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Digital Freedom

Wednesday, December 10, 2008

TuneCore Looks to Monetize Website Traffic for Artists

At the Digital Freedom Campaign, we love TuneCore (totally platonic love, but love nonetheless). If you aren't familiar with the company, a short description of their current model, as described by Ars Technica, goes like this: "TuneCore is best known for its fee-based distribution system that lets you sell music and videos through iTunes, eMusic, Rhapsody, and other websites. After paying a small yearly fee, TuneCore customers receive all revenue from sales and retain all rights to their masters. TuneCore is best known for its flat $10 deal to distribute a single to 11 online stores."

This is a wonderfully simple and effective tool for independent artists to access the same digital distribution channels as major-label artists, at almost no cost and with no need to give up the rights to their recordings. Now the company is taking this model to the next level by giving bands the chance to monetize their website traffic by, as this Ars Technica article describes, having "sponsors pay bands what TuneCore calls 'the equivalent of a 'banner ad fee' to drive traffic to their web site.' Artists can promote free songs at their web sites, encouraging fans to visit the corporate sponsor to download the songs. It's up to the band to decide how they want to promote that link and get people to those sites whether by displaying an adbox or in-blog links....The traffic fees will be split between the musicians, based on the number of downloads generated. More fans means more downloads, which means more money for the band in the end. It's basically a way to monetize fame outside the traditional boundaries of record labels. "

Simply brilliant. Kudos to TuneCore for their revolutionary efforts!

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 10:32 AM 8 Comments

Friday, December 5, 2008

Change.gov Content Now Under Creative Commons License

By Richard Esguerra
Electronic Frontier Foundation

In the last few days, President-elect Obama's transition team took a significant stride towards a more open government by licensing the content of Change.gov under a Creative Commons Attribution license. Using that license essentially means that the transition team is allowing others to freely share and remix what's posted there, provided that reposts are attributed to Change.gov. The move is a victory for the public and the many advocates for a more wired, participatory democracy.

It's also another reminder of the importance of Creative Commons, which affords creators an opportunity to opt for something less than Disney-style copyright restrictions. By embracing a CC license, the Obama team sets a valuable example for others in government, many of whom may have defaulted to "all rights reserved" without considering other options.

While Change.gov has experienced some growing pains, the transition team appears to be making a real effort to use the website as a legitimate location for its conversation with the American public. The preview post of the President-elect's planned weekly address (posted on Thanksgiving Day) includes links to multiple sources — an embedded YouTube video, a link to the same video posted to Yahoo! Video, and a high-resolution .mov file — with the Creative Commons license guaranteeing that the public can freely share, remix, comment, and report on the President-elect's statement.

The switch to Creative Commons licensing is encouraging and we hope that it is a herald of more pro-open government changes to come.

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 11:13 AM 21 Comments

Thursday, December 4, 2008

Do 20 Million HDTV's Matter?

By Jef Pearlman
Public Knowledge

Remember Selectable Output Control? It’s the issue where the MPAA petitioned the FCC for the right to turn off any and all of the outputs on your cable box — especially those pesky high definition analog connections — if they move up the Video-on-Demand (VoD) release date on movies. In our original filing opposing the petition, we cited an article which said that 11 million HDTVs currently in use have only analog inputs, and would surely be cut off by the MPAA. News Corp shot back, saying that according to the Consumer Electronics Association (CEA), there were only 4 million such TVs out there. Who’s right? Apparently, neither of us. Yesterday, CEA filed a letter with the FCC saying that there are over 20 million HDTVs currently in use which only have analog inputs, and if the petition were granted, would “no longer function as they did when originally purchased by U.S. consumers.”

That’s not all, of course; these numbers actually underestimate the problem. Not only will HDTVs with only analog inputs not be able to view this content, but anyone whose receiver, DVR, Slingbox, or other home entertainment equipment relies on high definition analog will be cut off. If that wasn’t enough, the MPAA wants the ability to turn of the digital outputs as well, giving them the potential to cut off everyone who owns a current TV. And finally, lest we forget, there’s just three months until the DTV transition hits the airwaves. Now is not the time to add to the consumer confusion which we already know is coming. And it will never be the time to give content producers veto power over consumer electronics or punish early adopters by disabling their equipment.

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 11:12 AM 10 Comments

Tuesday, November 25, 2008

Can a Movie Be Highly Pirated and Still Top the Box Office?

The answer appears to be yes. In a great Techdirt article by Mike Masnick, it is revealed that The Dark Knight was simultaneously the highest grossing and most pirated film of the year. But how is this possible? After all, the movie industry is claiming that the reason The Dark Knight made so much money was because of their anti-piracy efforts. The movie industry's willful ignorance of what actually drives sales is not only stunning, but has a real effect on their resource allocation decisions.

Using the misinformation that anti-piracy efforts are what drive higher movie sales, a studio executive would logically invest more money in anti-piracy efforts, and less in the movie's actual development. For all the confused studio executives out there we offer a bit of useful, albeit unsolicited advice: Invest your money in making movies that people want to watch. Or said another way - build it and they will come.

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 8:26 AM 10 Comments

Thursday, November 20, 2008

The Knights who say "Free"

It’s a great day for Python fans -- Monty Python has posted vast collection of best content on their own YouTube channel. This simultaneously undercuts unauthorized sites and drives traffic to the Python site where fans can by books, cds, t-shirts etc. The strategy of giving away infinite goods to promote scarce goods has worked with music, as proven by Nine Inch Nails and Radiohead.

Like these two bands, Monty Python boasts a loyal, semi-fanatical fan base. There is every reason to think a business plan based on giving fans what they want, rather than suing them, will work for the Pythons as well.

“Always look on the bright side of life”, indeed.

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 1:18 PM 9 Comments

Tuesday, November 18, 2008

Content vs. Culture?

Wanted to point everyone in the direction of a thought-provoking article from Cory Doctorow, the founder of Craphound.com and co-editor of BoingBoing, titled "Why I Copyfight." The article makes the argument that "Content isn't king: culture is," and that "The existence of culture is why copyright is valuable."

The point Cory is making is that copyright exists because our culture creates the market for creative works, through the sharing of information, such as a song or book recommendation to a friend. This sort of information sharing is what our culture is made up of and is what creates the market for creative works.

The Digital Freedom Campaign does not condone or encourage copyright infringement of any kind, but we do see a fundamental need for our laws to ensure that this sort of information sharing can continue in the digital age - so that our culture, and consequentially the market for creative works, can survive and thrive.

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 6:34 AM 6 Comments

Thursday, November 13, 2008

Check Out NYMusicCopyright.org

Our partners at Public Knowledge launched NYMusicCopyright.org yesterday, a site dedicated to copyright issues as they affect musicians. The site is funded by a grant from the New York State Music Fund. Gigi Sohn, the President and co-founder of Public Knowledge says the site is "dedicated to helping musicians understand a very complicated copyright landscape," - a worthy and necessary objective. The Digital Freedom Campaign applauds Public Knowledge's efforts here, and encourage all our readers to check it out!

posted by Digital Freedom Campaign # 6:18 AM 15 Comments

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Digital technologies allow everyone the freedom to be artists, innovators, producers and creators, and to listen, watch, and participate wherever, whenever and however they choose. That freedom must be protected and nurtured.