The dilemma facing any owner of copyrighted works continues to be how to compete with online piracy, mainly torrent sites that offer online versions of books, music, and videos. The usual response is some sort of digital rights managment, which is frustrating for the user and actually provides little protection against piracy. Fairplay implemented by Apple is the most well-known and widely implemented DRM scheme and Eevery song available on iTunes is available on torrent sites. The only person benefitting from Fairplay is Steve Jobs, not any of the copyright owners. I personally think Emusic has the best model: no DRM at all.
Copyright owners are finally beginning to get smart about distributing their content. Businessweek.com has an article talking about a company called SpiralFrog, which is hoping to start a new trend in the digital download world: ad-based distribution.
SpiralFrog, expected to be up and running by yearend, is still negotiating with music companies and big marketers. The plan is that SpiralFrog would pay the labels enough from ad revenues to compensate for what they would forfeit in per-tune fees, says CEO Kent. So far, EMI Music Publishing and Universal Music Group have signed on. Consumers will be able to select a track and download it in 90 seconds. In that time, they will watch ads and be directed to other areas of the site. Then the song can be played endlessly (limited to two portable devices), as long as users log on to the SpiralFrog site once a month. Otherwise, songs will expire.
I am not sure ad-based distribution is going to work for songs and movies. Am I required to listen to ads everytime I want to listen to a song? If done properly, movies would not be too bad since mosts DVDs require you to watch previews anyway. I am skeptical that this is going to work or rather that Spiralfrog will be able to provide a worthwhile experience for the consumer. Once the site is up and running (expected by the end of this year), I will post a review.
Wed, Oct 18, 2006
DRM-free media