Content Labels can resolve Viacom vs Google issue

I received an email from Paul Miller of Talis yesterday (he obviously doesn’t stop working either!), bringing to my attention, an article in the Independent about the saga between Viacom and Google. Paul has written a blog post about this also.

Viacom, owner of Paramount, studios and MTV says that Google has breached its copyright 1.5 billion times by allowing YouTube users to share video clips. And the outcome of the $1bn lawsuit may have a knock on effect for newspapers and blogs. So, newspapers such as the Guardian and Independent and bloggers such as TechCrunch, Robert Scoble, ReadWrite/Web and Vecosys better watch the outcome of this lawsuit.

Make sure you read beyond the quote as I go on to talk about *the* solution to this problem.

According to the Independent (original article)

The case, which accuses Google’s YouTube video-sharing site of building “a lucrative business out of exploiting the devotion of fans to others’ creative works”, has the potential to redefine how content is used on the internet. “If it goes to court, this will be the biggest case since Napster [the music-sharing website shut down by litigation in 2002],” says Edgar Forbes, senior lecturer in media law and intellectual property at Bournemouth University.

[snip]

Bloggers and websites increasingly use newspaper articles to attract users, provoke debate and sell advertising on their sites. “This is a big issue,” says Larry Kilman of the World Association of Newspapers. “If a company like Google is using content and selling advertisements around it, that is of concern to many newspapers and publishers.” The association, with partners including the global news agency Agence France-Presse (AFP), Macmillan Publishers and Independent News & Media (parent group of The Independent on Sunday), is working to create an international protocol to regulate online use of newspaper content.

The Automated Content Access Protocol (Acap) would let owners of published content communicate permission information automatically in a form recognised by internet search engines. This would allow legitimate online users to comply easily and quickly with copyright law. Lawyers say such an international standard would be immensely useful. But making it work requires absolute clarity about what is protected by copyright and how it can be enforced.

Paul M. brought this to my attention because of the ACAP (Automated Content Access Protocol) connection. What ACAP is looking to achieve is exactly the type of use case that we have in mind for Content Labels .

In fact, I discussed this particular use case with Philip Hallam-Baker, Chief Scientist at VeriSign over dinner last year. Philip told me of their proposed (and very propritary) solution with Microsoft before the launch of IE7. I remember saying that what VeriSign could do to combat Phishing for $800 per certificate, Segala could do for $8 using Content Labels <g>

Jemima Kiss wrote an article about Content Labels, covering some of the major use cases in the Guardian today. Perhaps Jemima will write about Segala’s proposed solution for ACAP soon…

According to Acap’s homepage

ACAP will enable the providers of all types of content published on the World Wide Web to communicate permissions information (relating to access and use of that content) in a form that can be automatically recognized and interpreted, so that business partners can systematically comply with the publishers’ policies. In the first instance, ACAP will provide a framework that will allow any publisher, large or small, to express access and use policies in a language that search engines’ robot “spiders” can be taught to understand. It is anticipated that, in future, the scope of ACAP will be extended to other business relationships and other media types.

As a result, it will be possible for publishers to make more content available to users through the search engines, and to continue to innovate in the development of business models for network publishing.

I hope they’re not spending too much time and money on developing a new ’standard’ for which there is a solution already, a solution that is going to be the standard for labelling content on the Web (and potentially for mobile and TV). In short, Content Labels does exactly what ACAP want to achieve.

Known within the W3C as POWDER (Protocol for Web Description Resources), Content Labels is moving onto a full recommendation track. This means our Content Labels are set to become the standard method for content classification on the Web. The W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) is responsible for creating standards such as HTML and WAI Guidelines. This helps to ensure that our method of labelling content is (beyond) scalable and importantly free or low in cost.

Furthermore, Content Labels (I mean POWDER, sorry, I can’t get used to the new name), will be proposed as a replacement for PICS. PICS is the old/out dated W3C recommendation still in use by Internet Explorer for Site Advisor.

I came up with the idea of contentlabel.org to help organisations like ACAP adopt a system for its own code of conduct almost immediately and seamlessly. It also helps industry create new codes of conduct for which Content Labels will be created, as reported by the Guardian.

There are too many proprietary technologies and so-called standards looking to achieve the same goal. I’m not saying for a second that this is what ACAP is trying to do, but let’s not create another standard if it’s not necessary please. In fact, I’ve already been introduced (by email) to ACAP’s project coordinator and technical project manager and look forward to hearing from them.

I’ll write a separate post which looks at all the current attempts at enabling more trust on the Web using ‘a’ standard. For now, I must catch a train into an Internet People event.