New Neilsen technology to help media producers curb online video piracy

Following months of delays (and media company complaints), video-sharing Web site YouTube has recently started making moves to implement a fingerprinting copyright protection system into its service designed to prevent users from submitting illegally posted content. Rating specialist Nielsen unveils new Digital Media Manager copyright protection system. Credit: Neilsen.

Rating specialist Nielsen unveils new Digital Media Manager copyright protection system. Credit: Neilsen.Now, ratings specialist Nielsen has stepped forward to add its considerable weight to the media and technology drive shifting forward to protect against the practice of online copyright infringement, reports the Wall Street Journal. Specifically, Neilsen is offering up its new Digital Media Manager service, which will provide copyright owners with more peace of mind by ensuring that their owned media content is only distributed and viewed online via a system of sanctioned approved.Neilsen may get steal an impact jump on rivals looking to deliver a similar policing strategy to media clients, especially as it claims to have already encoded over 95% of national TV programming for its recently overhauled TV ratings service. However, unlike rivals companies, Nielsen is yet to secure media customers, though it says it has tabled the service before the likes of Google (YouTube) and News Corp. (MySpace)."We have decades of experience working with the TV industry, and we have the technology in place," commented Nielsen executive VP Susan Whiting regarding the unveiling of Digital Media Manager.Digital Media Manager works by filtering a user’s submitted video and inspecting an embedded information code with fingerprint technology to establish how rules laid down by the copyright owner should be applied to that specific clip. For example, the content may be deemed clear for uploading without any modification, or it may first need to be attached to a predetermined slice of advertising, or it may be refused uploading permission completely as a piece of unauthorised media.Expected to officially arrive in the spring of 2008, Neilsen’s new filtration system will be aimed at major media companies such as Viacom and NBC along with user-generated sites such as YouTube and social networks such as MySpace. Neilsen also hopes to incorporate the system into the DVD, music, and videogame markets.Competition from similar anti-piracy companies exist through the likes of Audible Magic, Vobile and BayTSP, all of which offer clients a form of copyright protection solution.