mr. Magazine" Husni
  • The New Single Copy
  • Who Is BoSacks?
  • PIB REVENUE & Pages


  • Contact Information
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    phone: 518-329-7994
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    This email was sent to bosacks.tobor@blogger.com, by bosacks@aol.com

    Precision Media Group | PO Box 53 | Copake | NY | 12516

    Where The Book Business Is Humming

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    "Heard on the Web" Media Intelligence:
    Courtesy of BoSacks and The Precision Media Group
    America's Oldest e-newsletter est.1993
    BoSacks on the Web
    The BoSacks Blog Spot
    Click here to forward this email
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    "The oldest books are only just out to those who have not read them."
    Samuel Butler (English novelist, essayist and critic, 1835-1902)

    Where The Book Business Is Humming
    Bertelsmann is making a bundle off Old Media in former Soviet bloc countries

    http://www.businessweek.com/print/magazine/content/ 07_20/b4034065.htm?chan=gl

    You wouldn't typically expect to find a high-profile executive of a major media company in drab Kharkiv. The gritty city of 1.5 million is the kind of place where local leaders haven't yet gotten around to tearing down statues of Lenin, and outside Ukraine it's best known (if it's known at all) for the Red Army tanks it used to make. But on a sunny April afternoon, Ewald Walgenbach, a member of the executive board of Germany's Bertelsmann, smiles as he watches a battered steam shovel ladle bricks onto a dump truck at a dilapidated factory that's being converted into a distribution center for the company's Family Leisure book club. Above the din, Oleg Shpilman, CEO of the Ukrainian unit, shouts that the new facility will be able to ship 20 million books a year. "What will happen next year when you have 21 million?" Walgenbach replies with a laugh.

    Optimism about the printed word is pretty rare these days. In fast-modernizing Ukraine, though, Bertelsmann is enjoying dot-com-like expansion for its book club, a category that's a slow- or no-growth proposition in the U.S. and Western Europe. Family Leisure moved 12 million books last year-everything from cookbooks to local potboilers to Stephen King thrillers-while sales grew 55%, to $50 million. Today, Bertelsmann is Ukraine's biggest bookseller, with 12% of the market. And the operation enjoys profit margins that are triple the 4% global average for similar Bertelsmann units, which include the Book-of- the-Month Club and Literary Guild in the U.S.

    Ukraine is the most spectacular example of Bertelsmann's success with book clubs in the former Soviet bloc. And it's proving that with the right mix of marketing and merchandise, there's money to be made even with low-cost goods. The region has well- educated populations hungry for a good read but relatively few bookstores where they can indulge their passion. As a result, Bertelsmann has also become the biggest book publisher in the Czech Republic and has scored big successes in Poland, Russia, and elsewhere.

    The book clubs are part of a broader trend of booming print media in the developing world. In India, newspapers are thriving, with Mumbai alone boasting a half-dozen major dailies. Swiss magazine giant Ringier saw 18% sales growth last year from its lifestyle publications in Vietnam. In Argentina, the number of books published has more than doubled since 2002. And emerging markets are also proving lucrative for another Bertelsmann unit, Gruner + Jahr, which is the second-largest magazine publisher in China via a joint venture.

    TEXTING THE ORDERS
    Bertelsmann's allegiance to Old Media in newer markets is paying off in other ways. In the U.S., its book clubs tend to serve older customers. By contrast, nearly half the Family Leisure Club's 2 million members (in a nation of 47 million) are under 30. The secret: The Bertelsmann club recruits hot young Ukrainian authors and serves as their exclusive distributor, a smart strategy in a country with only about 300 bookstores. "They're very effective, much more than other publishers," says Ljubko Deresch, an intense 23-year-old who has published five novels- the latest with Bertelsmann-dealing with youthful disenchantment and pop culture.

    Keeping prices low is crucial. The average Ukrainian makes less than $8,000 per year, and in Kharkiv, Bertelsmann's main competition is an open-air book market. Dozens of merchants in corrugated metal stalls sell everything from textbooks to science fiction. Family Leisure titles typically go for under $5, competitive with the outdoor market. Then to keep costs down, the club delivers shipments to post offices, where customers claim their books.

    No doubt Bertelsmann would like to bottle its Ukraine formula for export to other countries. Although few offer such a favorable mix of book-hungry citizens, cooperative postal authorities, and energetic local management, some innovations from Ukraine can travel. Customers there, for instance, are world leaders in ordering via mobile-phone text messages, a promising e-commerce strategy in poorer countries where few can afford Internet access. Says Shpilman: "Our goal is not to be a book club, but an integrated bookseller."

    Original Source Link


    Responses to all Articles and Bo-Rants are greatly encouraged and may be included in " BoSacks Readers Speak Out"

    "Heard on the Web" Media Intelligence: Courtesy of The Precision Media Group.
    Print, Publishing and Media Consultants Contact - Robert M. Sacks 518-329-7994 PO Box 53, Copake NY 12516


    Publishing Links and News
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
  • BoSacks Blog
  • The New BoSacks Archives
  • Publishing Executive Magazine
  • The Official Site of Samir "Mr. Magazine" Husni
  • The New Single Copy
  • Who Is BoSacks?
  • PIB REVENUE & Pages


  • Contact Information
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
    phone: 518-329-7994
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    This email was sent to bosacks.tobor@blogger.com, by bosacks@aol.com

    Precision Media Group | PO Box 53 | Copake | NY | 12516