I am signed up for Google News Alerts for the word 'ioda' and the words 'digital music'. They work pretty well. I did get a whole bunch of emails about the International Optimist Dinghy Association championships, but I didn't really mind because they used to be #1 when anyone searched for 'IODA' and now they are #4 (and we have 6 of the 10 search results on the first page returned). Today I got a Google Alert about a new post to Ioda's MySpace page. I guess our marketing folks have probably seen this before, but I never realized that Ioda is an actual person. Somewhere in Indiana. With a classic MySpace page.
A 'digital music' alert today turned me on to the following hot story - "Kiwi firm to end illegal music downloads, revolutionise web".
Here are some quotes from the article:
A New Zealand company says it can stop illegal digital music downloads by completely re-writing the internet/
Really? I didn't realize that it would be possible for a company in New Zealand to actually rewrite the Internet. In fact, I have no idea what that means.
..[Company executive Allan Rutledge] explained that the music package is based on the company's Digital Asset Protector (DAP) technology...Under the DAPMusic revenue model, there is no need to protect music from pirates, he said. Instead, pirates are encouraged.In a nutshell, the Manabars DAPMusic revenue model recognises the pirate as a distributor and encourages him or her to compete with other illegal piracy networks. When pirates upload music onto the DAPMusic platform, they are rewarded each time the song is accessed by another person.
Wow, they are truly turning piracy on its head! Pirates are rewarded! It's amazing that they can actually pay pirates without anyone else having to pay even if they 'access the song'. Incredible.
Manabars in fact has quite the website. Their system has "Zero attack surface area" because "The Emulator utilises Set Theory to achieve computational completeness at a level of scope. This prevents software from attacking new software." Uh-huh.
The Manabars network actually sounds almost exactly like the locked down internet of Verno r Vinge's Rainbow's End.. So maybe the UN will actually try to have Manabars "rewrite the Internet". If that happens, let's just hope then that the company is indeed little more than the confusing wasteland of buzzwords that make up its website.