Audible Magic Delivers Expanded Content Identification for Short-Form Video
Los Gatos, Calif. (Nov. 13, 2019) – Audible Magic, the leading provider of content identification solutions, announced it has expanded its services to provide copyright compliance and monetization for short form video found on social networks. The expanded service is available immediately. With the explosive growth and popularity of short-form videos, typically 15 seconds or less, there is a need to automatically identify copyrighted content of very short duration.
This capability supplements the company’s industry leading service for long form video, which has been adopted by the social media platforms. The service adheres to the same high standards with exceptional identification rates and virtually zero errors. With the 24/7 nature of social media, the service operates at scale with sub-second response times. As a turnkey solution, the service is easily integrated and is cost-effective for a range of companies – from large global platforms to small startups; and websites to mobile apps.
The new service is integrated into the company’s recently announced UGC Music Rights Platform (UMRP), which provides a comprehensive program to facilitate the licensing and monetization of music on social media platforms.
“We’re laser focused on providing copyright solutions for user-generated content on social media platforms,” said Vance Ikezoye, president and chief executive officer of Audible Magic. “This expanded solution uses our robust technology to support the compliance and licensing of content used in short user clips, which is a significant growth area for our customers.”
About Audible Magic
For more than 20 years, Audible Magic has innovated solutions to identify content, manage rights, and monetize media. Audible Magic’s Emmy-winning automatic content recognition (ACR) technology powers billions of transactions monthly. The Silicon Valley pioneer is the trusted intermediary among rightsholders (including labels, studios, distributors, publishers, and collectives) and major platforms.
Contact
Adriana Saldaña
Sterling Communications
[email protected]
+1 408-395-5500
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Audible Magic and Stadeum Sports Partner to Fight Piracy in Romania
Partnership Protects Liga Profesionista de Fotbal Club Content Across Social Media Networks
July 23, 2019 (LOS GATOS, Calif.) – Audible Magic, the industry standard for content identification linked to digital rights, and Stadeum Sports, who is digitally transforming football in Romania, announced a partnership to fight piracy impacting sports leagues in Romania. Using Audible Magic’s technology, Stadeum works on social media platforms to remove infringing pages that often host unauthorized live or pre-recorded video content.
Stadeum monitors social media networks on behalf of Romania’s professional football league Liga Profesionista de Fotbal (LPF) and its 14 member clubs. The company works diligently with social media platforms to take down fake pages, and unauthorized video clips and live streams of matches. Additionally, through their partnership with Audible Magic, Stadeum protects against unauthorized sharing and enables authorized club content to be legitimately shared on their official social media networks.
“I am very thankful to Audible Magic and Stadeum Sports for their engagement and support in this important LPF initiative,” said Robert Pongracz vice president of LPF. “We consider the fight against piracy an essential objective to increase the value of our IP in the future. This step will provide us great opportunities to further develop the game in the digital world and to deliver huge benefits for the football community and our member clubs.”
Audible Magic’s Emmy Award™ winning technology fingerprints registered content that has been provided to Stadeum by the football clubs. Once the authorized content has been registered it is assigned a unique fingerprint, which can be identified across the social platforms that Audible Magic has relationships with. This process ensures the legitimate use of audio and video content, including live streams of media in real-time, for the rightful owner.
“As the pioneer of automated content recognition, we view our foray into sporting events as a natural extension for the use of our technology,” said Vance Ikezoye, president and chief executive officer at Audible Magic. “The process of registering content to prevent unauthorized use of audio and video, both pre-recorded and live events, will allow the LPF football clubs to re-direct energy to invest in the production of content that can be made available to fans around the world through the clubs' official social media pages.”
About Stadeum
Digital technology is unlocking unprecedented opportunities in the sports industry, offering the potential to draw fans closer through innovative and customized experiences. To capitalize on this opportunity, however, digital will need to be embedded in every aspect of the business, transforming people, process, and technology. Stadeum Sports helps teams, leagues, and players navigate this digital transformation that is rapidly unlocking new opportunities for growth.
About Audible Magic
For more than 20 years, Audible Magic has innovated solutions to identify content, manage rights, and monetize media. Audible Magic's Emmy-winning automatic content recognition (ACR) technology powers billions of transactions monthly. The Silicon Valley pioneer is the trusted intermediary among rightsholders (including labels, studios, distributors, publishers, and collectives) and major platforms.
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6 Things You Must Ask Your Automated Content Recognition (ACR) Vendor
Automated Content Recognition, or ACR, has become an integral part of the consumption of music and video as we experience them today. As more platforms publish user generated content, effectively monitoring use of copyrighted material has become increasingly difficult. So, how does one choose an ACR vendor that can be relied on?
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Guest post by Audible Magic VP of Product Development and Marketing, Jay Friedman on Hypebot.com
Automated Content Recognition (ACR) is essential to music and video consumption as we know it today.
An important aspect for companies distributing content with music and video is the aspect of digital media rights. With the explosion of user generated content, it has become increasingly difficult to monitor and manage the proper use of copyrighted material.
Platforms distributing user generated content typically come from a purely technological background and can easily overlook important aspects of digital media rights. This oversight can cripple a business either via an infringement lawsuit or shortage of capital, especially since content platforms vary widely from large technology providers to popular apps to yet undeveloped offerings.
As an example, the European Union recently approved Article 17 requiring companies who host user generated content and have a European presence or customer base to take responsibility to either license works or prevent usage of unlicensed user-uploaded copyrighted material. If a user uploads a piece of content that infringes copyright, the platform is at risk. According to Article 17, platforms must filter users’ uploaded content for copyright materials or have a license for it.
What’s an online platform to do? Finding a vendor for ACR is a vital business activity for those who are subjected to dealing with digital media rights. This technology puts in place a method for platforms to protect copyrighted content from being improperly used. But with several to choose from, what is the criteria to look for? How does one determine which vendor is appropriate for their business? How can one ensure that the services provided are cost-effective and necessary? Here are six things to look for (or even ask directly) when making a determination.
What is the pedigree of the technology?
ACR is a technology service, so it only makes sense to start the hunt for a vendor by exploring the merits of the technology itself. Ask if the vendor holds patents which the ACR is built upon, or if the technology is licensed from another company. The answer will give you a clue if the vendor will be capable of addressing emerging market challenges in stride. A strong R&D department is a great indicator of a vendor that seeks to push the industry forward.
Does the service scale well?
Does your company need to monitor the usage of a handful of digital media rights, or do you have to cover just about everything under the sun? Several pop-up ACR vendors have appeared recently to address the former, sometimes licensing technology or developing a service that satisfies one specific task needed. These pop-ups are worth investigating if your needs are truly specific and limited in scope, but take caution to ensure that they’ll be able to handle an increased workload as your service demands grow and – more vitally – the amount of content that needs to be scanned or monitored increases.
What is the technology’s false positive rate?
Take heed of the false positive rate, the fine print statistic that cuts through any misleading marketing metrics. If a vendor boasts scalability as a primary value proposition, asking about false positive rate is the follow-up question that will help you find out if service quality was sacrificed in order to achieve scale. A false positive rate of even 0.5% means that for every 1,000 pieces of digital media scanned, five will be mistakenly given an incorrect attribution of ownership. The effect that this has on user experience cannot be understated. A spotty experience easily translates to the loss of users or customers.
Who are the customers?
This segues neatly into the next question. The music industry is chalk full of long-standing partner relationships. Top labels are going to work with vendors they trust to protect their catalogs, and will be hard-pressed to change from companies they trust to do the job right. On the flip side, UGC platforms want to ensure they are in full compliance for rights usage and desire a vendor that understands international nuances – that their vendor has they’re backs. Entertainment may be “fun” to the everyday citizen that consumes media, but in the business world the emphasis is on the bottom line and sound practices. If you recognize a vendor’s customers as major players, that’s a good indicator that the vendor has an established cadence of trust.
What will this cost?
ACR is the technology that the digital media rights ecosystem can’t afford to not have. That said, what good is an ACR vendor if a company can’t afford the service in the first place? Vendors shouldn’t offer a one-size-fits-all solution at a single premium price; rather, cost should reflect the level of service that is being provided. After all, distributors and platforms have varying policies and needs when it comes to identification reporting. Some companies seek basic identification, while others desire advanced reporting and other features. Know what your needs are before you shop, or find a vendor that will help you determine what’s right for you based on your business model and policies.
Will the vendor find ways to open new revenue streams?
This question falls outside the normal line of thinking for basic software-focused ACR vendors, which makes it a hardnose test of business smarts. Those who know how the digital media rights landscape works will be able to work collaboratively with you to suggest and enable new revenue streams. Not only should a vendor have a line of questioning to understand your business model and connect the dots, they should be actively engaged in trying to improve your company. This doesn’t fall outside of the realm of what should be expected from a vendor, because savvy ones know that your success ultimately becomes their success. This line of thinking makes an ACR vendor a valuable asset as an advisor. Keep in mind there’s no substitute for management that has been there, done that, and can draw from the industry to help you succeed.
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MORE: DistroKid Links With Audible Magic To Verify Music Authenticity, Launches DistroLock
Guest Post on 06/13/2019 in Music Business, Music Tech, Publishing & Songwriting, Streaming, YouTube & Video | Permalink | Comments (0)
Tags: ACR, Amazon, Apple, Apple Music, Google, indie, metadata, music, music business, music industry, music tech, musician, musicians, Pandora, Spotify, YouTube
https://www.hypebot.com/hypebot/2019/06/6-things-you-must-ask-your-acr-vendor-.html
Apple's & Spotify's Distributor Tiers Raise the bar for Catalog Management
Audible Magic Offers New Services to Manage Distribution Conflicts
In 2018, the top digital service providers (DSPs) publicized their preferred distribution partners and their ranking criteria. For Apple, whose ranking criteria includes exceptional content review" and "low rejection rate," CD Baby and The Orchard made the "Preferred Plus" list. For Spotify, whose criteria lists "preventing infringement content," The Orchard made the "Preferred" list while CD Baby made the various "Recommended" partner lists.
a 9.2% increase over 2017 - Buzz Angle
The challenge of adhering to these strict DSP guidelines while the keeping pace with the huge growth in the space is daunting for digital distributors. Digital distributors must manage current catalogs and ingest large numbers of tracks every day in an efficient and cost-effective way. Buzz Angle Music’s 2018 report on U.S. music consumption indicated that the number of unique titles audio-streamed was 36.3M tracks, a 9.2% increase over 2017. The sheer number of tracks eliminates manual review and metadata checks prove to be unreliable.
As a result, digital distributors use automated content recognition (ACR) technologies to scan new releases, as well as their back catalog, to ensure they can meet these strict content review requirements. A distributor can improve their overall score and ranking if they can deliver a clean catalog that doesn’t create a lot of copyright ownership conflicts at a DSP. The impact on their business is significant. For example, as an Apple Music Preferred Plus distributor a company will have access to support for advanced customer features and analytics as well as early access to product features.
Audible Magic’s newly launched services, RightsAudit™ and RightsRx™ are a great cost-effective way to proactively identify potential ownership conflicts prior to delivering to a DSP. Audible Magic’s ACR technology combined with one of the most comprehensive and most up-to-date reference databases in the world provides a highly accurate and method to compare audio and video recordings.
Learn more about The Orchard and CD Baby partnering with Audible Magic for catalog management.
EU in Final Stages of Clarifying Copyright Law for User Generated Content Platforms
The European Union is nearing finalization of significant changes to the copyright law, which will increase the legal obligations of websites and apps that allow sharing of user-uploaded content, often referred to as UGC or user-generated content. While it is still progressing through the legislative process, it seems likely some form of this legislation will become law. The three current versions approved by separate arms of the EU government share a few common provisions.
If it becomes law, it will likely apply to websites and app platforms that meet four basic conditions:
First, the platform allows the storing and distribution of UGC that may include copyright content, even if use is just incidental. If users can upload content with embedded clips of music or video as part of their content, this provision applies.
Second, the platform promotes or optimizes content for commercial purposes. Commercial purposes would include the generation of income through advertising, subscriptions, app and in-app purchases, and other creative income producing schemes, or attracting users to the service to increase the capital value of the platform.
Third, the platform is located in the EU or if it is located outside of the EU, is it accessible by users from any of the 28 countries currently in the EU. That means if the platform is based in the US but allows users in the EU to access it, this law applies.
Fourth, the platform is above a certain size, currently proposed to be more than 50 employees or annual revenues in excess of €10 million.
Some exceptions to the type of platforms covered are expected. For example, cloud storage services that are for individual use. Other examples include not-for-profit encyclopedia services (such as Wikipedia), open source software platforms (such as GitHub) and online markets whose main activity is selling of physical goods (such as eBay).
If a platform falls under these qualifying conditions of the directive, then what? The company will be required to obtain licenses from copyright owners or must take preventive measures to ensure that copyright works are not available through their service. Since there are inconsistencies between the three versions, it’s not yet clear what will qualify as a preventive requirement. However, it is expected that copyright owners will be obligated to specify what content they want protected.
So where do things go from here?
A trilogue process is currently underway by the EU to reconcile the three different approved versions. A compromise version is expected to be finalized before the end of 2018 and approved in the first quarter of 2019. Once approved, there is a two-year period before it becomes law in every EU member state.
Audible Magic Launches AMLive™ to Protect Against Rebroadcasting Premium Content by Users of Live Streaming Platforms
Los Gatos, CA (April 3, 2018) — Audible Magic Corporation, the leader in audio and video digital content identification solutions, announced today the availability of AMLive — a new service to identify unauthorized user streams of premium content registered by rights holders. The service addresses industry needs to protect live sports, live-broadcasted music and other premium content. AMLive operates on both live streams and video-on-demand.
Using a simple dashboard or via an API to integrate into existing workflows, AMLive makes it easy for broadcasters and programmers to register live broadcast events. Once content is registered with Audible Magic, the social platforms can automatically identify and block unauthorized streams in real-time.
“Content owners can now more easily ensure their valuable content is available only from authorized streaming services.” said Vance Ikezoye, Co-founder and CEO of Audible Magic. “AMLive is well suited for the live sports industry, where piracy of live streams is a major concern. The service also addresses a growing issue where recorded music is streamed live by bedroom DJs.”
“What makes Audible Magic unique in the industry is we provide a service used and paid for by the social platforms to proactively prevent the unauthorized distribution of copyrighted content. The social platforms then make the service available to any content owner who wants to register content they own or control. AMLive enables greater cooperation between the social platforms and the content industry.”
Audible Magic is recognized for its pioneering work in audio and video digital fingerprinting, the foundation behind its content recognition technology, and is a trusted provider among both platforms and rights owners. With the launch of AMLive, Audible Magic expands its portfolio beyond video-on-demand (VOD) services.
Audible Magic will be discussing AMLive and other recent developments with content owners and OVSPs at the National Association of Broadcasters show in Las Vegas, April 9-11. Please contact [email protected] to schedule a meeting.
Additional information on AMLive can be found at http://bit.ly/ampr318
Audible Magic Honored With an Emmy® Award for Content Identification Technology
Audible Magic Honored with an Emmy® Award for the Company's Content Identification Technology
Los Gatos, CA (August 30, 2017) — Audible Magic has been recognized as one of a select few to be honored with the Emmy® Award for Technology and Engineering in 2017 by the National Academy of Television Arts and Sciences (NATAS). The internationally-renowned Emmy® Award, granted by NATAS and chosen each year by dozens of industry experts and peers, recognizes excellence and creativity; and represents the highest achievement in the television industry.
Audible Magic was recognized by the NATAS for the company's more than 18 years of pioneering work in the development and use of content identification technologies to protect content value and copyright. The company's content recognition solutions, which are based on its patented digital fingerprinting technology, quickly and cost-effectively detect authorized and unauthorized uses of live and pre-recorded television content shared by consumers on social media and live streaming platforms.
"The Academy is pleased to highlight Audible Magic's contributions to the television industry addressing the need to respect television media copyrights on the Internet," said Robert P. Seidel, Chairman of the Technology & Engineering Committee of the NATAS. "Audible Magic's technology has had a significant positive impact in protecting the value of television content."
"Recognition by the NATAS and to be honored with an Emmy® Award is not only testimony to the extraordinary contribution of our technology but in addition, the entire ecosystem we've created," said Vance Ikezoye, Founder and CEO, Audible Magic. "Audible Magic has over 18 years developed industry-advancing technologies, resulting in over 65 patents covering a broad range of inventions in content identification."
This year’s recipients will be honored at the 69th Annual Technology & Engineering Emmy® Awards that will take place in partnership with the NAB (National Association of Broadcasters) Show/conference on Sunday, April 8, 2018 in Las Vegas, NV.
About Audible Magic
Audible Magic provides technologies that make media devices, apps and networks content aware. The company is the trusted leader in digital fingerprinting techniques that recognize audio and video content in all forms across radio and television broadcasts, Internet streams, cable and satellite transmissions, stored digital files, and on consumer devices such as smart TVs, set-top boxes, smart phones, tablets, and other appliances. Since its founding in 1999, the company has been awarded more than 65 patents. Currently Audible Magic has worked with more than 200 customers and thousands of content partners in technology, entertainment and media industries.
About The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences
The National Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (NATAS) is a service organization dedicated to the advancement of the arts and sciences of television and the promotion of creative leadership for artistic, educational and technical achievements within the television industry. It recognizes excellence in television with the coveted Emmy® Award for News & Documentary, Sports, Daytime Entertainment, Daytime Creative Arts & Entertainment, Public & Community Service, and Technology & Engineering. NATAS membership consists of over 15,000 broadcast and media professionals represented in 19 regional chapters across the country. Beyond awards, NATAS has extensive educational programs including Regional Student Television and its Student Award for Excellence for outstanding journalistic work by high school students, as well as scholarships, publications, and major activities for both industry professionals and the viewing public. For more information, please visit the website at www.emmyonline.tvw.emmyonline.tv
New Mobile App Enhances Cinema Experience for the Vision Impaired
Swedish Cinema Uses Audible Magic Content Recognition to Synchronize Audio Descriptions and Spoken Subtitles with Movie Sound Tracks
April 08, 2015 12:00 AM Eastern Daylight Time LOS GATOS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Audible Magic, the leading provider of automatic content recognition software solutions announced that Cybercom Group of Stockholm, Sweden has licensed its technology for Sweden’s “Available Cinema” project, making movie experiences more accessible to those with sight and reading impairments.
Available Cinema, a government project managed by the Swedish Film Institute in cooperation with the Swedish Post and Telecom Authority, enables audiences with any range of vision impairment or dyslexia to enjoy pre-recorded audio descriptions of the screen action and spoken subtitles. A mobile app provides narrative through the user’s earphones, using Audible Magic’s audio fingerprinting technology for frame-accurate synchronization with the movie soundtrack.
Lisa Wacklin, project manager for Available Cinema at the Swedish Film Institute says, “It's a huge change. In the past, audio descriptions were performed live and limited to about 150 movie screenings per year. Now they will be available for more than 150,000 screenings every year in Sweden.”
Cybercom created the Disabilities Platform, consisting of a software development kit, which can be easily incorporated within a mobile app, and separate tools to enable movie post-producers to package ‘fingerprints’ of the movie soundtrack with audio descriptions for app users to download from Sweden’s Cinema Guide server. The Swedish Film Institute intends to make the Disabilities Platform available internationally to movie distributors, broadcasters and organisations representing the vision and reading impaired.
“Working with Cybercom on this project has been truly rewarding,” said Mike Edwards, General Manager EMEA for Audible Magic. “Witnessing the delight of users at the launch is an experience I will not forget.”
“It is a very successful project with great cooperation between our companies,” said Cybercom project manager Magnus Månsson.
Audible Magic is the trusted leader in automatic content recognition (ACR) fingerprinting technologies. The company offers a broad range of hosted solutions as well as hardware and software products that identify audio and video content, synchronize actions between media devices, trigger user interactivity and generate usage reporting. Audible Magic’s customers and partners span technology and media industries and include industry leaders such as Dailymotion, Deluxe Media, Ensequence, Intel, Sling Media, Sony Music and SoundCloud.
Cybercom is an IT consulting company that assists leading companies and organisations to benefit from the opportunities of the connected world. The company’s areas of expertise span the entire ecosystem of communications services. Cybercom’s domestic market is the Nordic region, and in addition the company offers global delivery capacity for local and international business. Cybercom was founded in 1995 and has been quoted on the NASDAQ OMX Stockholm exchange since 1999.
The Swedish Film Institute works to promote film across the board – from idea to finished product, during launch in Sweden and around the world, and by preserving films for posterity in their archives.
The Swedish Post and Telecom Authority (PTS) monitors the electronic communications and postal sectors in Sweden. The Authority provides leadership on consumer and competition issues, efficient utilization of resources and secure communications.
Audible Magic Introduces Upgraded DMCA Tool for Colleges and Universities
CopySense® Appliance 10G Automates DMCA Notice Reduction for Campus IT Networks
Los Gatos, Calif., February 3, 2015--(Business Wire)--Audible Magic, the leading provider of enterprise-class content recognition solutions announced the CopySense® Network Appliance 10G. This is a new version of Audible Magic’s CopySense Appliance that now accommodates a 10 GB network interface.
The CopySense Appliance is popular with college and university IT organizations for its ability to reduce workload and expenses related to Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) takedown notices. It also automates actions that educate students and other campus network users toward good digital citizenship with regard to the use and sharing of copyrighted content.
With a CopySense Appliance monitoring the campus network, users that engage peer-to-peer (P2P) networks to download or share copyrighted media content get automatically redirected to information on campus network use policies. These responses are only initiated when the user attempts copyright-infringing, public sharing of media content. Sharing of non-copyrighted files on P2P networks is ignored, thus allowing the campus to embrace and allow P2P file sharing for non-infringing uses.
As users become educated and stop participating in public sharing of copyrighted media, the number of DMCA infractions is reduced. The institution then spends less resource following up on takedown notices.
“The CopySense Appliance has helped top educational institutions large and small across the United States reduce their DMCA takedown notice workload,” said Vance Ikezoye, Audible Magic CEO. “The latest 10G version helps them keep up with their growing network bandwidth requirements.”
Visit Audible Magic’s website for more information on the CopySense Network Appliance.
Audible Magic is the trusted leader in automatic content recognition (ACR) fingerprinting technologies. The company offers a broad range of hosted solutions as well as hardware and software products that identify audio and video content, synchronize actions between media devices, trigger user interactivity and generate usage reporting. Audible Magic’s customers and partners span education, technology and media industries and include industry leaders such as Dailymotion, Deluxe Media, Ensequence, Sling Media, Sony Music and SoundCloud.
Audible Magic Receives Its 30th Patent Award
Latest Patents Add to Portfolio in the Areas of Audio and Video Content Recognition and Related Services Optimization
LOS GATOS, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Audible Magic, the leading provider of enterprise-class automatic content recognition (ACR) solutions announced that the company was recently issued three new patents. This brings the total patents awarded to the company to 30 overall in areas such as digital fingerprint-based media detection technology, detection of content on media-playing devices, identification of content flow across networks, and approaches to media identification information systems performance.
“Audible Magic’s intellectual property portfolio, plus our experience in massively scalable content identification and information services, makes the company’s offerings a preferred choice among the largest names in media and technology industries”
The recently-issued patents include:
- European Patent EP 1 490 767 B1, for copyright detection and protection system method regarding digital data processing. This patent involves identifying, reporting, and/or protecting digital works from unauthorized transmission and/or copying, such as over networks or network segments connected to the Internet.
- U.S. patent 8,732,858 B2, for identifying digital data content; a computing system selects data from an unknown work and detects each event. It determines an event metric between each successive event and generates a list of metrics between the events, comparing event metrics for the unknown work to those of a known work, to determine if the unknown work is a copy of the known work.
- U.S. patent 8,645,279 B2, in copyright detection and protection system method, for detecting against unauthorized transmission of digital works.
The generation of patents by this privately-funded company has enabled Audible Magic to establish itself as the leader in ACR solutions. “Audible Magic’s intellectual property portfolio, plus our experience in massively scalable content identification and information services, makes the company’s offerings a preferred choice among the largest names in media and technology industries,” said Vance Ikezoye, CEO. Visit Audible Magic’s website for the full patent documents.
Audible Magic is the trusted leader in automatic content recognition (ACR) fingerprinting technologies. The company offers a broad range of hosted solutions as well as hardware and software products that identify audio and video content, synchronize actions between media devices, trigger user interactivity, generate usage reporting and activate content monetization. Audible Magic’s customers and partners span technology, entertainment and media industries and include industry leaders such as Dailymotion, Ensequence, Sling Media, Sony Music and SoundCloud.