No time like crisis time
The pressures on the existing content companies are showing up in multiple ways as the continuing credit crisis and resulting recession in economic activity impacts grow.
But for content companies, which have traditionally done well during lean times, this cycle promises to force the issues that confronted them during the boom years.
Theory meets reality in two items in the last week. First is the budget squeeze. With recession a reevaluation of all expenditures are in order. At the studios, TV series production budgets, already under intense scrutiny, have been dropped across the board- 2- 20% according to The Hollywood Reporter. At the MPAA, the studios lobbying and unified agency for all manner of things, not the least of which is reminding the world of how much money piracy costs them, the budget for the upcoming year is expected to be cut by about $20 million. Since about half of the MPAA’s $100 million was expended in areas related to piracy, it is to be expected that the studios will have even more pressure on them to innovate their way through the digital distribution jungle while the existing strategies of lobbying for extended copyright, legislation of college networks and the cat and mouse of hunting enterprise pirates will be curtailed.
The other area is highlighted by well read blogger and Linux Journal senior editor Doc Searls complaints about his options as a TV subscriber to Verizon’s FIOS service in Boston MA. Like many of us, Doc is unhappy having to pay for all those channels he doesn’t watch. And while HD over the air is pretty well supported in his neck of the woods, those same shows are coming to him via the internet. So his call for ‘ala cart’ television is neither unique nor likely to shrink under economic duress. This week Doc dropped his TV service from Verizon.
For both Verizon, and the studios, such calls mean further erosion of steady and predictable cash flows, more complicated development and distribution processes.
Naturally, we think digital watermarking, and SmartMarks in particular, are part of the answer to both of these circumstances. If Doc could buy just the shows he wants with a personalized watermark that could be used to hold him accountable for using the content outside of his acquired rights, the risks to the producers of his favorite shows could be mitigated while new revenue streams develop. For the MPAA, which conducts much of the sleuthing for the studios, going public with catching crooks is an opportunity to let the content consuming public know that it is thieves that concern the content owners, not viewers, while trumpeting they are defending the rights of content owners.
We bang this drum here a lot, but it bears repeating. Watermarks are a smart and elegant solution to much of what ails and challenges the content industry. We have proven that this technology is adaptable, effective, and can be cost efficiently used and installed in the studio environment. We are eager to expand our demonstrations, and need our audience to support this effort, in the public discourse, and in the marketplace of both content and equity.
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