I thought this was interesting. The record industry got totally side swiped by the Internet (as well as the invention of compact and compressed music formats.) From a technology standpoint, they were a cross between a deer standing stunned in the headlights, and an angry bear who's just seen you run off with his blueberries.
So the music and movie industries are going to test some ideas they have for distributing music and movies via the next Internet, Internet2. College folk will know what that is - the rest of us don't have access though.
MPAA and RIAA participate in Internet2 project
Monday, September 12, 2005
Let's try that again.
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2 comments:
They're not there to test content distribution. That's what projects like Planet Lab are for. They are joining internet2 because it's a fast connection between college students and these connections get used for file sharing.
I think it's so they can monitor over such networks as the i2Hub, where college folk get their pirated booty at record speeds.
I wonder if media companies are going to try to impose regulations on I2 routers in order to get a better handle on piracy. I'll bet that at the very least, the US government will.
The strategy at the moment seems to be rights-management file formats. With iTunes and all the players that support .wma audio files, a lot of the downloading of songs has been brought over to formats where the number of copies, CD burns, etc. are brought to heel.
Personally, I don't see those things making too many inroads. At some point, that music has to make it out to a 1/8" or 1/4" jack. Once it is an analog signal, you can't stop it from being re-recorded.
And while I've heard some musing about technology to secure headphone jacks from copying, the last step - the sound from the speakers - can't be stopped. You can always re-record that, and with a good microphone, a quiet, muffled room, and decent speakers, the re-recorded copy can be nearly as good as the original!
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