January 15, 2007
Volume 16, Issue 4
INTENT Offers Nettwerk Music & Joins A2IM
DCIA Member INTENT MediaWorks, a leading provider of technology for online distribution of licensed digital media, is partnering with fellow Member Nettwerk Music Group to distribute Nettwerk’s large and ever expanding catalog of artists, such as Barenaked Ladies, Sarah McLachlan, and Avril Lavigne.
Nettwerk has been responsible for the release of over 400 albums that have amassed worldwide sales in excess of 100 million copies, including multiple number one albums and singles.
"Nettwerk believes in putting music where fans spend their time and allowing them to decide how to consume it," said Terry McBride, CEO of Nettwerk and a visionary proponent for the future of music distribution.
"INTENT’s approach to digital distribution takes advantage of the sheer volume of the peer-to-peer (P2P) audience in a meaningful manner. It combines the promotional, marketing, and revenue tools necessary for artists to take control of their art and career."
INTENT puts licensed music and video into general circulation via P2P networks, websites, and social networking destinations. Its technology tracks each file as it makes its way through the Internet for rights holders.
This week INTENT also joined the American Association of Independent Music (A2IM), representing a broad coalition of independent music labels. The organization is committed to promoting sector opportunity and enhancing market share for its membership.
"With nearly 30% of the market, indies are gaining prominence at a rapid pace. INTENT offers a way for these artists to significantly accelerate their market presence and adoption," said Les Ottolenghi, CEO of INTENT MediaWorks.
"People have shared music for decades and online channels are a natural evolution of the practice. File sharers represent behavioral marketing at its best and should be embraced. INTENT brings much needed structure to the P2P market with a platform for profitable and consumer-friendly distribution of digital entertainment," he added.
INTENT MediaWorks CEO Les Ottolenghi will deliver the opening keynote address at the upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY.
VeriSign Powers NBX & Partners with Adobe
DCIA Member VeriSign, a leading provider of intelligent infrastructure for the networked world, this week announced that NBX, an online sports entertainment company, will use the new VeriSign Intelligent Content Delivery Network (ICDN) to improve its user experience for online video.
VeriSign is enabling NBX.com to securely deliver high-quality podcasts and videocasts to sports fans via the Internet. The NBX Fantasy Sportsbook combines fantasy sports betting with an activity-based social network and original sports media programming.
"Like other media companies, sports entertainment companies need a secure and cost-effective way to distribute the Internet-based content their customers are demanding," said Todd Johnson, Senior Vice president for Global Marketing at VeriSign.
"The VeriSign ICDN, through the latest streaming technology and Kontiki P2P technology, enables NBX to offer the best possible experience for sports fans by providing them a choice in how their content is delivered."
According to the Center for Media Research, the top five sports websites alone boast more than 60 million visitors. In addition, an estimated 20 million fantasy sports players were online in 2006.
VeriSign this week also announced its intent to collaborate with Adobe Systems on integrating Flash technologies with VeriSign’s peer assisted content distribution technology, setting a new standard in the delivery of high-quality video content.
The first phase is expected to consist of VeriSign incorporating Adobe Flash Media Server 2 into its new globally deployed ICDN, enabling publishers to deliver high-fidelity video-on-demand and MP3 audio streaming services across a high-performance, secure and reliable CDN.
The two companies also intend to work together to integrate future versions of next generation media technologies leveraging VeriSign’s Kontiki P2P technology and Adobe’s award winning Flash Video software. The combined services will allow companies to deliver customized interactive Flash Video experiences, including movies, TV shows, broadcast media, and user interface technologies.
Through Adobe Flash Player, the ubiquitous cross platform client runtime installed on more than 700 million connected PCs and devices worldwide, users are able to instantly view video content.
VeriSign Senior Vice president for Global Marketing Todd Johnson will deliver a keynote address at the upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY.
Report from CEO Marty Lafferty
 Congratulations to Gary Shapiro and the entire Consumer Electronics Association (CEA) team for their colossal success with the 2007 International Consumer Electronics Show (CES).
We are proud to be an allied association, and very grateful for our opportunities to participate in this enormous market.
The DCIA conducted a panel and announced speakers for our upcoming P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY at CES. Please click here to register now and save up to $200.
We especially thank CES Next Generation P2P panelists for generously contributing to a very informative session: Robert Summer, Executive Chairman, iMesh; Michael Weiss, President & CEO, StreamCast Networks; Pete Bradley, VP, Business Development, Azureus; Jonathan Lee, VP, Business Development, MediaDefender; Andy Cooper, President, INTENT MediaWorks; Jamie Perlman, Director, Business Development, SNOCAP; and Peter Kang, Partner, Sidley Austin.
Bob distinguished between open and closed P2P applications, acknowledging that it took some time for iMesh to become convinced that content filtering was possible. Asking rhetorically, "What’s working that should not be working?" the answer is iMesh as a fast-growing subscription service that is learning to "compete with free" by providing real value to its subscribers. On P2P’s evolving legal front, Bob remarked that it is important to keep in mind that US precedent affects what will happen worldwide.
For the benefit of entertainment industry leaders struggling with the digital realm, Bob recalled a relevant experience at Sony Music International when he retained the London School of Economics as a third-party unimpeachable source to conduct a study helping determine new strategy. Looking ahead, Bob envisions P2P as a natural for user-generated content (UGC), but also notes that the verdict is out on what the UGC business model will be, or whether indeed there will even be one per se.
Mike announced that Morpheus has been downloaded 165 million times and that, with its new patent, StreamCast Networks intends to play a prominent role in media convergence. He cited promising new affiliations to distribute ad-supported content, such as with INTENT MediaWorks and Nettwerk Music Group, which have huge potential. Mike complained that protracted legal activity has had a profound effect on Morpheus, but that the company now has renewed hope that the entertainment industry will fully accept P2P, as exemplified by CBS CEO Les Moonves’ keynote address.
A new goal at CBS is to build communities with great content as the catalyst, and to transform the broadcast TV network into an audience company. Mike recalled how many times the phrase "a cold day in hell" has presaged a historic step forward in media development, and now this applies to P2P as majors are at last licensing the channel. He cited Les Moonves again as his "new guru" for embracing progressive revenue-sharing plans and proclaiming that there are no longer old media and new media, but rather just media. Mike is enthusiastic that P2P is on the ascendance again, with headlines such as Google partnering with a P2P company in China.
Pete Bradley exclaimed that Azureus is the largest BitTorrent client; now growing by 500 thousand downloads per week. Azureus defines its mission as the highly efficient delivery of content, including feature-length high-definition video, along with strong support for social networking. BBC America, which is one of a number of major content providers already to have licensed content to Azureus, exemplifies how such entities are now seeing the value of low-cost high-resolution P2P distribution to tech-savvy audiences.
UGC and independent works will be supported increasingly on P2P platforms as well. In terms of P2P video content origination, Pete believes the medium lends itself to the likes of a breakthrough "Blair Witch Project" type of production that will mark a significant turning point for the industry.
Jonathan explained MediaDefender’s traditional copyright enforcement role through the deployment of spoofs and decoys as well as its newer activities supporting licensed downloads. He noted that MP3s continue to be the most popular music format on P2P, and expressed optimism about the development of ad-supported models that will drive significant revenue through this emerging channel.
He voiced the view that with consumers now able to easily download a new P2P client whenever an old one ceases to be attractive to them, that there are now exponentially greater challenges faced in enforcement efforts than when there was just Napster. Remarking that YouTube should have been P2P, Jonathan foresees that the "sell" on P2P-based services will be "all about lifestyle," and that the major content providers need to streamline negotiating processes and accelerate the licensing of their content.
Andy disclosed that INTENT MediaWorks now distributes 2 million licensed files per day into open P2Ps and other high-traffic venues, and that the most value is being generated by using P2P to create lifestyle media products. Business issues that must be addressed include the fact that open P2P users have become habituated to a free experience, and there continues to be a need for major content companies to get in front of end-user traffic by licensing their material more aggressively. He observed that litigation settlements and resultant market share aberrations among P2P clients have had no effect on the overall steady growth pattern of P2P usage, and saw irony in YouTube’s $2.6 billion valuation.
Andy advised that major content suppliers need to remember that distribution is good, and that the endgame is not to lock content down, but to successfully monetize it. Creative marketing has not yet been applied to P2P. Licensing processes remain too complex to adequately support needed experimentation with new business models. Entertainment industry leaders need to ask themselves what are the consumers doing. P2P is just a protocol and in the future the issues addressed on this panel won’t be discussed in the same way: there is a lot of interesting content, and there will be a lot of ways to monetize it.
Jamie outlined SNOCAP’s central role in the online content distribution chain as a digital registry to support rights holders’ monetization of their works through P2P and other distribution mechanisms. He analogized that P2Ps are comparable to social networks in that when operators simply filter and clamp down on copyright infringement users just go to the next new network. The key to advancement is to come up with a better value proposition than unlicensed material, like branded bottled water versus tap water.
It’s time to accept the fact that technology got ahead of all of us, and now we must work together to harness it. Issues are complicated and considerations must be given both to P2P as a technology as well as to P2P as a content community. Jamie is sanguine about the future of digital media as networked devices proliferate and consumers experience the benefits of new subscription services.
Peter Kang described his role at Sidley Austin as an intellectual property (IP) attorney, supporting the protection of IP by parties involved in various points along the P2P distribution chain. He characterized the current status of commercial development of P2P as one in which all parties are struggling to find the winning business model(s). As a general proposition, litigation settlements are good; they are like deals and facilitate forward progress.
On the other hand, consumer litigation is ill advised versus improved education programs. Peter advised entertainment companies to embrace P2P technology; not despise or fear it. It can be helpful at this juncture to set up internal R&D efforts, growing internal technical capabilities with the help of outside experts, including P2P developers. P2P will grow along with the expansion of social networking as we move ahead.
Audience questions led into a discussion of the Venice Project’s likely effect on improving the entertainment industry’s perception of P2P and its expected impact on the video marketplace. Ultramercial and Shared Media Licensing were cited as attractive business models to be adopted by larger industry players. Digital rights management (DRM) is viewed by many as both restrictive and anti-competitive in the ways that it has been implemented to date.
The central issue is digital distribution and the primary need is to define more robust online channels. The nature of such new channels, of which P2P and especially P2PTV are by far the most promising, must be factored into strategic decisions about how to best exploit them to achieve optimal distribution. That is a conundrum for further discussion. Share wisely, and take care.
CBS Amps up Online Efforts
Excerpted from Online Minute Report by Wendy Davis
CBS intends to amp up its online efforts. At least, that’s what Les Moonves, network President, told the crowd this week at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.
"There’s no such thing as old or new media anymore; we’re just media," he said, according to United Press International. "Whether ‘programming’ means ‘CSI’ or ‘C++,’ we’re all playing on the same big digital field."
Moonves announced a slew of initiatives, including a new deal to bring the "Star Trek" franchise to virtual reality site Second Life. As described by The Wall Street Journal, that arrangement will involve creating a simulated version of the Starship Enterprise on the site.
The CBS exec additionally touted the benefits of free online content. As he said at a Goldman Sachs conference last September, CBS increased its revenue from webcasts of the NCAA tournament 18 fold – from $250,000 to $4.5 million – when it moved from an online subscription model to an ad-supported one.
CBS also plans soon to start testing a SlingBox service that lets users share video clips from TV shows – even though doing so may well violate the network’s copyright.
‘‘If somebody spends the time to take 20 clips from ‘CSI Miami,’ I think that’s wonderful,’’ Moonves told The Associated Press. ‘‘That only makes him more involved with my show and want to come to CBS on Monday night and watch my show."
The Demise of Digital Rights Management
Excerpted from MediaPost Report
Despite Apple’s announcement this week that it’s sold 2 billion songs on iTunes, digital rights management (DRM) is on the decline. Consumers, in fact, are so frustrated with the restrictive software they’ve sued companies like Apple and Universal Music Group from using DRM on their music, citing anti-trust law.
Regardless of how those lawsuits turn out, the writing is on the wall. CD sales continue to drop, down 15% since 2000, but current digital sales aren’t picking up that slack. Apple, with its 2 billion songs sold, accounts for most of digital sales – 20 times more than eMusic, the industry’s No. 2 reseller. Just about everyone else in the music game, from Sony to Microsoft to Yahoo to Amazon.com, which plans to enter the business this year, want to see DRM go away.
Why? Because Apple is able to monopolize the music download business through its DRM software. It has the market-leading music player – a music player that won’t play other music companies’ files. No one else can get users to buy a player and the music to make a dent in Apple’s monopoly. Competitors want to be able to sell songs that play on the iPod and the only way to do this is to bring Apple to court. Meanwhile, many consumers have decided that it’s just easier to steal music. Please click here for the full report.
Exclusive: Inside the Venice Project
Excerpted from NewTeeVee Report by Om Malik
The Venice Project (TVP) is not just another online video start-up. The Luxembourg-based company is the latest co-production of the two-person hit factory of Niklas Zennstrom and Janus Friis.
The founders of DCIA Members Kazaa and Skype are hoping that TVP will upend the television experience just as their earlier efforts turned the music and phone businesses on their respective heads.
And while the glam duo might hog the headlines, the task of making TVP a reality falls on the shoulders of Fredrik de Wahl, a lanky Swede with a quiet demeanor who has been a cohort of Messrs. Zennstrom and Friis for more than half a decade.
Unlike many of his Silicon Valley counterparts de Wahl prefers to stay out of the limelight. Sipping on his steaming hot, standard-issue Starbucks coffee, de Wahl outlined the vision for TVP and answered our questions about TVP’s underlying technologies.
After Zennstrom left to work full-time as the CEO of Skype, de Wahl took over as the chief executive of Joltid, the company that controls the P2P technology that powers not only Kazaa, but also Skype and now TVP. "Skype licenses the P2P technology from Joltid," de Wahl says.
He explains that just like a "Skylib" enables voice and chat services on the Joltid’s P2P layer, TVP runs on a media streaming library the company has nicknamed "Anthill." The company uses a H.264 codec licensed from CoreCodec, a US-based company, much in the manner Global IP Sound provided the voice codecs for Skype. "CoreCodec is the best of breed H.264 video codec and is efficient and has the high quality we need," de Wahl says.
Running on top of these core technologies is a highly modified version of the Mozilla browser, which makes it easy for the company to port its client to any operating system – Mac, Linux or even mobile operating systems. The user interface is built using SVG technology. In other words, it’s a web-enabled hybrid application, much like the brilliant Songbird meta-music client.
The Mozilla framework will allow the company to layer web services into its client – social networking, video sharing and chat – to mention a few.
"I think very soon people can start writing plug-ins for TVP," he says. Mozilla has blossomed because of its lightweight footprint, security features, but mostly because of a vibrant developer community that has written plug-ins that extend Mozilla in many different ways.
He says, "SVG is not the only technology used for the user interface, although it is the most used. XUL, XHTML and CSS are also used. This product is a great proof that XML-based markup technologies are ideal to create internet-integrated desktop applications."
By embracing the off-the-shelf technologies, he says, "It buys the company time to market." Like the TVP client, he expects more and more start-ups to use the Mozilla framework to build hybrid applications, because this reduces the "software cycle" quite drastically.
When asked if a Mac client was in the cards, de Wahl confirmed that the company was working on a client, but declined to give a timeline. A Linux client is also on the drawing board. "Basically we can port this to any platform including Apple TV and set-top boxes within weeks not months," he added. Even PS3 and Nintendo Wii.
"We are in the beta phase and are trying to solve all the technical issues, because we want to go to content producers with a full solution," says de Wahl. He points out that the system is built for content owners to not only expand online, but also retain their branding, and monetize that content as well.
He argues that since the company will be able to offer global-sized audiences to the professional content creators, TVP will attract more and more content. Of course everyone is trying to do exactly that, including a Google-gobbled YouTube and well-funded start-ups such as Brightcove. But de Wahl argues that the TVP platform can deliver content geo-targeting and more focused advertising.
As our conversation came to an end, what stuck was that Skype succeeded for two reasons – it made phone calls free, showing incumbents the longest finger of the human hand at a 90-degree angle. The second reason was that it was drop-dead simple to use. At least TVP has got that one covered. Please click here for a first look at TVP.
DCINFO Editor’s Note: Please click here for a related Wall Street Journal weekend edition article.
MediaZone Launches P2PTV
Excerpted from NewTeeVee Report by Liz Gannes
MediaZone, an enabler of subscription online television services for companies such as NBC Sports, announced Tuesday the beta-launch of an ad-supported P2P streaming online television network. The idea is essentially cable-style television offered for free online.
As opposed to on-demand efforts such as Brightcove and the Venice Project, MediaZone will offer linear, streamed programming. It is Windows-only, with a P2P client available either via ActiveX or desktop app. You won’t get any of the fancy premium content all the VOD players are fighting for, but you will get free instant content.
"As we’re expanding into a broadband offering, particularly one that’s free and advertising supported, P2P allows it to be financially viable," said MediaZone CEO Michelle Wu in an interview last week.
The launch of MediaZone’s "Social TV" includes channels for local programming from places such as China and Trinidad and Tobago, and extreme sports. MediaZone will enable larger sites to play channels as well as provide advertising and hosting on its own destination site for smaller programmers.
Though "Social TV" doesn’t pack much punch as a moniker, MediaZone is following through on the name by including chat, ratings, comments, and blogging features alongside channels.
For now everything will be free, though future versions of Social TV promise to have subscription and pay-per-view options, according to the company.
San Carlos, CA-based MediaZone is a subsidiary of South African media company Naspers. Wu, an entrepreneur with experience at Xerox PARC and the China Internet Group, says she runs the two-and-a-half-year-old company as if it were a startup and Naspers an investor. She leads 80 employees in the United States and an additional 250 in China.
Escape Media Group Introduces Grooveshark
Escape Media Group this week introduced Grooveshark, a new P2P music-sharing community that will compensate both copyright holders and members who participate in the community.
Grooveshark combines the best of P2P file sharing and online music purchase sites into one service. Visitors can browse songs uploaded by other members and pay to download MP3 files with no DRM technology. Songs vary in price, but cost no more than 99 cents. Grooveshark will pay appropriate royalties to copyright holders by taking commissions from users’ transactions and also compensate users with free music for community participation such as uploading songs, fixing song tags, flagging unwanted files, or reviewing music. Members will be rewarded based on their level of contribution to the community.
"Our bottom line is value. By bringing the convenience and selection of a P2P network together with the recommendation power of a community of friends – all the while removing DRM – we can generate revenue to compensate both copyright holders and users," said Sam Tarantino, 20-year-old founder and CEO of Escape Media Group, the parent company of Grooveshark.
Because all Grooveshark files are DRM-free MP3s, they can be played on any computer or digital music player, so users no longer risk losing the ability to play songs in their collection if they change their computer or player.
Grooveshark will function much like popular P2P file exchanges. Members can offer their media library for sale through Grooveshark and discover and share new music with other members (only MP3 or OGG files without DRM). The difference: Grooveshark will broker music transactions by charging up to 99 cents for each song downloaded and use those proceeds to pay royalties to the copyright holders and reward members for community participation.
"Much of the success of P2P networks can be amplified by a community aspect – allowing users to find someone with similar musical tastes and sample songs from their collection to find new artists or rare and unique songs and genres," said Tarantino. "By harnessing the power of user-generated content (UGC), Grooveshark can bring together online community elements, compensate artists and users and provide customers with control over their music by eliminating unfair DRM schemes," he added.
OkCupid Raises $6 Million
Excerpted from GigaOM Report
DCIA Member OkCupid, a free online dating service, has raised $6 million from a group of angels, CEO Sam Yagan told GigaOM. "Our goal is to reduce GDP by half a million dollars by completely eliminating the subscription online dating market."
Yagan says he can run a successful dating site without making people pay. OkCupid currently has 600,000 active users (measured as those who’ve logged on in the last 90 days). It’s not apples-to-apples, but industry leader Match.com has 1.3 million subscribers.
"All of the big guys think users want to pay for dating because paying for something equals quality," says Yagan. "Well, unless Match.com has some way of getting Tom Cruise and all the actors and actresses to stand behind a firewall, our users are their users."
The new funding will go toward broadening marketing efforts beyond viral growth, and expanding to non-English speaking users in Europe and Asia.
Yagan, who’s led two companies before but never taken venture capital, talked to 20 different VC firms last year and received a number of term sheets, but didn’t like the proposed equity distribution. Instead, he went with five angels.
Yagan previously founded two immensely popular consumer Internet products: SparkNotes, the online alternative to Cliffs Notes that was bought by Barnes & Noble in 2001, and eDonkey, the P2P file-sharing application.
New Chip to Move BitTorrent Beyond PCs
Excerpted from Intl Business Times Report by Thomas Fredrickson
Trading movies and other large data files online through the popular BitTorrent delivery platform may soon happen on simple consumer devices, thanks to a pair of companies that are creating specifically designed processors that can handle what PCs can do today.
Iadea, a Taiwan-based licensee of BitTorrent technology, and Star Semiconductor, an affiliate of semiconductor giant UMC Group, jointly announced the world’s first BitTorrent-optimized microprocessor chip on Thursday.
Most of the BitTorrent downloads today are done by software that runs on the PC. The new microprocessor will enable consumer electronics hardware makers to create devices that directly download and play BitTorrent content.
"I remember in the old days people first watched DVDs on the PC, like how BitTorrent is used on the PC today," says Steven Huang, Chairman and CEO of Star Semiconductor, co-developer of the new chip. "Very soon our chip will enable millions of consumer devices to run BitTorrent and help consumers do what they do today on the PC using just a simple remote control."
The companies said that two versions of the chips will be available, with both chips featuring an ARM922 processor core, network interface, and dual USB 2.0 high-speed ports. The features, the firms say, allow the chip to be used in embedded consumer products, such as routers, DVD players, set-top boxes, and other digital media appliances.
"New digital appliances utilizing our chip work cooperatively to deliver large media files," said John C. Wang, CEO of Iadea. "We see this trend emerging as ‘Web 3.0’ where each consumer becomes part of a universal content storage and delivery system. Our new chip plays a part in the new paradigm by making BitTorrent available efficiently and economically.
The peer-assisted digital content delivery platform, BitTorrent, allows files to be distributed to users across the Internet. Parts of a desired file are distributed by many users who have the file already, relieving the strain and dependence put on typical centralized servers. Since its creation, the technology has amassed a user base of over 135 million worldwide.
Recently, BitTorrent has signed content license agreements with several entertainment companies to help distribute large media files to viewers simultaneously without heavy investment into server hardware and bandwidth.
The BitTorrent-optimized STR9810/20 microprocessors will be available in Q1 2007. The chips will be available to systems designers starting at $8.75 in quantities of 1,000.
Avvenu to Enable Music Sharing
Excerpted from Associated Press Report
A new online music service lets people share music stored on their PCs with other computer users or those with web-enabled mobile phones.
Using the free Avvenu Music Player, which is scheduled to launch this week, users select tracks they wish to share and send links via e-mail. Recipients click on the link to listen to the songs for as many as five days on standard web browsers.
Google Takes Pro File-Sharing Stance
Excerpted from Slyck.com Report by Steve Donaldson
With Google’s recent investment in Chinese company Xunlei Network Technology, it has unequivocally taken a stance that is pro file-sharing.
Xunlei is the developer and creator of the Thunderbolt Download Accelerator, which, in the style of GetRight or Flashget, supports multi-source downloading and resumption if the transfer is interrupted. What hasn’t been adequately reported are the details of what Thunderbolt in fact is: a P2P file-sharing application. Xunlei is a web portal first, but also produces the widely used Chinese P2P application which now includes a new Google toolbar installation option during setup. Google search is now also a prominent option on the Xunlei.com portal.
It’s probable that Google is hoping to crack the second biggest online search market, of which they are a small player, by leveraging the over 100 million users estimated to have downloaded Thunderbolt in China.
After installing the Thunderbolt P2P client, the end-user is greeted with a fairly slick interface. Links to the latest media are prominent on the interface’s main page. These links in the format "url=thunder://QUFodHR..../," are reminiscent of BitTorrent and include the typical metadata and hash of the file in question.
Upon opening the Thunderbolt P2P application, the user is greeted with thumbnails of the latest releases in the right-hand menu from which a couple of key-presses will garner a Thunder link to a file which is then automatically loaded into the Thunder client. The extent of the content available on the Thunder network is typical of most file-sharing networks: movies, music, applications, and so on.
The Thunderbolt application itself features a sharing aspect and utilizes web caches to aid in accelerating downloads. Other features include streaming video, YouTube-like video streams, integrated chat, and a ratings feature, as well as built-in media playing functionality. Once the end-user gets over the animated advertising and browser pop-ups inherent in the client, it functions rather efficiently. The impetus behind the client is to facilitate multi-source downloads to gain maximum download speeds within the underdeveloped Internet infrastructure currently in place in China. The current infrastructure closely resembles North America’s dial-up heavy populous a decade ago - including the advertising model of pop-ups and animated graphics, but with modern-day tools.
In short, Xunlei, sponsored by Google, is acting much like a typical file-sharing network: facilitating the aggregating and locating of material via the Thunderbolt application, then creating and releasing free-of-charge the application with which to download content, and acting as a tracker for others with the same file including web caches containing the file.
Senators Revive Net Neutrality Push
Excerpted from Technology Daily Report by David Hatch
Senators Byron Dorgan, D-ND, and Olympia Snowe, R-ME, Tuesday reintroduced legislation designed to ensure that the Internet remains open and accessible to all consumers and competitors.
The so-called network neutrality bill is expected to trigger a fresh round of fierce lobbying over Internet regulation, extending last year’s telecommunications debate into 2007.
The nine-page "Internet Freedom Preservation Act" is intended to restrict high-speed Internet service providers from discriminating against competitors by offering preferential treatment to companies for a fee.
Co-sponsors include three potential presidential contenders – Senators Hillary Rodham Clinton, D-NY; John Kerry, D-MA; and Barack Obama, D-IL – along with Senate Judiciary Chairman Patrick Leahy, D-VT.
On the other side of Capitol Hill, House Energy and Commerce Chairman John Dingell, D-MI, told reporters Wednesday that passing net neutrality legislation would be a "high priority" this year. He also indicated that there would be major telecommunications legislation in 2007, despite some industry predictions to the contrary.
Last June, Snowe and Dorgan failed in an effort to add net neutrality language to sweeping telecom legislation authored by then-Senate Commerce Chairman Ted Stevens, R-AK. The amendment was rebuffed on an 11-11 tie, but the larger bill eventually stalled.
The latest net neutrality proposal likely would require a broader legislative vehicle in order for it to move, sources said.
The latest developments on Capitol Hill come less than two weeks after AT&T’s reluctant agreement to abide by net neutrality regulations for two years as a condition of its merger with BellSouth.
Jeannine Kenney, a senior policy analyst at Consumers Union, said the condition has provided an "impetus" for Internet restrictions to be applied to all broadband providers.
But, in a statement, Verizon Communications lobbyist Peter Davidson insisted that while his company supports the rights of consumers to fully access the Internet, it does not think legislation is necessary.
"Net neutrality – better named net regulation – is trying to solve a problem that doesn’t exist," he contended.
Coming Events of Interest
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MidemNet Forum – January 20th-21st in Cannes. France. International business leaders will meet to network and exchange digital music knowledge. Held at MIDEM, the world’s music market, the MidemNet Forum was sold out in 2006 with over 1,200 decision-makers. DCIA Member INTENT MediaWorks will co-sponsor the A2IM’s popular American Independent Pavilion at MIDEM 2007.
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P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY – February 6th–8th in New York, NY. The Winter DCIA Conference & Exposition will cover policy, marketing, and technology issues affecting commercial development of this emerging high-growth industry. Exhibits and demonstrations will feature industry-leading products and services, including the newest phenomenon, P2PTV. For sponsor packages and speaker information, please contact Karen Kaplowitz at 888-890-4240 or karen@dcia.info. Plan now to attend.
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Media Summit New York (MSNY) – February 7th–8th in New York, NY. Digital Hollywood’s premier international conference on motion pictures, television, cable & satellite, broadband, wireless, publishing, radio, magazines, news & print media, advertising and marketing. Your registration for the full P2P MEDIA SUMMIT NY Conference & Exposition includes this event as well.
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CONSUMER 2.0: Meeting the Demands of the Connected Consumer - February 21st-22nd in Toronto, Canada. The era of mass media is giving way to one of personal and participatory media. People no longer passively consume media but actively participate, which usually means creating content, in whatever form and on whatever scale. To remain relevant, advertisers and the media need to tap into this energy for innovation and communication by integrating the social media with their marketing mix.
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Digital Music Forum East – February 27th–28th in New York, NY. For the past six years, the most influential decision-makers in the music industry have gathered at Digital Media Wire’s annual music conference. They come to network, do deals, and share ideas about the future of the music business. Participants have described the event as a "melting pot of the best of the best in digital music" where ideas are shared and opinions don’t go unchallenged.
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IPTV World Forum – March 5th-7th in London, England. Mikkel Dissing, CEO of DCIA Member RawFlow, will speak on "TVoverNet: Threat or Opportunity." The company will also demonstrate SelfCast, its revolutionary new live publishing tool for user-generated broadcasting at Booth 70. SelfCast can be built into any existing social community site to allow for live broadcasting of video and audio.
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