The media industry has been a big beneficiary of the transition to digital technology. Today media is available seemingly everywhere there is an internet connection. One of the problems that media producers have faced is how to keep track of their Intellectual Property (IP) once it is published online.
Depending on where media is reproduced, the creator may or may not have the ability to have it taken down if they weren’t paid for its use. To make matters more difficult for smaller creatives, finding their media online can trying. Search engines can help, but blockchain technology could make the entire media ecosystem better for everyone.
Widespread Implementation is Possible
Numerous speakers at a media forum which was hosted by the China Global Television Network (CGTN) and video news agency CCTV+ were very positive on the impact that blockchain could play in the media distribution business.
Hubii AS was a news aggregator before they decided to pivot to blockchain. Their CEO, Jacobo Toll-Messia, told the conference that blockchain was great for, “Storing data for all kinds of purposes, on top of which you can implement all kinds of solutions.” He is especially excited about the smart-contracts that are possible to create with blockchain, which could make selling media online a lot easier.
Mr. Toll-Messia went on to state that Hubii AS’s micro-payments platform, “Is going to be implemented very soon, as soon as in the coming year.” Smart-contracts and micro-payments are a perfect fit, and they can make new platforms economically possible. Instead of working through the existing financial infrastructure, media producers can sell via blockchain-based platforms that cost practically nothing.
Better Media Tracking Solutions With Blockchain
Baidu Baike is an online encyclopedia which was created by Chinese search engine Baidu. Yang Minglu, who is a product architect at Baidu Baike told the conference that, “Last year, 2017, was the turning point. Starting in 2017, every product manager was talking about blockchain.” There is a lot of hype in the blockchain space, but there is loads of potential as well.
Ms. Minglu thinks that blockchain could be a big help to her company. She said that, “We (Baidu Baike) store the information of the image in blockchain so that from the very beginning, we can initiate protection efforts. Also, we combine blockchain, artificial intelligence (AI) technology and data processing technology in this project so that we can compare the information of the image with information of other images available on the Internet so that in cases of intellectual property rights being infringed by others, we can take legal action.”
Once IP is stored in a blockchain, advanced AI algos can help content owners find out where their media is being used. For clients that want to simplify the purchase of media rights, smart-contracts could be a great tool. It can also help to verify the origin of online media, which has been the subject of many allegations over the last few years. The term “fake news” is a byword for suspicious media, which blockchain can help to eliminate.
The Associated Press is Working with Blockchain
Jim Kennedy is the senior vice president for strategy and enterprise development at the AP, he commented on blockchain recently, saying that, “I started to hear about blockchain before the hype and was interested in it from a point of view of registration and verification and syndication.” The Associated Press (AP) is one of the largest content producers on the net.
The AP has found the, “free and open internet,” difficult to manage, and they hope their collaboration with blockchain firm Civil will yield solutions for their content management needs. The use of smart-contracts and micro-payments could also be useful for the AP, as they have to compete with more content producers on a global level.
For the moment all of these blockchain platforms remain in their nascent stages. The blockchain infrastructure that exists is very promising for content creators, and with a few more years of development, blockchain could be the next major platform for rights management.
