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News
P2P activity frustrates senators
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
Members of the U. S. Senate are pushing federal authorities to crack down on peer-to-peer services that pirate copyrighted works, Reuters reported.
Sens. Arlen Specter, (R-Penn.), and Dianne Feinstein, (D-Calif.), told officials with the Justice Department and the U.S. Copyright Office that they wanted recommendations for government action on the issue. They spoke at a Senate hearing on the P2P services following the Supreme Court’s June decision in MGM v. Grokster that file sharing networks could be liable when their users copy music, movies and other protected works without permission.
Feinstein, in particular, was upset over what she views as inaction by the Justice Department. She said with a unanimous Supreme Court decision, and peer-to-peer use is increasing, the country needs a strong law to protect copyright companies.
Debra Wong Yang, the U.S. attorney for California’s central district, defended the department’s actions, pointing out several investigations DOJ has undertaken that have led to arrests and convictions. He said the DOJ is going after those who are distributing the bulk of the material. Yang chairs the new Subcommittee on Cyber Crime and Intellectual Property of the department’s Advisory Committee.
Yang, Reuters reported, told the lawmakers that the department is concentrating on netting the big fish because it does not have the resources to go after everyone who infringes. It’s got to either be made legal or shut down, Feinstein said.
SeaChange purchases European content aggregator
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
SeaChange International has acquired the remaining 72 percent of the outstanding capital stock of the On Demand Group (ODG) that it did not previously own.
ODG is a London-based aggregator of television content that provides movies and other television programming for on-demand and pay-per-view services throughout Europe, including cable operators ntl and Telewest in the U.K. ODG is also a principal in the recently launched FilmFlex on-demand movie service venture with Sony Pictures and The Walt Disney Company.
SeaChange paid approximately $13.4 million in cash at the closing for the remaining portion of ODG, making it a wholly owned subsidiary of SeaChange. In addition, under earn-out provisions in the purchase agreement, if ODG meets certain annual performance goals over the period through Jan. 31, 2008, SeaChange will pay an additional $9 million (at today’s exchange rate) in contingent consideration, including up to 50 percent payable in shares of SeaChange Common Stock with the remainder payable in cash.
ODG was formed in 1995 and is privately funded. It is considered a leader in Europe in interactive media service deployment and development, content management and television production. It has provided services in more than 20 countries. In 2002, SeaChange entered into a non-exclusive strategic partnership with ODG to develop video-on-demand opportunities worldwide. ODG has recently worked extensively in supplying a wide range of movies, kids programming, television and music video content and project management services for the successful launch of the ntl on-demand service in January 2005.
In 2004, ODG, Sony Pictures, and the Walt Disney Company founded FilmFlex to provide an on-demand movie service. Since then, FilmFlex was selected by ntl and Telewest to provide their on-demand films offering, together with systems and software from SeaChange. FilmFlex provides content from the libraries of Sony Pictures Television International, Sony Classics, Walt Disney Television International, Warner Brothers, Pathe, MGM, Dreamworks, Hollywood Pictures, Touchstone Pictures, Miramax Film, Buena Vista International, Paramount Pictures, Columbia Pictures, TriStar, Icon and other sources. With its acquisition of ODG, SeaChange acquires ODG’s interest in FilmFlex.
For more information, visit www.schange.com.
Record industry files another round of lawsuits
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
A trade group representing the U.S. music industry has filed lawsuits against 757 people it claims used online file-sharing networks to illegally trade in copyrighted songs.
The latest round brings the total copyright infringement lawsuits filed against individuals to 14,800 filed by the U.S. music industry.
Of the 757 filed by the end of last week, about 64 were filed against individuals using college networks, said the Recording Industry Association of America, which represents labels like Sony/BMg and Universal.
Theater piracy law snags first victim
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
A new federal law aimed at discouraging camcorder-equipped movie pirates has snared its first catch. Federal prosecutors said Curtis Salisbury, 19, pleaded guilty to using a camcorder to record movies in a St. Louis, MO, theater and distributing his recording on the Internet, CNET reported.
When Salisbury worked in the box office of a theater, he and others entered the projection booth after-hours and used a camcorder and audio recorder to tape “The Perfect Man” and “Bewitched” in June, according to the plea agreement. Sentencing is scheduled to take place in a San Jose, CA, federal court Feb. 27.
Salisbury appears to have been the first person prosecuted under the Family Entertainment and Copyright Act, which Congress approved in April in an effort to curb online piracy. One section of the law stipulates that any person who uses an “audiovisual recording device” to tape a movie in a theater can be fined up to $250,000 and imprisoned for up to three years. The charge of Internet distribution could carry additional punishment.
Although the Department of Justice wasn’t divulging many details, a representative of the U.S. Attorney’s Office for the Northern District of California said Salisbury was caught as part of an undercover operation being conducted in the San Francisco area. That investigation, called Operation Copycat, resulted in indictments against four men this summer. Salisbury’s recordings, among others, were transmitted to servers in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Technology/Applications
Seoul Broadcasting tops survey of worldwide DAM sites
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
A recent independent study from Kane Consulting into best practices in digital broadcasting named Korea's Seoul Broadcasting System (SBS) as the global leader.
Of the 353 digital asset management sites worldwide surveyed, SBS and five other broadcasters stood out as leaders. SBS was rated at 80 percent on Kane's index of best practices in areas such as production speed, editorial quality, cost reduction, productivity gain and generation of incremental revenue.
Other broadcasters included RTL Cologne, RTL/TVI Brussels, SVT Stockholm, France 2 Paris and New York 1. Each scored more than 50 percent on Kane's index, with an average of 62 percent.
Kane's study spanned the broadcast lifecycle of ingest and catalog, production, distribution, storage and security. Common best practice attributes include the use of standards-based digital asset management technology to digitize broadcast content and streamline production workflows.
IBM’s Digital Media Center solution, along with other integrated technologies from KONAN TECHNOLOGY, Grass Valley, CIS Technology and D2NET, enabled SBS to produce and store news digitally with the broadcast of the Athens Olympics in 2004.
For more information, visit www.kane-consulting.com.
Hollywood unites in the battle against movie pirates
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
The six major Hollywood studios, hoping to gain more control over their technological destiny, have agreed to jointly finance a multimillion-dollar research laboratory to speed the development of new ways to foil movie pirates.
The new nonprofit consortium is to be called Motion Picture Laboratories — MovieLabs for short — and will begin operation later this year, the New York Times reported. According to Hollywood executives involved in its establishment, MovieLabs will have a budget of more than $30 million for its first two years. The idea arose out of Hollywood’s contention that the consumer electronics and information technology industries are not investing heavily or quickly enough in piracy-fighting technology.
The lab is modeled after CableLabs, which since 1988 has spearheaded pivotal innovations in the cable television industry — hastening the adoption of fiber optics, cable modems, telephony and digital video. Hollywood’s version will begin with a more modest mandate, said Dan Glickman, chairman of the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA). It will focus principally on piracy prevention.
The initial projects planned for MovieLabs include studying these problems or devising these solutions:
- Ways to jam camcorders being used inside movie theaters, or to project movies with flickering images that are invisible to the eye but will appear on unauthorized video recordings.
- Network management technologies to detect and block illegal file transfers on campus and business networks.
- Traffic analysis tools to detect illegal content sharing on peer-to-peer networks.
- Ways to prevent home and personal digital networks from being tapped into by unauthorized users, while not preventing consumers from sending a movie to more than one TV set without having to pay for it each time.
- Ways to link senders and receivers of movies transmitted over the Internet to geographic and political territories, to monitor the distribution of movies and prevent the violation of license agreements.
The Hollywood studios have teamed up on research and development before, most recently in the Digital Cinema Initiative, through which the major studios combined with the Entertainment Technology Center at the University of Southern California to write uniform specifications for and test digital movie distribution technology.
Microsoft and Intel back HD-DVD format
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
Microsoft and Intel announced that they are backing the HD-DVD format developed by Toshiba over the Blu-ray standard touted by Sony, Matsushita Electric, Samsung and others.
Microsoft announced in June that it would work with Toshiba to develop HD DVD players. Now, Microsoft and Intel say they will develop software and chips that will allow personal computers to play the next-generation DVDs from Toshiba.
The companies said they had not ruled out incorporating Blu-ray technology in their operating systems and on their chips in the future. But they are convinced that as of now, the HD-DVD format discs can be produced more cheaply and more quickly than the Blu-ray discs, and are therefore likely to become the dominant technology, the New York Times reported.
For the last two years, Microsoft and Intel have been careful not to alienate either camp in the format battle because they sell software and components to companies on each side. They also hoped that the electronics makers and Hollywood studios developing the formats would reach a compromise.
But the major Hollywood studios are now split between the formats, and electronics companies on both sides plan to start selling next-generation DVD players as early as Christmas. Sony also plans to include Blu-ray technology in its new PlayStation 3 game console to be released next spring.
As the format standoff has deepened, demand for the current generation of DVDs and DVD players has slowed, alarming Hollywood studios, which have come to depend heavily on disc sales. The studios, as well as electronics makers and computer manufacturers, expect high-definition discs to restart sales growth. But the lack of a resolution over the future format has slowed the changeover.
The decision to support Toshiba’s HD-DVD format also creates a huge split in the PC industry. Dell, Hewlett-Packard, and Sun Microsystems — among the world’s largest PC makers, are part of the Blu-ray group. Their computers, assuming they include Microsoft and Intel products, will be capable of playing HD-DVD discs. But if they want their machines to play Blu-ray discs, they may have to find a third-party to design software for them. Also endorsing Blu-ray is Apple Computer, creator of the Macintosh platform.
Also last week, Toshiba said it would delay its launch of next-generation HD DVD players in the U.S. market to around February or March 2006, revising its prior plan for a year-end start date. The company said it will introduce HD DVD players in the Japanese market by year-end.
RealNetworks goes mobile
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
A pioneer in streaming media has gone mobile. RealNetworks is now offering music, games and video to customers on their mobile phones, CNET reported.
Rob Glaser, founder and CEO of RealNetworks, said mobile entertainment is a huge opportunity, during a keynote at the CTIA IT and Entertainment show in San Francisco. He said his company is committed to mobile just as much as they are to PCs.
The past couple of weeks have seen a bit of a coming-out party for RealNetworks’ mobile products. Earlier this month, it announced that its Rhapsody music service would be offered to Sprint Nextel mobile customers. And last week the company touted a big win with its announcement that Cingular Wireless will provide the mobile operator with technology that allows people to watch streaming video on their cell phones.
The Cingular deal is key for RealNetworks as it moves into the mobile entertainment market, CNET said. Its biggest rival, Microsoft, is being used to deliver streaming TV over Verizon Wireless’ network. The race between the two companies to provide the technology to make this functionality a reality is in full force.
Cell phone operators are banking on mobile entertainment to boost revenues. A quick ramp-up in sales over the past 18 months from other non-voice services, such as text messaging and ring tones, has led many mobile operators to expand their offerings of entertainment content, including full-length music tracks, streaming video and games, CNET reported.
SanDisk stakes future on TrustedFlash
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
SanDisk has introduced new mini storage card technology it says will let people play or view secured content on multiple devices, including smart phones and portable digital players.
The TrustedFlash technology embeds digital rights management software right on the card instead of relying on the player to dictate where and when content can be played, said SanDisk, which helped pioneer flash memory storage cards used in phones and digital cameras.
The first batch of cards using TrustedFlash, due in November, will be pre-loaded with the Rolling Stones’ new CD “A Bigger Bang.” The card will feature 265MB.
Yahoo said customers who subscribe to its digital-music service could use a different version of a TrustedFlash card, which will be sold under the name Gruvi (pronounced groove-eye).
Samsung Electronics also said it would support Gruvi in its next generation of phones that support SD cards. More than 87 million phones with memory card slots were sold in 2004, according to IDC, which forecasts that 164 million will be sold worldwide in 2005.
Harari said the TrustedFlash card would behave in the same way current SD cards do, but the technology could also be extended to on-demand content such as feature films and online games.
Showing off how the technology works, SanDisk demonstrated how a consumer could purchase a video online, view it on their home PC, save it to the TrustedFlash card and then insert the card onto a personal digital assistant to view later.
TrustedFlash is expected to eventually be included in SanDisk’s array of flash-memory products, including its miniSD, microSD and SD card formats with a maximum capacity of up to 2GB.
Once again, lobbyists try to raise broadcast flag
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
Lobbyists for movie and recording industries are pushing Senate Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens, (R-Alaska), to give the FCC authority to mandate copy protection technology for movies and music. The provision is being sought in the pending DTV legislation now on the fast track for mid-October completion.
Public Knowledge, a public advocacy group focusing on digital copyright issues, circulated draft language that it said the Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) and the Recording Industry Association of America (RIAA) are floating on Capitol Hill.
The movie studios want the FCC to have regulatory authority over television equipment in order to prevent the mass, online redistribution of high-definition entertainment, the National Journal reported. The RIAA and other artist and music groups are worried that consumers will be able to use software to record and create libraries of high-quality music via digital radio. Some artists worry the practice could undermine revenue they could earn through digital downloads.
Mitch Glazier, senior vice president for the RIAA, told the Journal that they and the MPAA are working to protect video and audio content, but it may not be this specific language. He said his group has not yet presented the final language to Stevens.
The language circulated by Public Knowledge would authorize the FCC to regulate both digital audio broadcasts and receiving devices. It responds to a court decision earlier in the year.
The U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia in May overturned FCC rules mandating that all digital TV sets contain technology to prevent the piracy of “flagged” content. The court said the FCC had exceeded its regulatory jurisdiction because Congress never authorized it to mandate copy protection schemes for TV manufacturers.
Glazier said RIAA wants Congress to specifically give the agency such authority over copy protection standards for fear of future lawsuits. “The language of the D.C. circuit opinion is so broad and paints with such a broad brush that we would feel better with a specific grant of jurisdiction,” he said. “Otherwise we could have another lawsuit from Public Knowledge, and that would be another two years.”
Glazier said RIAA is “reaching out” to the technology industry “to make sure that the language is narrow enough and doesn’t raise any concerns.” But both Public Knowledge and the Consumer Electronic Association (CEA) blasted the proposal.
Michael Petricone, CEA’s vice president of technology policy, told the Journal The phrase “unauthorized copying and redistribution of digital audio content” would even ban making copies for personal use and shifting content between devices inside the home, long-established consumer rights that are protected by fair use standards for copyrighted content.
Broadband use grows in the U.S.
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
More than 60 percent of Americans who use the Internet at home now do so with a high-speed connection, a new study has found.
That’s a jump from 51 percent a year ago. Nielsen/NetRatings says 86 million Internet users surfed the Web on home broadband connections in August.
Broadband use has grown steadily in the United States as prices fall and more video and other bandwidth-intent materials are available online.
New Products
Front Porch Digital selected by CIRIS for digital archive
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
Front Porch Digital has been selected by Netherlands post-production facility CIRIS to implement a centrally shared digital video archive. Front Porch will supply its DIVArchive application to enable CIRIS customers to store and access broadcast and other content remotely.
CIRIS made a long-term investment in DIVArchive, working closely with Front Porch in the specification, installation, and integration of a centrally shared digital video archive to host content from multiple CIRIS clients, the companies said.
DIVArchive (Distributed Intelligent Versatile Archive) is a software middleware that enables interoperability between large digital media storage devices, video servers, editing systems, and digital media workflow applications in the broadcast, media, and entertainment industries. DIVArchive simplifies the process of preserving, managing and accessing content.
For more information, visit www.fpdigital.com.
North Plains intros enterprise server for Tiger OS
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
 TeleScope Enterprise organizes scattered collections of digital media files and their often dissociated business practices into a secure and organized repository of digital assets. |
North Plains Systems has announced that TeleScope Enterprise, its digital asset management application, will now support Tiger Server and Xsan, Apple’s 64-bit cluster file system for Xserve RAID storage hardware.
TeleScope Enterprise, a scalable digital asset management application, builds on Apple’s Xsan storage array in the video production, printing and publishing markets. It serves as the primary software platform for integrating and organizing media production tools such as Apple Final Cut Pro, Adobe Creative Suite, Digimarc ImageBridge, Microsoft Office, Microsoft PowerPoint, Telestream FlipFactory, QuarkXPress and Virage VideoLogger.
TeleScope Enterprise allows IT and business managers to create an end-to-end digital media supply chain for the creation, management and distribution of rich media. Its SOAP-based APIs and XML gateways enable integration with existing enterprise IT investments such as enterprise content management systems, customer resources management systems and enterprise information portals.
TeleScope organizes scattered collections of digital media files and their often dissociated business practices into a secure and organized repository of digital assets, business processes and intellectual property. It allows the purposeful access of digital media assets throughout an organization for reuse, repurposing or re-expression.
For more information, visit www.northplains.com.
Data protection solutions deliver new RAID technology
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
Data Protection Solutions, a provider of disk mirroring and data backup products, has announced the addition of its next-generation DD4 technology with the EzRaid 3.5in DD4 Serial ATA (SATA) Bay Mount products.
Mounting easily into any standard 3.5in or 5.25in drive bay, users may easily connect up to two SATA drives and a system motherboard to the EzRaid DD4 SATA controller. Once connected, EzRaid simultaneously and automatically writes data to both drives quickly in the background to build a complete mirror of the system’s data.
The company said this patented technology enables it to deliver maintenance-free, operating system-independent RAID solutions easily deployed in multiple form factors, making EzRaid ideal for system builders with vertically oriented or special purpose systems.
During the set-up process, the mirror drive is automatically built and new data simultaneously written to both drives. In the event of a hard drive failure, EzRaid notifies the user while automatically switching operations to the mirrored hard drive. Upon replacing the failed hard disk drive, EzRaid automatically rebuilds the data in the background creating and then maintaining a constant mirror of all the system data. Because EzRaid simultaneously writes data at the Block-level, EzRaid is compatible with all types of disk drives, drive formats and partitioning schemes.
For more information, visit www.ezd2d.com.
OmniBus automates new Kuwait channel
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
OmniBus Systems, a provider of broadcast automation and content management products, has sold newsroom, media asset management, and playout technologies to a new TV station in Kuwait, Al Rai Television.
Al Rai Television, on-air since October 2004, is one of the first broadcast enterprises undertaken by Al-Rai Media Group, publisher of Kuwait’s highest circulation daily newspaper. The deal marked one of OmniBus’ first installations in the country.
OmniBus products form part of the main broadcasting infrastructure contract that was managed, designed and delivered by Sony Professional Services as the prime contractor and systems integrator. OmniBus supplied its G3 modular architecture with desktop control, low-resolution browse capabilities for all journalists, and the HeadLine Media Editor with voiceover recording functionality.
Al Rai is using the OmniBus system to coordinate the operation of a wide range of equipment including Leitch video servers and AP’s Electronic News Production System (ENPS) via the MOS protocol.
For more information, visit www.omnibus.tv.
SGI teams with Ardendo for MAM solutions
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
Silicon Graphics Broadcast Europe and Ardendo have teamed up to provide European broadcasters with complete and highly customized media asset management (MAM) solutions.
The collaboration between the two companies is a key component of the SGI Open Broadcast Initiative, which enables broadcasters to smoothly transition from analog to digital infrastructures. Ardendo’s software solutions for digital archiving, ingest, media asset management, transcoding and browse editing have been chosen by SGI for many of its integration projects. Among the latest of these projects being the implementation of a complete workflow at CIRIS post-production facility in the Netherlands, where ARDOME, the MAM system from Ardendo, was integrated by Silicon Graphics Broadcast Europe into the SGI InfiniteStorage and server solutions.
The new relationship will result in integrated solutions that take full advantage of the hardware, software and expertise of the two companies.
For more information, visit www.ardendo.com and www.sgi.com.
KVVU selects Sundance Digital for newsroom
Oct 11, 2005 8:00 AM, Strategic Content Management e-newsletter
 SGI’s SGI InfiniteStorage and server system has been implemented with Ardendo software at the CIRIS post-production facility in the Netherlands. |
KVVU, a Meredith Broadcasting station located in Las Vegas, has purchased and installed a Sundance Digital NewsLink system. The Fox affiliate will operate NewsLink in conjunction with Avid’s Unity nonlinear news production system and control two Avid AirSpeed multi-purpose media platform servers for play-to-air. The combined configuration will go on-air by the end of the year.
NewsLink, an automation solution for live newscasts, offers the news and production staffs an array of workflow applications that link essential devices with an intuitive graphical interface. All daily tools are immediately accessible via tabbed screens on the newsroom computer.
For more information, visit www.sundancedigital.com.
