Indicadores 27/11

Bovespa	-2,13%	40870	27/11	17h46
Nasdaq	-1,91%	2413,04	27/11	17h46
Dólar comercial	+1,05%	R$ 2,1930	27/11	15h59
Dólar paralelo	+0,00%	R$ 2,3700	27/11	14h42
Dólar turismo	-0,22%	R$ 2,2550	27/11	14h42
Euro	+1,85%	R$ 2,8950	27/11	17h35
Poupança	0,5991%		27/11

Indicadores 24/11

Bovespa	-0,74%	41757	24/11	18h30
Nasdaq	-0,23%	2460,26	24/11	17h31
Dólar comercial	+0,04%	R$ 2,1700	24/11	16h00
Dólar paralelo	+0,00%	R$ 2,3700	24/11	13h05
Dólar turismo	+0,22%	R$ 2,2600	24/11	10h33
Euro	+1,18%	R$ 2,8411	24/11	17h38
Poupança	0,6626%		24/11

Indicadores 23/11

Bovespa	+0,37%	42069	23/11	18h31
Nasdaq	+0,45%	2465,98	22/11	19h49
Dólar comercial	+0,09%	R$ 2,1690	23/11	16h00
Dólar paralelo	+0,00%	R$ 2,3700	23/11	15h31
Dólar turismo	+0,44%	R$ 2,2550	23/11	15h31
Euro	+0,27%	R$ 2,8123	23/11	17h42
Poupança	0,6809%		23/11

Fonte: Folha de São Paulo

Câmara aprova Lei Geral das Micro e Pequenas Empresas

Por 323 votos favoráveis e quatro abstenções, a Câmara dos Deputados aprovou nesta quarta-feira a Lei Geral da Micro e Pequenas Empresa. O projeto irá agora para sanção presidencial

Conhecido como Supersimples, a lei estabelece um regime tributário diferenciado para as micro e pequenas empresas que faturam até R$ 2,4 milhões por ano.

As alíquotas nesse sistema variam de acordo com o faturamento e vão de 4% a 11,61% no comércio. Há acréscimos para as indústrias (meio ponto percentual) e para as empresas do setor de serviços --50% a mais do que é cobrado do comércio.

Além da parte tributária, a lei também simplifica o processo de abertura das empresas e dá a elas preferência na participação de licitações públicas de até R$ 80 mil.

A expectativa do governo é que a lei permita a criação ou formalização de 1 milhão de empresas e, com isso, a geração de 2 milhões a 3 milhões de empregos formais.

A lei deverá começar a vigorar apenas em 1º de julho de 2007, segundo alteração feita pelo Senado. O texto aprovado pela Câmara dos Deputados previa que ela passasse a vigorar a partir de janeiro. A mudança foi feita porque Estados e a Receita Federal alegaram que não haveria tempo hábil para desenvolver o sistema de arrecadação.

A renúncia fiscal prevista inicialmente era de R$ 5,4 bilhões ao ano. Como a Lei Geral deverá vigorar apenas no segundo semestre do ano que vem, essa previsão cai pela metade.

Indicadores 22/11/2006

Bovespa	+0,82%	41912	22/11	18h30
Nasdaq	+0,45%	2465,98	22/11	19h49
Dólar comercial	+0,13%	R$ 2,1670	22/11	16h00
Dólar paralelo	+0,85%	R$ 2,3700	22/11	12h35
Dólar turismo	-0,22%	R$ 2,2450	22/11	12h35
Euro	+0,84%	R$ 2,8018	22/11	17h41
Poupança	0,6322%		22/11

Universal Music Group Sues MySpace over Music Videos

November 22, 2006
By Bill Rosenblatt

Universal Music Group (UMG) followed through on prior threats and sued MySpace last Friday for copyright infringement over music videos posted to the site.  The suit was filed shortly after MySpace announced that it would be implementing acoustic fingerprinting technology to filter out copyrighted music from the site. 

There are two primary reasons for this litigation.  One is an almost emotional issue for record companies: the residual feeling that MTV held them for ransom.  When MTV appeared in the 1980s, it became necessary for record companies to go to the time and expense of producing videos for their big stars -- with no direct compensation.  The music industry has been determined to prevent this happening again.  MySpace is particularly relevant here, because it has effectively supplanted MTV as the music destination of choice for young fans.

The other reason for the litigation is as a negotiating tactic over the much larger issue of MySpace selling major-label music on its site.  As we have mentioned, MySpace set up a framework two months ago to enable musicians and labels to sell music directly from the site -- though not with DRM.  Major labels that insist on DRM must get MySpace users to click over to other sites, such as iTunes and Amazon, to buy their products. 

The major labels fear that MySpace's enormous drawing power among their target audience will force them to do something that may be more objectionable than producing music videos for free: to sell music without protection.  They were able to effectively force Napster, with its reputed 26 million users just before shutting down, into a DRM-based model: today's Napster is in essence a rebadging of pressplay, which was set up by UMG and Sony Music around 2000.  With MySpace, more than four times the number of users are at stake, a market that UMG and the other majors cannot ignore in any way. 

UMG has licensed P2P services, such as iMesh, which use acoustic fingerprinting technology that is functionally similar to the technology MySpace is adopting.  But MySpace is not comparable to a file-trading network, and more importantly, the stakes are higher here.  The question of DRM and MySpace promises to be a tipping point for the music industry in the coming months.

Indicadores 21/11/2006

 

Bovespa	+1,32%	41570	21/11	18h30
Nasdaq	+0,08%	2454,84	21/11	19h49
Dólar comercial	+0,13%	R$ 2,1640	21/11	15h59
Dólar paralelo	+0,00%	R$ 2,3500	21/11	12h12
Dólar turismo	-0,44%	R$ 2,2500	21/11	12h12
Euro	+0,43%	R$ 2,7799	21/11	17h41
Poupança	0,6023%		21/11

Presidente da EMI brasileira é, enfim, demitido

Presidente da EMI brasileira é, enfim, demitido

Marcos Maynard foi oficialmente demitido esta semana de sua função de presidente da filial brasileira da gravadora EMI Music. O executivo deixou o cargo nesta quinta-feira, 16 de novembro. Já esperada pelo mercado fonográfico, a demissão é conseqüência de a matriz inglesa ter descoberto maquiagem de números que inflava os lucros operacionais de seu braço brazuca. A denúncia da fraude foi feita em caráter mundial, em 25 de outubro, pela própria major em comunicado que, na ocasião, fez as ações da empresa despencarem cerca de 3,74% na bolsa de Londres (há quem, como a BBC, tenha afirmado que a queda das ações foi de 8,8%).

Pela maquiagem dos números, a EMI brasileira teria inflado seu lucro operacional em cerca de nove milhões de libras - algo em torno de 17,5 milhões de dólares ou 36 milhões de reais. O vice-presidente financeiro da companhia nacional já tinha sido demitido dias antes do comunicado público. Mas é o afastamento de Maynard que devolve a empresa a credibilidade para voltar a anunciar números de vendas - o que seria impossível se não houvesse troca de gestão.

Antes do escândalo, Maynard vinha alardeando suposta liderança da EMI Music no mercado fonográfico nacional, o que irritava a concorrência. Tradicionalmente, a disputa por essa liderança sempre foi travada no Brasil entre a Universal Music e a Sony Music, hoje agregada a BMG sob o nome Sony & BMG.

 

http://blogdomauroferreira.blogspot.com/2006/11/presidente-da-emi-brasileira-enfim.html

 

Fechamentos & Indicadores 17/11/2006

Fechamentos & Indicadores

17/11/2006

 

Bovespa	-0,32%	41029	17/11	18h31
Nasdaq	-0,13%	2445,86	17/11	19h49
Dólar comercial	+0,32%	R$ 2,1600	17/11	16h00
Dólar paralelo	+0,00%	R$ 2,3500	17/11	14h39
Dólar turismo	+1,11%	R$ 2,2600	17/11	14h39
Euro	-0,03%	R$ 2,7732	17/11	20h43
Poupança	0,6742%		17/11

German Music Service Launches with Fraunhofer Watermarking

German Music Service Launches with Fraunhofer Watermarking
September 21, 2006
By Bill Rosenblatt

H2 Media Factory, based in Bonn, Germany, last week launched a beta version of a music download site called Akuma, which features a collection of 350,000 tracks from independent labels.  The tracks, on sale for EUR 0.89 or more each, are in unencrypted MP3 format with device-specific watermarks (fingerprints).  The Fraunhofer-Institut supplied the watermarking technology.

This is happening while eMusic.com, which provides much the same set of music in MP3 format for a monthly subscription fee, is caught in a dispute between the British collecting society MCPS-BRS and its Dutch counterpart Buma-Stemra over the validity of a pan-European music license that the latter granted to eMusic.  The squabble is typical of the way in which certain entrenched European collecting societies are slowing down growth of licensed music services in Europe, and it is holding up eMusic's European launch.

The watermarking technology used in Akuma is not the first example of indie tracks being given fingerprint watermarks in an Internet download service -- Bitmunk, which appeared two years ago, is another example -- but it is a good example of the gradual proliferation of watermarking applications for content protection.

In fact, an industry trade association has just formed to accelerate the pace of watermarking adoption: the Digital Watermarking Alliance (DWA), which was officially launched yesterday.  The DWA is centered around Digimarc and licensee of its patent portfolio such as Philips and Verance.  The DWA will host events, publish case studies, and share best practices about a wide range of watermarking applications, and not just in the media industry.

 

Digital Watermarking Alliance

Esse é o press release de formação da Dgital Watermarking Alliance.

É um approach diferente da fingerprint acústica. 2006/11/18

 

Alliance Formed by Industry Leading Companies to Communicate Benefits of Digital Watermarking

Digital Watermarking Alliance member companies include Cinea, Digimarc, GCS Research, Jura, MediaGrid, Media Sciences International, Philips Electronics, Signum, Teletrax, Thomson, Verance, and Verimatrix

Los Angeles, Calif., Sept. 20, 2006 — The Digital Watermarking Alliance, an international group of industry leading companies, today announced its formation to promote the value of digital watermarking to content owners, industry, policy makers and consumers (www.digitalwatermarkingalliance.org).

With movies, music and photos increasingly being distributed and shared digitally across numerous mediums, and printed materials such as IDs, financial instruments and product packaging at risk to counterfeiting, fraud and theft, protecting the rights and integrity of these assets and enabling legitimate uses has become critical. At the same time, consumers are demanding instant access to entertainment content — any time, any place and in any format.

Recognizing this critical juncture in the digital revolution, the Digital Watermarking Alliance (DWA) has been formed by leading companies to advocate for digital watermarking technology and solutions that will protect and identify content while enabling the freedom and mobility that is expected by today's consumer.

"Digital watermarking is enjoying a steady resurgence of interest now that the media industry is finding more and more applications for it throughout the content lifecycle — from creation through to production, packaging, distribution, and consumption," said Bill Rosenblatt, president, GiantSteps Media Technology Strategies and Editor, DRM Watch (www.drmwatch.com). "The Digital Watermarking Alliance will perform an important role in educating the industry on the wide variety of uses for digital watermarking, exchanging best practices, and generally facilitating the growth of this field whose potential is only beginning to be tapped."

The Digital Watermarking Alliance comprises 12 companies that are successfully delivering digital watermarking solutions to various markets, including media and entertainment, state and national governments, mobile communications and other commercial markets. Member companies include: Cinea, Digimarc, GCS Research, Jura, MediaGrid, Media Sciences International, Philips Electronics, Signum, Teletrax, Thomson, Verance, and Verimatrix. (http://www.digitalwatermarkingalliance.org/membership.asp)

Digital watermarks can identify copyrighted content and associated rights, during and after distribution, to determine copyright ownership and facilitate rights management policy while enabling innovative new content distribution and usage models. Digital watermarks are broadly deployed with billions of watermarked objects and hundreds of millions of watermark detectors in the market, supporting various applications. (http://www.digitalwatermarkingalliance.org/casestudies.asp)

For more information about the Digital Watermarking Alliance, please visit: www.digitalwatermarkingalliance.org

CONTACT: For media inquiries, please contact Leslie Constans (lconstans@digimarc.com or +503-469-4620) or Jeremy Bartram (Bartram@itstrategies.com or +206-264-1999).

About the Digital Watermarking Alliance
The Digital Watermarking Alliance (DWA) is an international alliance of industry leading companies that deliver valuable digital watermarking technology and solutions to a broad range of customers and markets around the world. Member companies include Cinea, Digimarc, GCS Research, Jura, MediaGrid, Media Sciences International, Philips Electronics, Signum, Teletrax, Thomson, Verance, and Verimatrix. For more information, please visit www.digitalwatermarkingalliance.org

UK Digital Radio Station to Offer Windows Media Downloads

UK Digital Radio Station to Offer Windows Media Downloads
October 5, 2006
By Bill Rosenblatt

UK digital radio station Heart FM has been beta testing a new service that will enable consumers with Digital Audio Broadcasting (DAB)-enabled mobile phones to purchase songs they hear on the station as permanent downloads using Windows Media DRM.  The first device to offer the service is the Virgin Lobster DAB handset, which is made by HTC of Taiwan.  The service is expected to go live in early 2007.

The Heart FM/Lobster service will provide two copies of each file, a low-fidelity (24kbps) one for listening on the phone and a high-fidelity (128kbps) version available over the Internet for PCs.  Songs will cost GBP 1.25 (US $2.35) each.

This development is a parallel to US satellite radio receivers like the Sirius S50 and the XM Pioneer Inno, which can record songs off the air in Windows Media format.  The US music industry is suing XM over its receiver/recorder devices, claiming that its functionality goes beyond the recording features in analog terrestrial receivers and therefore requires a royalty payment that XM refuses to make -- while Sirius is paying the royalties. 

Of course, DAB is a terrestrial (not satellite) digital broadcasting medium, which makes it more similar to HD Radio in the US and other markets.  Digital radio provides better quality and reliability than most mobile voice networks for lengthy data downloads, making it an interesting -- if less widely available -- way of developing the mobile music market.

Guba Introduces Video Fingerprint Filtering

 

 

Guba Introduces Video Fingerprint Filtering
July 27, 2006

http://www.drmwatch.com/drmtech/article.php/3623091

Guba, the video sharing website, announced that it is cooperating with the MPAA to keep copyrighted video clips off its site by using a technology for video fingerprint filtering.  The technology, code-named "Johnny," was developed internally at Guba starting years ago when the company focused on searching Usenet bulletin boards.  Guba is considering licensing the technology to its competitors in the video-sharing space, such as YouTube and Google Video.  Guba has licenses to distribute programming from Sony Pictures and Warner Bros. in DRM-protected formats.

Guba has released no details of the Johnny technology, other than some suggestions that it is robust enough to survive simple manipulations such as cropping.  Yet we suspect that its effectiveness is limited to a relatively small number of titles, such as feature films.  It is possible to take "fingerprints" of video in the same way that acoustic fingerprinting technologies like Audible Magic do for music: they examine the actual content and compute a number from that analysis -- the fingerprint -- that can be used to look up the content's identity in a fingerprint database. 

The problem is that the universe of music tracks to be fingerprinted is relatively tractable, compared to copyrighted video clips such as every day's newscasts on television networks and stations throughout the world (and even then, there are some doubts that acoustic fingerprinting actually works beyond the relatively small universe of "short head" major-label releases).  Updating such a large and fast-growing fingerprint database, and making it efficient enough to be used in filtering of copyrighted material from a site like Guba, seems utterly impractical.

Therefore it makes sense that Guba is working with MPAA -- and not, say, NAB, which represents television networks analogously.  Yet how well it works may be beside the point.  Video-sharing sites like Guba and YouTube have exploded in popularity over the past several months, and copyrighted material has inevitably been posted on them.  Copyright owners have served them with DMCA-based takedown notices, with which they have complied, but this process is not scalable.

Furthermore, the current US legal landscape makes litigation against these services, on a broader scale than individual infringers, a distinct possibility.  The Supreme Court's Grokster decision of a year ago implies that content owners can cause trouble for these services by dredging up evidence that their business models depend on copyright infringement.  Just last week, in fact, a journalist sued YouTube over a video news clip from 1992 that someone posted to the site -- an occurrence that may well become more frequent as time goes on (although Johnny seems utterly inadequate to identify such content). 

Therefore, any evidence that Guba and its competitors can produce that they are proactively trying to keep copyrighted material off their sites helps fend off Grokster-related litigation.  For this reason, we suspect that Guba might have a nice line of revenue on the side from licensing its video fingerprinting technology -- which we believe to be unique as a practical matter -- to its competitors.

GUBA and MPAA Team Up to Crack Down on Movie Piracy

Digital Fingerprinting of Films and TV Shows Prevents Illegal Online Distribution

San Francisco and Los Angeles, Calif. - July 20, 2006 - GUBA, a leading online video entertainment website, announced today that it is collaborating with the Motion Picture Association of America, Inc. (MPAA) to block illegal trading of movies and television programs on www.guba.com. GUBA is the first video sharing community to partner with the MPAA in filtering copyrighted video.

GUBA is filtering movies and TV shows using a proprietary technology, codenamed “Johnny.” Johnny analyzes video in digitized form and generates a unique fingerprint for each video. Once Johnny has scanned a video, that video is blocked from illegal file trading or distribution on GUBA’s site. GUBA plans to make Johnny available to other video sharing services to help eliminate copyright infringement on the Web and on Usenet, an electronic bulletin board commonly used for illegal file sharing. Until the implementation of Johnny, copyrighted content on Usenet has been largely unfiltered.

“Johnny can identify a video, even if that video has been modified, cropped, reformatted, re-encoded or reposted,” said Thomas McInerney, CEO and founder of GUBA. “GUBA allows users to upload and share their videos, while Johnny helps protect copyright holders from illegal posting and sharing. Johnny is an essential cog in making video sharing safe and easy.”

The MPAA has been working with a wide array of technology companies to provide a bridge in the digital transition. GUBA and the MPAA have included thousands of movies and television programs from major studios in Johnny’s filters. Filtering efforts on MPAA titles have so far been successful, and GUBA is committed to continuing and improving on this initiative. In the last month, GUBA has begun distribution of Warner Bros. and Sony film and television shows online.

“Providing consumers legitimate ways to get movie and television programming online is essential to our industry,” said Chairman and CEO of MPAA, Dan Glickman. “Collaborating with GUBA has given us an opportunity to test new technology that will help ensure consumers can freely share videos without being exposed to illegal programming, which could lead to copyright infringement. We hope that other such sites will employ similar technology which allows them to conduct legitimate online businesses while protecting the creations of thousands of people who work in the entertainment industry.”

As a copyright-friendly service, GUBA currently prevents users from uploading feature-length films, DRM-protected content, MP3 files, and software.

About GUBA
GUBA is a leading online entertainment destination helping you find digital content that will entertain and captivate you. On www.guba.com you can easily browse, download and share video, and buy feature films and TV shows from quality producers, such as Sony and Warner Bros. GUBA has an intuitive search interface that enables rapid download to the PC, iPod, PlayStation Portable, and other portable devices. Users can watch video in Flash, QuickTime, and Windows Media formats, and can stream video in their home network using Windows Media Center and Apple's Front Row.

GUBA accepts video submissions from users in all commonly available formats, indexes video from parts of the Internet that major search engines do not search, and licenses feature films and TV shows from major studios and independent producers.

Founded in 1998, GUBA is privately held and is located in San Francisco, California. For more information, please visit www.guba.com.

GUBA is a registered trademark of GUBA, LLC. All other trademarks and registered trademarks previously cited are the property of their respective owners.

About the MPAA
The Motion Picture Association of America (MPAA) serves as the voice and advocate of the American motion picture, home video and television industries from its offices in Los Angeles and Washington, D.C. Its members include: BuenaVista Pictures Distribution; Paramount Pictures; Sony Pictures Entertainment Inc.; Twentieth Century Fox Film Corporation; Universal City Studios LLP; and Warner Bros. Entertainment Inc.

 

 

Conteúdo e Audiência

 

As verbas investidas em publicidade são finitas e não vão aumentar. Essa é uma máxima que percebemos e eventualmente ouvimos em vistas e reuniões.

 

Portanto, a briga é, na realidade, por uma fatia maior no bolo publicitário e isso é determinado pelos diferenciais de cada mídia: conteúdo, audiência, qualificação, informação, preço e transparência.

 

A competitividade entre as mídias se dará no balanceamento entre conteúdo e preço, uma vez que as demais variáves como audiência e qualificação vêm de um bom conteúdo e a transparência, incorporada na auditoria de mídia, são bases fundamentais e que todas as mídias já têm. Pode-se competir em preço, prejudicando fortemente a lucratividade das empresas ou competir em conteúdo, com uma política de preços menos apertada, entregando ao cliente os resultados que ele espera.

 

A AESP vem trabalhando com afinco para trazer um benefício inestimável ao rádio do ponto de vista de conteúdo e qualidade: o rádio digital; também trabalha com afinco junto às empresas de auditoria de mídia, como a Crowley, para prover para o rádio a transparência das demais mídias; e finalmente divulga o meio perante anunciantes públicos e privados. É um círculo virtuoso muito importante para o Rádio.

Fornecedores de Fingerprint Acústica

A grade batalha e fornecedores de soluções de fingerprint acústica parece que se consolida em 2 grupos de 3 compahias:

Mainstream

• Audible Magic (iMesh and PlayLouder)
• Philips (Mashboxx)
• Gracenote (MySpace)

Secundários

• MusicIP
• Relatable
• Shazam

Esses secundários terão que encontrar nichos para utilização de sua tecnologia, pois os grades já estão tomados pelas outras.

MySpace Adopts Acoustic Fingerprinting

MySpace Adopts Acoustic Fingerprinting

November 2, 2006By Bill Rosenblatt

Gracenote announced on Monday that it has licensed its acoustic fingerprinting technology to MySpace, to ensure that users do not upload copyrighted music to their MySpace pages. A timetable for implementation has not been specified.

On the one hand, this could be a major development. Once it is implemented, it will be the first truly mainstream production application of acoustic fingerprinting; it leapfrogs other initiatives such as the re-launched iMesh and Mashboxx, which is still in beta. The major music companies have signed off on acoustic fingerprinting for some time, but this could be the first time when the technology will be used in a very large-scale consumer application. If it succeeds, it all but guarantees that online services that allow users to upload content will be required to use acoustic fingerprinting if they want licenses from the majors.

This announcement also makes acoustic fingerprinting a three-horse race for technology vendors: iMesh and PlayLouder use Audible Magic's technology; Mashboxx uses Philips's, and now MySpace will be using Gracenote's. (Gracenote is far from a new player in the market, e.g., Wippit has been using it for its copyright-respecting P2P service.) Three tends to be enough in markets like this, which means that other vendors of similar technology -- like MusicIP, Relatable, and Shazam -- will need to seek niche applications or find synergies with vendors of other technologies in order to survive.

At the same time, two factors mitigate the importance of this announcement. One is that MySpace users who upload copyrighted material already do so at considerable risk. First, uploading copyrighted material is a violation of MySpace's user agreement. Second, those who do upload copyrighted material on MySpace should be easier to identify than users of uncontrolled P2P networks or even YouTube. So the benefits of the technology are to make proactive and efficient a process that would otherwise be forensic and labor-intensive, and in a way, to protect users from getting themselves into trouble. In other words, it should already be possible to catch uploaders of copyrighted material on MySpace; acoustic fingerprinting just makes it easier.

The other factor that lessens the importance of this announcement is that it doesn't answer the bigger DRM-related question around MySpace, which is whether the site will enable the majors to sell downloads directly from the site with DRM. It is already possible for anyone to sell unprotected MP3s on the site. MySpace attracts an enormous number of music fans, and the majors are well aware of its promotional value for their artists and surely see huge revenue potential in selling music directly from the site instead of redirecting users to iTunes or Amazon.com. And MySpace would have to be looking seriously at the potential revenue from taking a cut of each transaction.

We won't wait for our end-of-year roundup to predict that MySpace will adopt DRM to sell music from the major labels. We suspect that it will do so after the holiday shopping season, during the relatively quiet period of the late winter or early Spring, when the negative publicity it will endure will be at a minimum. A combination of the revenue potential and parent company Fox's strong pro-DRM policy will, we believe, lead to this decision.

Ref.: http://www.drmwatch.com/ocr/article.php/3641591

MusicIP Obtains Patent for Acoustic FingerprintingApril

MusicIP Obtains Patent for Acoustic Fingerprinting
April 13, 2006By Bill Rosenblatt

MusicIP, a startup located in southern California formerly known as Predixis, announced last week that it was awarded a patent for its acoustic fingerprinting technology. U.S. Patent No. 7,013,301 covers a specific technique for computing an acoustic fingerprint, which is a small amount of data that captures the identity of a music track, the way a human fingerprint captures the identity of a person.

Acoustic fingerprinting has several interesting uses, including as a way of identifying music tracks being exchanged on file-sharing networks. The theory is that an acoustic fingerprint technology can monitor files being sent around such networks, analyze them, and determine the identity of the music so that the rights holders can control access to them. There are a handful of "copyright respecting P2P" music services that use acoustic fingerprinting and are currently in beta test, including Snocap (through the online retailer Mashboxx), which uses acoustic fingerprinting from Philips Content Recognition, and iMesh, which uses technology from Audible Magic. (Another such music service, Qtrax, is in development with Audible Magic's technology)
MusicIP intends its technology to be used for other purposes, including music search and recommendation. But the most interesting technology that MusicIP has developed is its MusicDNS service. Just as the Internet's domain name service (DNS) returns the IP address of a node on the Internet, given the node's name (e.g., www.drmwatch.com), MusicDNS returns a unique identifier that denotes the music in a given digital music file. MusicIP calls its identifier scheme the Music IP ID or MIP-ID.

This type of unique identifier scheme is important to rights management because it can be used as the "glue" to connect music recognition with various services, such as access control, metadata, royalty payments, controlled sharing, rights clearances, and so on. It actually serves a purpose similar to that of the music industry's existing ISWC (International Standard Works Code) ID standard -- which makes us wonder why MusicIP didn't use ISWCs instead of its own scheme.

MusicIP recognizes the importance of MusicDNS to rights management: it has entered into a partnership with Creative Commons that effectively enables musical artists to register their music in the MusicDNS fingerprint database along with Creative Commons rights metadata.
As for the patent, it covers MusicIP's specific method of acoustic fingerprinting, which involves a mathematical technique called singular value decomposition (SVD). It does not necessarily cover other acoustic fingerprinting methods, such as those of Audible Magic, which has its own patents.