Everyone knows newsprint is failing due to a combination of the economic crises and advancements in internet technology. But, how does the internet affect other forms of media? Better yet, how do other forms of media affect the internet? Online newspapers are receiving more subscribers than their print counterparts. More people are watching television online than through cable services. People are downloading more music from iTunes than purchasing compact discs from electronic stores. Readers are saving trees by using personal reading devices to read eBooks. However, there are also people who illegally download music. Watching television shows online bypasses cable subscription service fees. The amount of user created content online makes searching for cold hard facts more difficult now than in the past.
I wouldn't say the internet itself is killing other forms of media but it does play a role. With inflation on the rise more and more people are trying to spend as little money as possible. The internet offers an infinite number of sites to cater toward an infinite number of needs. Convenience is the main positive the internet has against other media. On a whole, I noticed most companies don't have a problem with the internet; they have a problem with how much money they do or do not make having their content so readily available online. With so much content available, many companies have started enforcing their copyrights on a strict basis, often times preventing instances that could be considered fair use. The following blogs cover recent events that have altered how people use or view certain types of media and how the internet has played a role in that change.
Monday, April 27, 2009
Online Video
A new site from Google, whom owns YouTube, is in the works. The site is the birth child of YouTube and Universal Music Group. Vevo.com should be running online within six months. Vevo will be a site, much like Hulu, where companies can share their music videos for free online to internet users. As it stands, UMG will take a certain percentage of the profits that Vevo nets from advertisers. Warner Music Group had a similar deal with YouTube at one point in which users could upload WMG copyrighted material as long as YouTube gave a certain percentage of money made from site advertisements; the deal between WMG and YouTube no longer exists. All companies are still trying to find ways to make revenue from user uploaded content. YouTube makes all its profit from advertisers, yet with the economy in such bad shape and inflation on the rise, everyone wants more money and no one wants to spend it. Greed is the main reason the deal between YouTube and WMG failed. UMG is also researching ways it can eventually generate future revenue from Vevo.
Even with all the talks of money, Universal Music Group realizes the importance of making its artists' content more widely available. The internet is extremely portable, especially since the creation of the Blackberry and Apple's iPhone. Many artists still create music videos, but the number of music videos being aired on cable television is declining. The creation of Vevo will give artists more exposure and allow users to instantly find and watch the artists they want to watch. The only thing preventing other companies from taking advantage of the internet is money. Most of the time getting permission to use copyrighted material requires paying a fee. Deals between companies allow users to use and obtain various forms of content without having to pay such a fee, as someone is already paying the fees for them. Perhaps if YouTube offered a service in which users could have the option of creating a free or a paid account. Using a free account a person would not be able to upload copyrighted material. Using a paid account, or an account that requires a subscription fee, would allow users to upload copyrighted material as a percentage of the subscription fees paid would go to the companies of the copyright material for rights usage. However, all users, be it paid account users or free account users, could watch all video content uploaded. The free account users would be allowed to do this because the paid account users have already covered the fees for the rights to use and share the content.
Even with all the talks of money, Universal Music Group realizes the importance of making its artists' content more widely available. The internet is extremely portable, especially since the creation of the Blackberry and Apple's iPhone. Many artists still create music videos, but the number of music videos being aired on cable television is declining. The creation of Vevo will give artists more exposure and allow users to instantly find and watch the artists they want to watch. The only thing preventing other companies from taking advantage of the internet is money. Most of the time getting permission to use copyrighted material requires paying a fee. Deals between companies allow users to use and obtain various forms of content without having to pay such a fee, as someone is already paying the fees for them. Perhaps if YouTube offered a service in which users could have the option of creating a free or a paid account. Using a free account a person would not be able to upload copyrighted material. Using a paid account, or an account that requires a subscription fee, would allow users to upload copyrighted material as a percentage of the subscription fees paid would go to the companies of the copyright material for rights usage. However, all users, be it paid account users or free account users, could watch all video content uploaded. The free account users would be allowed to do this because the paid account users have already covered the fees for the rights to use and share the content.
User Created Content
YouTube.com has been a playground for user created videos since 2005. During the last four years YouTube has gone through many changes. The most impactful of these changes are the ones related to YouTube's partnerships with other companies. The most notable of these companies is Warner Music Group. YouTube used to have an agreement with Warner Music Group that allowed WMG to make money whenever content was discovered being used in videos on YouTube. YouTube paid for use of the copyrighted material. However, negotiations of the contract renewal failed and YouTube and WMG are no longer working together. WMG now uses YouTube's ContentID system to remove all videos that contain any copyrighted material, regardless of whether it falls under fair use. YouTube offers a service in which users can dispute whether their video falls under fair use or not. I myself have looked into the service, and I must personally say, trying to understand the fair use law is a rather difficult process without a consultant whom is familiar with copyright and fair use laws, i.e. a lawyer.
The ContentID system works so well it sometimes even prevents users from sharing accapella and cover versions of songs owned by WMG (von Lohman, Fred). I have a video of behind the scenes footage of my friends filming one of their original online shorts. In the finalized version I created for YouTube there are clips from some musicians under a WMG record label. My video was immediately pulled after being uploaded. The video I created in no way shape or form resembled any video made by any of the musicians I used. Another video I uploaded contained footage from the worldwide broadcast of the Live Earth concert. The broadcast was free and streamed live over the internet and on local television. The footage was of Missy Higgins's song "Steer." WMG owns the rights to video footage of Missy's performance of "Steer" from Live Earth and I was not able to upload the video of that song. However, video of the other eight songs she performed was able to be uploaded, as WMG did not own the copyright to video of those performances.
The ContentID system works so well it sometimes even prevents users from sharing accapella and cover versions of songs owned by WMG (von Lohman, Fred). I have a video of behind the scenes footage of my friends filming one of their original online shorts. In the finalized version I created for YouTube there are clips from some musicians under a WMG record label. My video was immediately pulled after being uploaded. The video I created in no way shape or form resembled any video made by any of the musicians I used. Another video I uploaded contained footage from the worldwide broadcast of the Live Earth concert. The broadcast was free and streamed live over the internet and on local television. The footage was of Missy Higgins's song "Steer." WMG owns the rights to video footage of Missy's performance of "Steer" from Live Earth and I was not able to upload the video of that song. However, video of the other eight songs she performed was able to be uploaded, as WMG did not own the copyright to video of those performances.
Sunday, April 26, 2009
Authors Guild
The Authors Guild filed complaints that Amazon's Kindle 2 eBook reader device violated copyright terms via its audio function. The audio function on the Kindle 2 allows it to read eBooks aloud. I'm not sure why the Authors Guild claims the audio feature violates copyrights, but an opinion letter sent by the guild's president claims, there is not much difference in the way the device speaks and the way an author speaks when reading his or her own book (The Authors Guild's Attack on the Kindle 2). Copyright law does not protect against books being read aloud. The only time a copyright law would be violated would be if someone were to take a work recorded by the author and make it available for illegal download or broadcast the work without permission. The Kindle 2 uses its own programming to translate the text into recognizable sounds. Humans use their own brains to translate text into recognizable sounds.
I could understand the Guild's view if someone were taking original recordings made by the authors and sharing those files illegally, but shutting down a device because it can translate text into sound is baffling. I own the audio book of Neil Gaiman's Coraline recorded by Neil Gaiman himself. I purchased the audio book from iTunes. If I were to take that file and share it with other users without permission of the copyright holder, then I would be in trouble. However, if I repeat aloud Neil Gaiman's words myself, then no copyright laws would be violated. The Authors Guild cracking down on the speaking capability of the Kindle 2 has caused many consumers to not want to purchase the device from Amazon. Amazon.com is the leading seller of eBooks. Authors make money selling their books in eBook form for use on the Kindle system. Amazon.com also sells audio books, which are official recordings of readings made by publishing and record companies. I think the crack down on the Kindle 2 system is less about copyrights and more about the fact that the Kindle 2 allows consumers to get a text version and an audio version for one price, instead of having to pay for both separately for a combined higher price.
I could understand the Guild's view if someone were taking original recordings made by the authors and sharing those files illegally, but shutting down a device because it can translate text into sound is baffling. I own the audio book of Neil Gaiman's Coraline recorded by Neil Gaiman himself. I purchased the audio book from iTunes. If I were to take that file and share it with other users without permission of the copyright holder, then I would be in trouble. However, if I repeat aloud Neil Gaiman's words myself, then no copyright laws would be violated. The Authors Guild cracking down on the speaking capability of the Kindle 2 has caused many consumers to not want to purchase the device from Amazon. Amazon.com is the leading seller of eBooks. Authors make money selling their books in eBook form for use on the Kindle system. Amazon.com also sells audio books, which are official recordings of readings made by publishing and record companies. I think the crack down on the Kindle 2 system is less about copyrights and more about the fact that the Kindle 2 allows consumers to get a text version and an audio version for one price, instead of having to pay for both separately for a combined higher price.
Music
A recent study at the B.I. Norwegian School of Management revealed, people that download music illegally also account for a large percent of online retail music sales (Brownlee, John). As someone who is an advent user of both Apple's iTunes and various BitTorrent clients, I can agree with the conclusion made from the survey. There are some artists that are not available through iTunes for various reasons, so users have to search elsewhere for such music. If I can't find it on iTunes I rarely choose to buy the music but instead search for and download the file at no charge. There are also times when copyright laws prevent users from buying music online that is from other countries. For instance, Missy Higgins is a singer and songwriter from Australia, on the US iTunes store there are about one hundred music files available for her. However on the Australian iTunes music store there are close to two hundred and fifty music files available for her. Living in the US and having registered my iTunes account with a US address, I am not allowed to purchase music from the Australian iTunes store. Instead I find it online illegally, as I cannot purchase it from any other US based store because of copyright laws. The music industry wonders why they lose money to illegal downloads, but they don’t realize the same copyright laws keeping various artists' music from being shared illegally, are also keeping It from being purchased legally.
I love Missy Higgins's music and I take every chance I get to legally purchase everything she creates, but when I am not allowed to purchase her music because of where I live, I do anything I can to obtain it. There have also been times in which a friend of mine has told me to check out a certain artist's music. Usually I'll check iTunes and listen to a sample of the music and if it sounds interesting I'll buy the song. Other times I buy entire albums on iTunes because of one or two songs I liked. Obtaining everything illegally doesn't help the industry, but being able to share music online that has already been purchased helps spread a particular artist's music to people who may not otherwise be able to obtain it. I also obtain a lot of my music directly from compact discs my friends own. I must also say, after seeing Missy Higgins for the first time during her performance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, if not for the internet, I never would have been able to learn as much about her and discover all the music she has to offer. Music downloaded from iTunes used to contain built in copyright protection that prevented those files from being used on other computers and other users iTunes programs; however, this past year iTunes stopped encoding their music and video files with copyright protection allowing for the files downloaded on iTunes to be used on different computers and with different iTunes user accounts.
I love Missy Higgins's music and I take every chance I get to legally purchase everything she creates, but when I am not allowed to purchase her music because of where I live, I do anything I can to obtain it. There have also been times in which a friend of mine has told me to check out a certain artist's music. Usually I'll check iTunes and listen to a sample of the music and if it sounds interesting I'll buy the song. Other times I buy entire albums on iTunes because of one or two songs I liked. Obtaining everything illegally doesn't help the industry, but being able to share music online that has already been purchased helps spread a particular artist's music to people who may not otherwise be able to obtain it. I also obtain a lot of my music directly from compact discs my friends own. I must also say, after seeing Missy Higgins for the first time during her performance on the Tonight Show with Jay Leno, if not for the internet, I never would have been able to learn as much about her and discover all the music she has to offer. Music downloaded from iTunes used to contain built in copyright protection that prevented those files from being used on other computers and other users iTunes programs; however, this past year iTunes stopped encoding their music and video files with copyright protection allowing for the files downloaded on iTunes to be used on different computers and with different iTunes user accounts.
File Sharing
Recently the operators of the internet site thepiratebay.org were charged and convicted of aiding in copyright infringement (The Pirate Bay Ruling). The Pirate Bay is an advanced search engine that finds BitTorrent files scattered across the web. Some of these files may contain copyrighted material in the form of but not limited to movies, music, books, television shows, and various photographs. Users, such as myself, can create a BitTorrent version of a file in our possession. Using a BitTorrent client, such as Vuze, enables users to share their BitTorrent files online. Sites like The Pirate Bay search for those files through various BitTorrent clients. Upon finding a file, users can then choose to download the file using a BitTorrent client of their choice. The BitTorrent client takes small pieces of that file from all the available sources the file is being shared from and puts them together to form the original file. The Pirate Bay is only one of many sites that search for BitTorrent files. BitTorrent file search engines are some of the most advanced search engines used in the online world at this time. However The Pirate Bay was not charged with federal copyright infringement because of the search engine it uses, but because of the way in which the site promoted the illegal files and refused to remove links to copyrighted files after being asked by the copyright holders.
I personally don't agree with charging the creators of The Pirate Bay with the allegations of copyright infringement. BitTorrent is a way for mass amounts of people to share different types of content online. Without sites such as The Pirate Bay it almost becomes impossible to find BitTorrent files; the BitTorrent clients only offer ways of downloading BitTorrent files. The Pirate Bay creators claim they should not be held responsible for the content that users share online as their site only searches for said content (The Pirate Bay Ruling). The government needs to rework the fine print of copyright laws. BitTorrent users gain nothing in the form of monetary value by sharing a file with someone else. Also most BitTorrent users give full recognition to the original owner or creator of a file. Copyright laws were originally intended to protect creators from having content stolen and passed off as works by other people. Now copyright laws are used as a way to prevent people from sharing content. In fact, if a person stops to analyze copyright law, if I were to record a sporting event on my TiVo and put it on a disc and watch it at a friend's house, I could face fines or go to jail for infringing upon the copyright of the broadcast.
I personally don't agree with charging the creators of The Pirate Bay with the allegations of copyright infringement. BitTorrent is a way for mass amounts of people to share different types of content online. Without sites such as The Pirate Bay it almost becomes impossible to find BitTorrent files; the BitTorrent clients only offer ways of downloading BitTorrent files. The Pirate Bay creators claim they should not be held responsible for the content that users share online as their site only searches for said content (The Pirate Bay Ruling). The government needs to rework the fine print of copyright laws. BitTorrent users gain nothing in the form of monetary value by sharing a file with someone else. Also most BitTorrent users give full recognition to the original owner or creator of a file. Copyright laws were originally intended to protect creators from having content stolen and passed off as works by other people. Now copyright laws are used as a way to prevent people from sharing content. In fact, if a person stops to analyze copyright law, if I were to record a sporting event on my TiVo and put it on a disc and watch it at a friend's house, I could face fines or go to jail for infringing upon the copyright of the broadcast.
Saturday, April 25, 2009
Cable Television
Last night I watched the first three episodes of "Harper's Island" online at the CBS website. I don't have cable service, but I still pick up all the standard local channels. CBS is one of those channels. However, working full time and attending classes at a local college, makes it difficult to find time to watch the local channels on television. The internet has provided me with a way to watch various shows at times that are convenient for me. In the fast paced world of today, less people are watching television as it is broadcast. By using sites such as Hulu.com, many people can watch various shows whenever they want. Realizing the impact the internet has had on their business, certain cable companies and television networks are moving toward offering online services to new and existing subscribers of television service. This means if a person has cable television service, their provider would offer the same programming online. This service would only be available to subscribers as an incentive to stay with cable.
The article compares cable companies now to the way record companies used to be. Record companies only used to provide music in album form. Many customers, including myself, may not have wanted all the music from a particular album. If we as consumers only wanted one song on an album we were forced to find it somewhere online and obtain it illegally, that is, before iTunes became available. Cable service providers also only provide bundles of content. As of now there is no offer to only pay for the channels you want or know you will watch. Before I started working on this project, I would often times talk to a coworker of mine about how I wished cable companies would offer individual channels. I personally feel cable companies providing their services online, is a great idea, but only to people who are already subscribers. As stated previously, I don't subscribe to cable service. I still look for television being streamed online. I recently discovered a site called Justin.tv. On Justin.tv different users stream television broadcasts online as they are being aired on television. I don't foresee this lasting too much longer as it cuts into cable television profits and as the broadcasters online do not own the rights to the media they are broadcasting.
The article compares cable companies now to the way record companies used to be. Record companies only used to provide music in album form. Many customers, including myself, may not have wanted all the music from a particular album. If we as consumers only wanted one song on an album we were forced to find it somewhere online and obtain it illegally, that is, before iTunes became available. Cable service providers also only provide bundles of content. As of now there is no offer to only pay for the channels you want or know you will watch. Before I started working on this project, I would often times talk to a coworker of mine about how I wished cable companies would offer individual channels. I personally feel cable companies providing their services online, is a great idea, but only to people who are already subscribers. As stated previously, I don't subscribe to cable service. I still look for television being streamed online. I recently discovered a site called Justin.tv. On Justin.tv different users stream television broadcasts online as they are being aired on television. I don't foresee this lasting too much longer as it cuts into cable television profits and as the broadcasters online do not own the rights to the media they are broadcasting.
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