August 17, 2009
Volume XXVII, Issue 7
Cloud Computing to Surpass $160 Billion By 2015
Excerpted from Mass High Tech Report
Research and Markets has announced its 609-page study Worldwide Cloud Computing Market Shares, Strategies, and Forecasts, 2009-2015. Cloud computing has many aspects related to a range of industries moving to leverage the Internet. Cloud systems are poised for significant growth as web-based applications are used to implement automated processes. Information available on the cloud is anticipated to increase substantially by 2015.
Worldwide cloud computing will achieve significant growth as enterprise software offered by vendors provides competitive advantages to users and the cost of improving search-engine functionality is spread across a broad base of users. The markets are expanding in response to the need to provide core productivity improvements for personal and business innovation. People will get better computing services paid for by advertising because 3 billion users is a very attractive audience.
Google has long envisioned and prepared for this change in the scale of the quantity of information to be managed. For clouds to reach their potential, they need to be as easy to program as it is to navigate the web. This new programming paradigm opens up growing markets for cloud search and software tools. Google and a host of other companies are beginning to offer application development without programming capabilities to users.
Developers can operate an application-testing infrastructure in the cloud. This saves time and money compared to traditional test scenarios. Testing more extensively and enabling faster hand-off from development to operations are achieved. Users get a transparent view of application performance, reliability, and scalability. Testing can be done before going into production. Users can test multiple architectures, variables, components, and configurations easily and independently. To proceed to deploy in the cloud, developers can push the debugged test environment live in a few simple steps.
Real-time analysis of information is being used to position companies to achieve competitive advantages. Cloud computing is a central aspect of the business process management (BPM) initiative, providing up-to-date information in a usable format. Companies are implementing BPM solutions in the context of cloud computing that provides syntax to business users.
Cloud computing markets at $36 billion in 2008 are expected to reach $160.2 billion by 2015. Advertising drives cloud computing. The markets are comprised of search engines, communications technology, application development without programming, and customer relationship management (CRM) automation.
Accustream: CDN Accounts Growing at More than 23% in 2009
Content delivery networks (CDNs) are achieving another year of double-digit growth in 2009, writing new contracts at a 23.3% pace above 2008, powering top-line revenue forecasts up 16.4% to $1.37 billion across the segment.
The US market currently generates an estimated 55.8% of the global CDN total, though international traffic is now increasing at a faster rate than its domestic counterpart, according to an industry report by AccuStream Research.
The report, "CDN 2010: Revenue, R&D, Cap-Ex, and Operational Analytics" provides comprehensive market performance metrics for each CDN, including monthly recurring revenue (MRR), total accounts, servers, penetration into video content verticals, video advertising, and user generated video (UGV).
In a year of steep bandwidth price declines at transit and retail provisioning levels, CDNs are managing margins by focusing on network operations efficiencies while pivoting toward the future: cap-ex investment is forecast to rise 9.2% to $149 million in 2009.
R&D is targeting new and expanding business areas including whole-site delivery, dynamic content, live video, high-definition (HD), mobile/iPhone, non-PC devices, adaptive bit-rate streaming, and support for Microsoft's Smooth Streaming solution.
Bandwidth costs (transit, co-location, power) make up the largest component (65%) of each retail contract, 59% of the cost of goods sold (COGS).
Of the 22.5 billion professional video views served in 2009, Akamai delivered 31.9%, Limelight Networks 12%, and Level 3 11.2%. Additional CDNs analyzed include Abacast, BitGravity, CD Networks, Cotendo, Edgecast Networks, Internap, Liquid Compass, Mirror Image, and Velocix (recently acquired by Alcatel-Lucent), among others.
"2009 and 2010 are transformational years for CDNs," commented AccuStream Research Director Paul Palumbo.
"We expect MRR growth to resume in 2010 as CDNs control more overage traffic, reduce exposure to under-performing accounts, and acquire dynamic object and advanced applications support," he added.
Report from CEO Marty Lafferty
 The DCIA is very grateful to all who shared with us a number of thoughtful recommendations for improving the text of HR 1319: The Informed P2P User Act. We are on track to submit a proposal that combines these informed, logical, and responsible suggestions to US House of Representatives' Energy & Commerce Committee staff this week.
As DCINFO readers will recall, HR 1319 was re-introduced to the current session of Congress by Congresswoman Mary Bono Mack (R-CA) along with Congressmen John Barrow (D-GA) and Joe Barton (R-TX) in March, and was the subject of a legislative hearing conducted by the Subcommittee on Commerce, Trade, and Consumer Protection in May.
Our written testimony submitted for the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee hearing on this same topic in July reflects both our proactive support through ongoing self-regulatory efforts for the intentions of this bill, and also our continuing concerns with unintended consequences and unenforceability.
This is not meant as a negative criticism of the efforts of the bill's authors. While relatively short in length, the bill is decidedly long in terms of drafting challenges. Its stated purpose is one which all industry participants can wholeheartedly support: "to prevent the improper disclosure of personal information."
The full-title of the measure could and, we believe, should elaborate on this as follows: "a bill to prevent the inadvertent disclosure of sensitive information originating on a computer through the use of file-sharing programs by first providing notice and obtaining consent from the owner or authorized user of the computer.''
This is completely in line with the public record associated with this legislative proposal: "Far too many people have no idea that they could be sharing all of their personal files and documents" said its chief sponsor Congresswoman Bono Mack. "This bill will empower individuals by making them aware and keeping them from inadvertently sharing their private information with complete strangers." Examples given by Congressman Barrow in endorsing the bill were inadvertent sharing of tax returns, financial records, and medical records. Congressman Barton cited as his reason for signing on, "A person's private information should not be unknowingly shared with others on a file-sharing network."
In publicizing the legislative hearing, the Congresswoman added, "People need to realize that by using a file-sharing program, they may be inadvertently sharing all of their personal files, such as medical records, bank statements, and tax returns, with anyone on the network." And at the hearing, she asked, "How many more medical records and tax returns is it going to take for us to act?"
This week's court conviction and sentencing in Seattle, WA of an individual who misused file-sharing software to commit computer fraud and identify (ID) theft, underscores the problem that this bill and the distributed computing industry are seeking preemptively to address.
To put this issue in perspective, US consumers and businesses lose $50 billion to ID theft in some 15 million cases each year. This was just the second-ever such case involving file-sharing software and the total amount of losses were less than $26 thousand.
Nevertheless, the industry's view of this problem is that no amount of victimization due to inadvertent file sharing is acceptable. Leading P2P and file-sharing software distributors have committed to eradicate this potential problem where it makes the most sense to do so - at its source, before personal, sensitive, or confidential data can be disclosed - in an organized approach led by the Inadvertent Sharing Protection Working Group (ISPG), which has developed a set of principles to protect consumers from this risk.
Representative companies are now engaged in a review process with the US Federal Trade Commission (FTC)'s of initial compliance reports that these firms have submitted after taking steps to voluntarily implement these principles.
Meanwhile, Congresswoman Bono Mack's legislative measure has garnered strong bipartisan support, now counting thirty-six co-sponsors, mostly as a result of the entertainment industry's concerted efforts to repurpose the bill as an anti-piracy rubric. Our proposal to Committee staff will address key problems identified in the initial draft, however, and seek to keep HR 1319 focused on its original purpose.
Arguably, the greatest problem is precision in drafting legislation aimed at regulating specific activities associated with unique attributes of certain implementations of a particular technology.
In our submission, we will attempt to assist legislators describe behaviors and define terms so as to zero-in on certain targeted behaviors associated with file sharing without causing collateral damage to other activities, attributes, implementations, and technologies.
The principal behavior that this bill, which might be more precisely entitled, "The Inadvertent Online File-Sharing Protection Act," should address is the enabling of a "protected computer" to make sensitive files originating on that device available to users of remote computers by means of a file-sharing program.
As originally contemplated, notice and consent are to be required twice: once during installation of the file-sharing program that may allow sensitive files originating on the protected computer to be searched for by and copied to remote computers; and once the first time any file-sharing function is activated that could make such files available for sharing - with part of this second notice being to point out exactly which files may be affected.
In addition, and also as originally conceived, our proposed language will make it unlawful to prevent blocking either the installation or un-installation of a file-sharing program or the activation or deactivation of a file-sharing function that could allow sensitive files originating on a user's computer to be made available for sharing.
It is critical that the definitions in this bill be exact. The term protected computer, for example, as originally stipulated, should have the meaning given this term in section 1030(e)(2) of title 18, United States Code. But the term "remote computers" also needs to be defined, in this instance, so as to mean networked data-processing and memory devices other than the protected computer that are operating the same or compatible file-sharing program, and are not specifically selected by the user of the protected computer to be recipients of sensitive files.
For the bill to remain focused on the problem it seeks to address, the term ''file-sharing program'' should specify a software application which is commercially marketed to the public that allows the user of a computing device on which it is installed and activated to make sensitive files available and to facilitate their being searched for by and copied to remote computers.
It is very important that exclusions be made for such programs as those that operate website servers; transmit or receive e-mail, instant messages, voice, or video-conference communications; facilitate the technical functioning, security, or maintenance of associated software; or use P2P technology other than for a file-sharing function.
Likewise, the term ''file-sharing function'' needs to be defined to cover searching for sensitive files originating on the protected computer by and copying them to remote computers without requiring interaction from a user of the protected computer, by means of a file-sharing program.
And finally, "sensitive files originating on the protected computer" needs to specify digital records which store information created or placed on that device by using a means other than the file-sharing program and which by file-type, folder-placement, or other method for ascertaining content can reasonably be expected to contain personal or confidential data.
Despite these recommendations to help focus the bill on the problem it is intended to address, and to make it practical and enforceable, we continue to be very concerned that this bill, if and when enacted, will fail to reduce the proliferation of individual and institutional leaked confidential data that is already searchable on file-sharing networks and the Internet generally, and will continue to increase rather than decrease despite shoring-up file-sharing program data origination points.
Once any such file has been disseminated to hundreds, thousands, or millions of networked devices, it is virtually impossible to recall all the copies of that file or prevent them from being discovered in an ever-expanding list of related search results on multiple platforms.
The challenge of deleting the massive amount of personal and sensitive data that is mistakenly in distribution on the Internet is indeed a very disturbing problem of a different order of magnitude. Nothing in HR 1319 addresses this aspect of inadvertent file sharing.
And because nothing in the bill as contemplated will mitigate the massive availability of sensitive information, it is likely that at some time in the not-too-distant future, Congress will convene another hearing at which lawmakers will again rebuke file-sharing software for this same problem.
As previously noted, what we really need is more fact-based discussion and honest collaboration aimed at practical solutions. Share wisely, and take care.
Cisco and Adobe Execs Interviewed Live on TWBT
On the Monday August 17th "Tomorrow Will Be Televised" online radio program, host Simon Applebaum will have a joint interview with executives from two technology heavy-hitters: Cisco Systems and Adobe.
The topic will be the emerging new interactive TV/Internet TV movement and the role both companies will play in it. Simon will also ask Cisco about reports the company is developing a videoconferencing/video telephony service on TV for the public.
This episode runs live at 3:00 PM US ET on www.blogtalkradio.com. Please register on the site first to hear the program live. The show is also available on replay 24/7 at www.blogtalkradio.com/simonapple04 and podcast from www.sonibyte.com.
First uTorrent 2.0 Beta Released
Excerpted from TechSpot Report by Jose Vilches
One of the most popular BitTorrent clients on the planet - and a favorite of ours - is nearing its next major development milestone. The first beta of uTorrent 2.0 for Windows went live this week complete with bug fixes and a handful of new features. Tracker owners in particular have been looking forward to this release as it finally implements support for the high-performance low-overhead user datagram protocol (UDP) for trackers.
As TorrentFreak explains, UDP trackers are much less resource intensive than hypertext transfer protocol (HTTP) trackers, and most torrent sites already support this upgrade. Essentially, what this means is that torrent trackers will be able to support many more users with their current hardware and not crash under the load, while, on the other hand, users will avoid browsing slowdowns since UDP trackers do not interfere with HTTP traffic.
Vuze, BitComet, Deluge, KTorrent, and several others have already implemented this feature; but uTorrent's popularity should further boost widespread adoption of the protocol.
There are a few other changes in version 2.0, including a transfer cap feature, which will help users with cap-limited bandwidth avoid overage charges or having their service cut-off. You can track your usage in megabytes, with a handy graph to visualize it, and even configure uTorrent to shut down once the predefined limits have been hit.
Last but not least, uTorrent enjoys several improvements to its UDP support, which allows the client to automatically regulate its bandwidth usage to avoid adversely impacting your Internet connection and other locally-running programs. The full list of changes can be found at the uTorrent forums.
Arvato Launches eeis Global Games Platform
With the launch of its electronic entertainment infrastructure services (eeis), the games task force at arvato systems is offering a service platform for online games that is unique worldwide. This platform makes it easy for developers and publishers to implement all relevant components for modern online games at all levels.
These elements comprise the completely revised multiplayer engine tinCat 4.0, a CRM application developed specifically for the entertainment market, as well as a 3D lobby online system. The advantages for developers and publishers are obvious: rapid implementation and low coordination costs. The eeis solution is also cheaper than implementing an in-house system and, thanks to the 3D lobby, offers completely new experience features for online games.
"Easy interactive signage" provides the consumer with information about products, new releases, and campaigns directly at the point-of-sale (POS). In addition to the visual interaction, "easy interactive signage" can help customers find products and information and, if required, can send the result to a mobile-phone via Bluetooth. It would be conceivable to send games trailers, theme music, or wallpaper for new game releases. The use of "easy interactive signage" can be adapted to shop-in-shop systems or experience-worlds in over-the-counter retail.
"Mbargo" has successfully established itself on the games market as an online anti-piracy technology. The quality of infringement protection on classic file-sharing applications has been further developed and improved. "Mbargo" can now also successfully be used on so-called share-hoster portals.
The arvato games task force is an initiative set-up by arvato companies and experts and offers a comprehensive service portfolio for the games industry. As well as the new services mentioned above, the range also includes the service components of media production, sales, and traditional distribution plus other elements such as fulfillment, customer service, financial services, and vendor managed inventory (VMI).
PlayFirst Delivers Games to PC Users via Steam
Excerpted from NewsBlaze Report
PlayFirst, the publisher of award-winning and family-friendly interactive entertainment products in North America, and Valve Corporation, a developer of leading-edge technologies and software, announced this week an agreement to bring PlayFirst titles to customers worldwide via Steam, Valve's leading platform for digital content distribution and management.
Beginning immediately, ten of the top PlayFirst titles will be available for purchase via Steam, which makes PC games available online to more than 20 million users worldwide. PlayFirst will continue to add to its roster of games on Steam, providing users with instant access - after purchase, they can download the game immediately and start playing. Pricing will be announced at a later date.
Once players have a Steam account, they can sign-in from any PC to access their Steam-distributed PlayFirst games. Because games are associated with their account and not their computer, players can get lost in the world of their favorite game anytime, anywhere.
PlayFirst is an innovative entertainment company dedicated to making games appealing to everyone. By creating engaging story worlds that capture the imagination and bringing them to life across popular platforms worldwide, including PC, Mac, mobile, handheld, and console, PlayFirst teams make quality gaming experiences available everywhere consumers want to play. The company's portfolio includes world-renowned titles, such as Diner Dash, Wedding Dash, Cooking Dash, Chocolatier, and Dream Chronicles.
PlayFirst games are available in major retailers and on more than 500 sites in 20 languages. For more information about PlayFirst games coming to Steam, please click here.
Gaming Console Zeebo Gets $6 Million in Debt Funding
Excerpted from PaidContent Report by Rafat Ali
Zeebo, the downloadable game console that launched earlier this year, has received $6 million in debt and options from one investor, according to an SEC filing. This money comes after Qualcomm invested an undisclosed amount in the company last year.
Just last week, Zeebo announced that Qualcomm veteran Mike Yuen had joined the company as its new SVP of Worldwide Content and Services.
Zeebo runs on Qualcomm's BREW wireless platform; the console is aimed at gamers in emerging markets that have limited access to other consoles because of high import costs and game infringement concerns.
Game publishers like EA, Capcom, and Namco Bandai have already ported roughly 20 of their console and mobile titles to Zeebo. It will roll-out its console in Mexico later this year, and India and China in 2010.
Dyyno: Stream Live P2P Video from any Desktop App
Excerpted from ReadWriteWeb Report by Frederic Lardinois
Until today, Dyyno was probably best known for powering the video back-end of popular gaming portals like Xfire or Outspark, where hundreds of users stream live videos of their gaming sessions at any given time of the day. Starting today, however, Dyyno will also offer personal and customizable channels for individuals and businesses. Thanks to Dyyno's hybrid P2P approach, users can easily stream their games, videos, webcams, and presentations from their desktops to up to 10,000 concurrent viewers.
We had a chance to talk to Dyyno's CEO Raj Jaswa and Vamshi Sriperumbudur, the company's head of marketing, last week. During the demo, they both stressed the fact that Dyyno's hybrid P2P architecture allows the company to provide reliable video streams while also keeping prices low. Dyyno can backfill these P2P streams with the help of its own servers, though at this point, the team has managed to bring the ratio between P2P traffic and streams from its own servers up to 98%.
Personal accounts with one channel cost $10 per month (up to 10 concurrent viewers) and the company also offers accounts for small businesses at $100 per month (with 10 channels) and an account geared towards larger enterprises at $1,000 per month (which allows for 100 channels with 1,000 concurrent streams). Not-for-profits, as well as education and religious organizations can also get access to this account for $1,000 per month.
Because of the company's reliance on its proprietary P2P architecture, however, users install a plug-in when they want to watch streams. Currently, Dyyno doesn't offer a plug-in for Macs, though the company expects to ship its Mac plug-in soon. Dyyno works well in Firefox and Internet Explorer, but Google's Chrome isn't supported yet.
Dyyno works extremely well and just as advertised. To share any part of your screen, you just drag and drop the Dyyno logo from the desktop client to any window and the sharing session will start. If you want to switch to another application, just drag the logo over to the next application. The video quality is generally excellent and you can also manually set the output resolution (up to 1024x768) and frame rate (up to 20 frames per second). In addition, you can also broadcast sounds from your computer.
Because Dyyno can easily stream video from any application, including webcams, video players, and games, it makes for a very flexible platform. In addition, Dyyno also offers a solution for Cisco Systems' popular WebEx online meeting solution. This brings all of Dyyno's capabilities to WebEx and makes it easy to integrate Dyyno into a platform that a lot of companies have already invested in.
We did miss a few features, though. It would be nice if channels featured a chat room, something we have come to expect from similar solutions. It is also currently not possible to embed a video stream on another site. The company tells us that these features are forthcoming.
Overall, assuming you are on a Windows PC, Dyyno offers a high-quality solution for anybody who needs to stream video from a desktop directly to the web.
TVU Networks Introduces Personal Video Recorder: TVU PVR
TVU Networks, a leading provider of live peer-to-peer television (P2PTV) services, announced this week the introduction of a powerful new Personal Video Recorder (PVR) features for its TVUPlayer.
TVUPlayer is a free application which to date has been downloaded by over 40 million viewers in 200 countries. TVU viewers watch some 300 live television programs from around the world, including top tier channels such as Cartoon Network, Deutsche Welle, Telemundo and FamilyNet, international channels not available on cable or satellite, as well as niche programming seen only on private networks or in certain countries.
With TVU PVR, viewers will now be able to record the program being watched, record a future program by channel and time, re-name recordings, have unlimited use and unlimited recording, and keep recordings permanently until the viewer deletes them or cancels his or her DVR subscription. The capacity of the TVU PVR is driven only by the hard drive
TVU PVR launches with an introductory offer through August 31st, with the first month free and $12 for a year's subscription thereafter. Starting September 1st, the subscription price becomes $1.99 a month.
According to Paul Shen, CEO of TVU Networks, "Our viewers asked for this, and we are delivering. Now, in addition to the compelling live programming we offer on TVU, our viewers can take advantage of the powerful Personal Video Recorder capabilities, ensuring they will never miss their favorite show. TVU is very pleased to be delivering this new suite of features which will surely make for an enhanced viewing experience on TVU."
TVU Networks offers a turnkey live P2PTV broadcast platform that empowers broadcasters to reach an unlimited global audience at a fixed low cost. At the core of the service is TVU's patent-pending resiliant packet ring (RPR) television delivery technology, which coupled with geo-filtering, subscription services, and personalized in-stream ad insertion tools, makes for a turnkey live Internet broadcast, monetization, and syndication platform for TV broadcasters, both professional and emerging.
ShowRSS Automates TV Show Downloads
Excerpted from PC World Report by Rick Broida
Ever wish your BitTorrent client could automatically download new episodes of your favorite TV shows? That's the idea behind ShowRSS, a site that turns TV shows into really simple syndication (RSS) feeds.
Okay, let's back-up a few steps. BitTorrent is a file-sharing tool. BitTorrent clients are programs that leverage the technology. Many of these clients support RSS feeds, meaning that when new downloads appear from a particular source, they can automatically download them.
ShowRSS makes it simple to find the feeds for hundreds of shows, and it weeds out duplicates so you don't wind up with half a dozen downloads of the same episode.
All you do is choose a username and password (you don't need an e-mail address), then add shows to your personalized list. From there you just copy and paste the feeds into your BitTorrent client. (I'm a fan of uTorrent.)
Depending on how you've set up your client, the feeds should automatically download new episodes as soon as they're available. ShowRSS lets you choose between standard-definition and 720p high-definition (HD) downloads where possible.
Tom Group to Bring Spotify P2P Music Service to China
Excerpted from Reuters Report by Melanie Lee
Chinese media conglomerate Tom Group said on Wednesday it is teaming up with European P2P streaming firm Spotify to bring the company's popular digital music service to China.
Founded by two Swedes, Spotify is a free service that allows users to stream music of their choice onto their computers. It is currently available in Europe and relies on advertising and some fee-paying customers for revenue.
The tie-up will create a localized version of the P2P software to provide music over computers and mobile phones, Tom said in a statement to Reuters. Spotify's current services are only available over computers.
"Tom will work toward unveiling a localized version of Spotify in Greater China in the near future," the statement said.
It was reported earlier this month that Spotify was close to securing new investment from high-profile investors including the charitable foundation of Hong Kong billionaire Li Ka-shing.
The foundation, venture capital firm Wellington Partners and others are close to investing up to $50 million, which would value Spotify at $250 million, the Financial Times reported, citing unnamed people familiar with the process.
Tom is majority owned by Li, and also counts eBay and its P2P telephony service Skype among its partners in China.
China is the world's largest Internet market with 338 million users, according to government data.
GGF To Host The Pirate Bay Press Conference
Excerpted from Billboard Business News Report by Richard Smirke
Swedish software company Global Gaming Factory (GGF) is to host a press conference on August 27th, regarding their proposed takeover of the controversial file-sharing site The Pirate Bay (TPB).
Widely expected to confirm GGF's acquisition of the BitTorrent tracker, the conference will take place at 2:30 PM local time in Stockholm, less than two hours after a scheduled GGF shareholders meeting.
Speaking to Billboard, Hans Pandeya, CEO and Founder of GGF, says that he is "very confident" of the proposed $7.8 million takeover going ahead as planned and that August 27th was "going to be quite an interesting day."
"There's been much speculation, so it's good that we take over so that people will see it is actually happening," he adds.
Confirming that the original TPB founder operators - Fredrik Neij, Gottfrid Svartholm Warg, financier Carl Lundstrom, and Peter Sunde, who stepped down as the site's spokesman earlier this week - would no longer be involved in the site following GGF's takeover, Pandeya also revealed that he hoped to have "at least one agreement" with a major record label in place before August 27th.
Pressed as to how close any deal with the unnamed major was to completions, he comments: "90% close to signing a deal with major. It's just a matter of weeks."
Looking beyond August 27th, he went on to say that signing agreements with the "whole global industry" will take "probably up to two years, but slowly you are going to see a lot of changes and a lot of interesting stuff on TPB."
GGF wants to turn TPB's 20 million users legit by introducing a monthly fee for file sharing and by signing content deals with record labels and film studios. Despite the failure of many file-sharing networks that have previously licensed content, Pandeya remained optimistic that TPB would continue to thrive.
"We believe in this," he says. "There is a big problem with file sharing and the industry hasn't been able to solve it for the last five years. It's the opportunity now to solve this problem and we think this is the way to do it - to license TPB. We think it's going to work."
Pandeya was not willing to discuss exactly what form the new TPB would take, but he did indicate that that it's unlikely to follow an ad-funded model.
The focus appears to be more on the networked storage/transmission business model, whereby users donate a portion of their hard-drive disk space to a virtual cloud locker, which the new TPB would then offer to clients at prices lower than the going online storage rate.
"The new thing really that we have is the next generation file-sharing technology," Pandeya tells Billboard. "So we'll be able to create new revenues that haven't been available before. It's not ad-supported, it's resource-supported. You share your resources. It'll become clearer when we've taken over what this all means and how this new technology works."
ItsHidden Offers Free and Anonymous Torrenting
Excerpted from Lifehacker Report by Jason Fitzpatrick
If you're of the mindset that what you do with your BitTorrent client is your business and not that of people snooping, sniffing, and prying at your packets along the way, ItsHidden offers a free virtual private network (VPN) server to anonymize your activity.
ItsHidden uses 128-bit encryption on the secure tunnel created between you and the ItsHidden servers. Based in the Netherlands, ItsHidden takes advantage of the legislative climate there and doesn't log any activity passed through its servers.
To access the ItsHidden VPN, you need to sign up for a free account and make a small configuration tweak to your respective operating system to enable the VPN. The company includes step-by-step instructions for Windows XP. Users of other systems will either have to use these instructions as a template or look-up the specific steps for their OS. ItsHidden requires no software installation.
During our test run with a large Linux distribution, connection speeds with the ItsHidden VPN enabled were only negligibly decreased from our standard torrent speeds without the VPN in place.
Torrents and Physical Ownership Score High for Music Fans
Excerpted from The Register Report by Andrew Orlowski
Music collections and physical recordings still matter, even to younger "digital natives" who aren't supposed to care about such things, a new British music survey suggests. The research highlights the growing popularity of file-sharing services, although this may be brittle - if something better that features licensed content comes along.
The survey, by the University of Hertfordshire for UK Music, polled 1,800 people between the ages of 14 and 24. It highlights the many forms of file sharing - including Bluetoothing, and IM - and contains mixed news for the music business.
File-sharing use is up slightly from last year - and remains a popular mainstream activity. 63% have downloaded from unlicensed file-sharing services, and 83% of this group uses those services on a weekly basis.
But the good news for labels is that people still express a desire to pay for sound recordings - and that's a demand that hasn't been fully exploited, because the services aren't there.
For example, if offered use of an unlimited all-you-can-eat music download service, only 15% of young respondents said they'd continue to use unlicensed file-sharing services to obtain music. 57% said they would sign-up even if it meant paying for the licensed download service, and they would give up using the file-sharing services altogether. It also suggests that most people use file-sharing services to save money - not as a political statement.
So although futurologists and anti-copyright activists insist that sound recordings have no value, young people beg to differ. It makes the music businesses' insistence on "fighting free with free" look quite irrational.
Fears of "cannibalization" may also be overstated. 77% of people said they'd carry on buying original albums (e.g., CDs) even if they were on an unlimited download service. Of these, 64% cited the simple desire to have a physical object, 57% like to have artwork and sleeve notes, 55% feel it's a statement of support for the artist, and 45% cite sound quality. So much for audio quality concerns being the worry of some small "elite."
But if the biz wants to break the infringement habit, it won't do so with streaming services such as P2P music leader Spotify or Last.fm. 89% of people want to "own" music, rather than trust that it will be available via on-demand Internet services such as Spotify.
Feargal Sharkey, head of UK Music, implied that the music business wasn't doing enough to satisfy demand. "We will achieve nothing if we do not work with music fans, and young music fans in particular," he said. "We ignore engagement at our peril. That message is loud and clear."
You can download the results here, including qualitative research on attitudes to music sharing. We reported on last year's survey here.
Green Party Proposes Collective Licensing for File Sharing
Excerpted from P2P Blog Report by Janko Roettgers
The German Green party has defended the idea of a "culture flat rate" for file sharing, according to a report from heise.de. Germany's Greens have been proposing collective licensing in combination with the authorization of non-commercial file sharing for a while, and party officials recently came out to defend the idea against critics from other parties as well as industry associations.
Party board member Malte Spitz told heise.de that the actual fee to cover file sharing and many other aspects of the proposal still has to be determined. He also clarified a few essential ideas of the party's proposal: The Green Party doesn't believe that such a culture fee should be rolled into the TV access fees that everyone in Germany has to pay. Instead, the money should just go to ISPs, which already have a billing relationship with Internet users.
Spitz also said that users probably would have to pay different amounts, depending on the speed of their Internet connection. A cost-free access to media via P2P for people below a certain income level is currently being discussed, and the same goes for the question of whether certain forms of art should receive more money from the collective licensing pool than others - a practice that's common among some performing rights organizations (PROs), which tend to pay classical and jazz musicians more than pop musicians.
The German Greens want to establish this type of collective licensing through changes to the country's copyright. That's a fundamentally different approach from the one taken by most US collective licensing advocates, which tend to prefer more or less voluntary approaches based on licensing agreements between rights holders and ISPs or other intermediaries.
We'll have to wait and see which approach will be more successful in the end. A first test of the popularity of the model proposed by the Green Party could be the country's federal election at the end of September.
Kids Don't Care About Copyright Infringement
Excerpted from Pollstar Report by John Gammon
The results of the latest UK Music survey into how young people get hold of music shows they have scant regard for copyright. They just want to get it for free.
Research carried out in the spring by the University of Hertfordshire showed 87% of 1,800 18-to-24-year-olds interviewed said "copying between devices is important to them."
Tellingly, for the record companies and the artists, 61% admitted to downloading music through file-sharing services, 86% owned up to copying CDs for friends and 75% said they've sent music by e-mail, Bluetooth, Skype, MSN or other methods.
The survey results published August 10th concluded that young people have an inherent sense of what copyright law is, but choose to ignore it. It said the vast majority of respondents knew that sharing copyrighted content is not authorized, yet continued to do so.
"Have they got the message that there is a thing called copyright and there is a philosophy of copyright? Yup. They get it. They just don't care," former Undertones singer and UK Music chief exec Feargal Sharkey told The Guardian.
The survey also showed the home computer is the youngsters' main music portal, with 68% of the interviewees saying they play music on it every day. It found the average hard drive contains 8,159 tracks, which is about 17 full days of music.
"What they're quite clearly trying to explain to us is that, 'we can get it for free and we're not going to get caught,'" Sharkey explained.
The bright spot for Sharkey and UK Music, the umbrella body that represents the British music business and commissions the annual research, is that 85% said they'd be prepared to sign-up to an MP3 download service that would allow them to get as much music as they wanted for a fixed fee.
More than half of them said it would stop them from unlicensed file sharing and more than three-quarters claimed they'd still buy CDs.
Sharkey called for the industry to "step up to the plate" and provide the sort of "all-you-can-eat download service" the kids say they're prepared to pay for.
Seattle Man Sentenced to Prison for ID Theft and Computer Hacking
Excerpted from Seattle Times Report by Ian Ith
Frederick Eugene Wood once had been a promising medical student, before the methamphetamine took over. Then he became an HIV-infected addict who used his smarts as a computer hacker and identity thief.
Tuesday, a federal judge in Seattle sentenced the 34-year-old Seattle man to more than three years in prison for abusing file-sharing networks to invade unsuspecting people's computers, steal their financial information, and use it to buy items online that he would then sell on Craigslist.
Wood was caught in November 2007 after a Seattle man answered an ad on Craigslist for a new Macintosh laptop. The man met with Wood, who called himself Ken, and gave him $1,500 for the computer, still sealed in the box. When the man got home, he opened the box to find that it contained only an old flower vase and a book.
The man then e-mailed "Ken" using a different name and arranged to buy another computer from him. But when he went to make the deal this time, he took along the Seattle police, who arrested Wood.
A detective then seized Wood's computer and found evidence that he had been abusing LimeWire, the popular file-sharing service, to poke around in strangers' computers all over the country and steal their tax returns and other sensitive financial information.
Wood would use the information to get credit cards and bank accounts in the victims' names. Then he would buy items to sell, but he usually just gave the buyers worthless junk in the boxes.
Police also learned that Wood was friends with a Seattle man named Gregory Kopiloff, who was sentenced to more than four years in federal prison last year for also using LimeWire to rip people off.
In court Tuesday, Assistant US Attorney Kathryn Warma said the government has tallied 13 people who actually lost money to Wood's hacking, to the tune of $25,713.
Wood stood to tell the judge that he was sorry, and that drug addiction had ruined his life. He said he hoped prison drug treatment would help him come back to society as a productive person. "One thing I wish more than anything else is that I could look the victims in the face and apologize to them," he said.
Judge Robart said he had his doubts, because Wood has failed drug treatment three times before and has shown a history of being manipulative. But he also said he hopes there is a lesson for would-be victims who read this story in the newspaper.
"Perhaps others will learn not to buy computers-in-a-box on Craigslist that turn out to be rocks," he said.
Harvard Law's Charles Nesson to Appeal File-Sharing Damages
Excerpted from Digital Media Wire Report by Mark Hefflinger
The NY Times and Ars Technica both published interviews on Tuesday with Charles Nesson, the Harvard Law Professor who failed to get admitted file-swapper Joel Tenenbaum off the hook from copyright infringement charges brought by the major record labels.
A federal judge declared Tenenbaum guilty, after which a jury ordered him to pay the labels $675,000 in damages. Nesson told The Times he is "counting on winning on appeal," will ask for a reduced penalty at an upcoming hearing, and still plans on pursuing a class-action suit against the labels over their litigation campaign against file sharers.
Infringement Verdicts May Violate US Constitution
Excerpted from Billboard Business News Report by Ben Sheffner
It's been a good summer for major-label litigators in their battle against individuals charged with copyright infringement.
In June, a Minnesota jury awarded the four majors $1.9 million in damages, finding that single mom Jammie Thomas-Rasset had used the file-sharing network Kazaa to download and share 24 unlicensed songs.
And at the end of July, a federal jury in Boston ordered college student Joel Tenenbaum to pay the majors $675,000 for sharing 30 songs, after hearing evidence that he used at least six different file-sharing networks for nearly a decade, continuing to infringe even after receiving multiple warnings.
But with the defendants challenging the damage awards and likely appealing the verdicts, these cases are far from over. And the courts will now have to confront a difficult and unresolved question in copyright law: Can awards in cases like this be so big that they violate the US Constitution's guarantee of due process?
First, some background. Copyright owners have two options as to the type of damages they may seek at trial: actual or statutory.
Actual damages compensate copyright owners for their losses stemming from, say, an unearned license fee or royalty, a diminishment in the value of their work or profits earned by an infringer. But actual copyright damages are often difficult or impossible to prove. Exactly how much financial harm did Tenenbaum cause the labels? As they admit, no one knows; not even a $500-an-hour economist testifying on behalf of the majors was willing to swear to a specific number on the witness stand.
Thankfully for copyright owners like record labels, the law provides another option: statutory damages. Assuming a copyright owner has registered its works, it can avoid the sometimes arduous task of proving actual damages and instead seek statutory damages. Under the US Copyright Act, statutory damages can range from $750 to $30,000 per work in the case of "regular" infringement. The upper limit soars to $150,000 in the case of "willful" infringement - committed "with knowledge of or reckless disregard for the plaintiff's copyrights."
Jurors have wide discretion in determining where within the statutory range an award should fall. They may consider factors including the nature of the infringement, the defendant's purpose and intent, and the value of the copyright. Statutory damages do compensate the copyright owner for its losses, but they're also intended to punish the infringer and to deter future infringement by the defendant and others. As the Thomas-Rasset and Tenenbaum verdicts demonstrate, awards of statutory damages involving multiple works can reach astronomical heights.
Those huge numbers have sent industry critics crying foul and arguing to the courts that such large verdicts violate the Constitution's guarantee of due process of the law, and even the Eighth Amendment's prohibition on "excessive fines." Just as the Constitution imposes limits on punitive damages - in a landmark 1999 case, the Supreme Court tossed a $2 million award over a $4,000 botched car paint job - they say it should also limit awards of copyright statutory damages, which may include a punitive element.
No court has yet accepted the argument that the Constitution limits awards of copyright statutory damages. But labels and publishers should be worried that the recent file-sharing verdicts may result in just that.
Coming Events of Interest
Bandwidth Conference - August 27th-28th in San Francisco, CA. Annual gathering of music/media executives and digital music professionals. Bandwidth explores the evolving musical experience - how people discover, purchase, interact with, and are exposed to new music.
Cloud Computing Conference - September 9th in San Diego, CA. Topics will include what's being done in the cloud today, separating myth from reality, while learning about the cloud's opportunities and challenges, gaining an overview of the multi-vendor, multi-product cloudscape combined with real-world examples and insightful analysis.
all2gethernow! - September 16th-18th in Berlin, Germany. An "open source" forward-looking Music 2.0 substitute for the postponed PopKomm, one of the leading international conferences and expos for the music and entertainment businesses worldwide.
New York Games Conference - September 30th in New York, NY. Join games industry leaders - including leading videogame publishers and developers, carriers, portals, technology companies, advertising execs, venture capitalists, lawyers, analysts, and many more.
FMC Policy Summit 2009 - October 4th-6th in Washington, DC. Future of Music's (FMC) annual event where, this year, music, technology, policy and law are going "back to the future." Early-bird discounts are now available.
P2P and Games Conference - October 19th in Santa Monica, CA. The DCIA's first-ever event focusing on the use of P2P technologies for the distribution of games and updates. Industry leaders from around the world will participate.
Digital Hollywood Fall - October 19th-22nd in Santa Monica, CA. With many new sessions and feature events, DHF has become the premiere digital entertainment conference and exposition. DCIA Member companies will exhibit and speak on a number of panels.
Cloud Computing Expo - November 2nd-4th in Santa Clara, CA. Fourth international conference on this subject. Cloud computing is a game changer. The cloud is disrupting traditional software and hardware business models by disrupting how IT service gets delivered.
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