Why can’t CD packaging be greener and cheaper? That’s the question that Emthelo, a supply chain consultancy specialising in the entertainment industry asked itself last year. The result of their deliberations is the MINTpack, a new, green, economical CD sleeve, as Emthelo Managing Director Olivier Durand explains to Emma Beddington.
Cinram has announced an alliance between its subsidiary 1K Studios and Audible Magic, provider of automated content recognition (ACR) solutions. The relationship involves the supply of audio syncing technology from Audible Magic to 1K Studios, enabling development of the 1K to enhance its development of second screen platforms. 1K’s second screen platform is to debut shortly on a major studio release.
Continue reading »The DVD6C Licensing Group (DVD6C), consisting of nine leading developers of DVD technology, has announced that their authorized licensor, Toshiba Corporation, won an arbitration to collect royalties due from ChangZhou Xingqiu Electric Co, Ltd, a Chinese manufacturer of consumer DVD players, under the DVD6C patent licence.
Continue reading »Cloud infrastructure provider Savtira has announced a list of strategic investors who are partnering to advance the company’s e-commerce platform. Some of the companies teaming up with Savtira include IBM, Brocade, Equinix, AboveNet and Akamai.
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The 2011 digital income of British record companies grew even faster than in 2010, according to trade figures released recently by the BPI. Geoff Taylor (pictured), BPI Chief Executive, said :“The record industry has continued to invest heavily in discovering and supporting outstanding British talent, which has helped sustain revenues in the face of difficult economic circumstances.”
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Facebook users on average share ten times more video than Twitter users, and video plays on tablets, mobile devices and connected TVs nearly doubled in Q4 2011 over Q3 2011. That’s according to Ooyala, a provider of digital video technology, analytics and services, which has just published its Q4 2011 Video Index report. “The dramatically increased engagement with IP-delivered video creates opportunities on a massive scale for publishers and brand marketers,” said Bismarck Lepe, co-founder and president of products for Ooyala.
Continue reading »That was the question that Vicki Betihavas, founder of Nineteen Fifteen, asked of her audience at the recent at the Broadcast Video Expo (BVE) show in London. “Will 2012 be the year that 3D takes off?” she mused rhetorically, stressing that “It will only survive if people make good programs”.
Continue reading »An international alliance of publishers including seven member companies of the Association of American Publishers, with support from AAP and other international trade associations, has identified and taken legal action against operators of one of the largest pirate web-based businesses in the world. The operators of two Ireland-based sites were served with court orders, following an identification and enforcement process taking more than seven months and spanned seven countries.
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The would-be successor to the throne so long occupied by the jewel box - the MINTpack, is attracting the attention of major labels and artists, with names such as The Cure and Stevie Wonder having used the new packaging. The latest name to appear on the new, green, CD packaging, is Sir Paul McCartney, whose new album, Kisses On the Bottom, has been released in the MINTpack.
Continue reading »Next month will mark one year of London-based DMS’s production of The Big Picture, originally conceived as an online movie show highlighting current UK cinema releases. Over the past 12 months it has involved interviews with some of the biggest names in Hollywood, with Tom Cruise, Daniel Craig, Kirsten Dunst, and Madonna among them. The concept, said DMS Director Bob Thomson, was developed in response to requests from clients (major broadcasters and online companies) and is designed to provide, on a regular basis, ‘broadcast-ready’ material featuring new UK cinema releases.
Continue reading »Screen Subtitling, supplier of captioning and subtitling systems, will be showing off ScreenConnect, its new connected TV publishing tool, at this year’s BVE event in London. Despite the significant revenue-generating opportunities presented by connected TV, Gordon Maynard, Screen’s product manager for connected TV, suggests that pick-up is generally slow due to deployment barriers – obstacles that the company has designed ScreenConnect to address.
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Second screening is the new way to consume broadcast content, with companies beginning to look at ways to control the way consumers second screen - and how to make money out of it. George Cole provides an overview of this 21st century viewing trend.
Second screen is making waves in the broadcast, social media and video worlds. In essence, second screen involves using a second display device, like a smartphone, laptop or tablet, while watching television. Many people are now second screening: research by Nielsen found that 70% of tablet users and 68% of smartphone owners used their device while watching television. “There are a lot of stats that show that a very large percentage of people who watch TV are doing it with a second screen on their lap,” says Chuck Parker, former Chief Commercial Officer of Technicolor.
Fingerprinting or watermarking? Is there a difference and does it make a difference? Anti-piracy specialist Richard Atkinson explains what they are and how they work but, most of all, why they are important for content management – and leveraging it for monetization – as much as content protection.
In comparing watermarking and fingerprinting, some aspects are similar and some are different. But, more importantly, as they continue to evolve, those differences are becoming less important. The main issue will be how it is used, because the business is driving things: it’s not just about content protection anymore, but about content leverage. With these capabilities, I can know exactly what the content is (whether there’s a mark in it or whether there’s metadata about it)...and leverage that knowledge in real-time.
Following the best Christmas sales ever for Amazon.com’s Kindle devices, the total e-reader category is expected to once again deliver double-digit growth this year, Jill Bilzi learns, as she looks at how it continues to revolutionize the publishing industry and forever change ‘books’ as we know them.
The exploding demand for digital reading devices and downloaded e- books during the fourth quarter of 2011 brought a flurry of news among the leading suppliers in the market.
Music on CD dead? Not so, say the fans - retro continues to be cool and collectors continue to collect. Debbie Galante Block talks to designers and artists who listen to fans and give them what they want in terms of desirable physical media.
Like vinyl, music packaging was scaled back by major record labels way before consumers were ready to let it go. Also, like vinyl, it’s back! With the advent of digital music, it originally seemed that designers were doomed to designing postage size pictures for iTunes, but artists and their true fans have clamoured for more.
The concept of the interactive documentary as something controlled by the producer is changing, as Michael Mascioni reveals.
Interactive documentaries have traditionally been conceived as a genre allowing users to select and explore different informational segments, elements, and themes in a framework largely circumscribed by the producers. Now, that concept is expanding significantly with the rise of ‘collaborative documentaries’ that have adopted crowdsourcing elements and extensive use of user-generated content.
