The service, as with most non-repudation services, works by time-stamping works uploaded to it and storing information about it including a hash of the work, the author and license information. This information, in theory, can be used if a legal dispute arises over the work, especially outside of the U.S. where there is no formal registration system.

However, RegisteredCommons still lags behind other non-repudation services in several areas. But, with it’s new update it does introduce a new feature that may grab the attention of those who routinely use or license works under Creative Commons licenses, especially those who mix CC licenses with commercial use.

Whether it will be enough to help RegisteredCommons compete in a very tight marketplace will remain to be seen, but it could be a revolutionary idea that could have an impact far beyond Registered Commons itself.

What’s New at RegisteredCommons

In an email sent to its users, RegisteredCommons outlined three new features and changes to its service, including:

1. GPL v 3.0: First, Registered Commons added version 3.0 of the GPL license to its list of license choices. However, the Free Documentation License, which is better for text works, is not available.
2. Double Licensing: RegisteredCommons allows users to license a work under one license, namely one without commercial use allowed, and then offer the ability to buy the right to use it in an otherwise unallowed manner. This is similar to CC+ but doesn’t seem to use the actual CC+ markups. RegisteredCommons, however, will handle the transaction if you wish or you can direct users to email you.
3. Buy4Commons: Finally, RegisteredCommons introduced a concept where a work is placed under a restrictive license, such as all rights reserved (meaning no license) or a restrictive CC license but, once a lump payment is made, the work is placed under a CC-BY license for everyone.

Of the three it is likely the third feature that will garter the most attention. Though it’s a system somewhat similar to crowdfunding systems that have been popular with novelists and filmmakers for a while, it is unique in that, instead of a crowd putting up funds for the release/creation of a work, an altruistic person is buying rights to the content both for themselves and for the public at large.

But will the idea take off? It’s very difficult to say.

Making Buy4Commons Work

The idea (and name) for Buy4Commons dates back to at least 2008 where it was discussed on mailing lists for Creative Commons. Though the idea there is somewhat different as RegisteredCommons implementation only has the public option, not choice of a public or private one, but the idea is largely the same.

On that front, RegistredCommons implementation of Buy4Commons is fairly straightforward. You simply visit a work that you’ve already licensed through the service, visit the “More Permissions” heading, select “Buy4Commons”, set a price and set a comment to the license if you wish. It takes all of a few seconds and, if someone does purchase the license, the RegisteredCommons page will change to reflect that, changing the license for everyone.

However, the question is how well-used this system will be. Unfortunately, CC+ doesn’t seem to have gained a great deal of traction (at least not that I’ve noticed) and I don’t see how Buy4Commons, with a much higher price tag, will fare much better.

Still, I could see some limited use of this concept, such as with novels or larger works that people might want to pay money to place them in the commons. However, those projects would likely require the support of crowdfunding operations, such as ChipIn, to be truly viable.

In short, what Buy4Commons may be best at is merging the worlds of crowdfunding and Creative Commons, however, it’s unclear if there’s a need for a formal regime for such a merger or if there’s a large market for such a system as it is.

Bottom Line

I haven’t written a great deal about RegisteredCommons over the past few years because, quite frankly, I haven’t heard a great deal from them. I first wrote about them in 2006 and included them in a comparison of services in 2009.

To me, RegisteredCommons has always been difficult to use, feature-limited and expensive (€99/year for unlimited uploads). Safe Creative and Myows both offer additional features, are easier to use and have more than usable free accounts available. Of the new features introduced today, Safe Creative has long had GPL as an option (along with other related licenses) and can handle sales and licensing internally.

The only new interesting feature, Buy4Commons, likely has a limited use and can be easily emulated across other non-repudiation services. It may be an interesting idea, but it isn’t enough to help RegisteredCommons stand out in an already crowded field.

At least, not when so many of their competitors seem to already be so far ahead.

covered a new startup in the copyright verification field

However, Myows is far from the only service that that is providing instant, unofficial verification of ownership of created works. The non-repudiation field has exploded in recent years. Gone are the days of expensive registries that rivaled the Copyright Office in price (while still being unofficial in nature) as now we have fast, cheap, services that offer to preserve your work and your claim on it.

But even there these services have grown, no longer merely providing a certificate of ownership, but branching out to provide help with licensing and even with infringement resolution.

So which service should you use? It’s a tough question that depends heavily upon what your specific needs and wants are. To help make the process a little bit easier, I’ve created a chart, which I’ve embedded and linked to below, to help you decide which of the services are right for you.

The Companies

Specifically, I decided to compare the services provided by five different sites. Myows, SafeCreative, Numly, MyFreeCopyright and Registered Commons. They are five of the biggest and best-known services in this field and all have been covered on this site in the past.

A notable omission is C-Registry.us, which is more of an orphan works protection service than a non-repudiation one, though it has some functionality as such. Also, since C-Registry is targeted almost entirely at artists and photographers, making it much less useful to bloggers and other types of creators.

However, if you are a visual artist, it is likely a service that is well worth looking into, especially if you sell stock photos.

I then took a look at the companies based up on some of the most popular and requested features. The results are embedded below.

The Chart

Click for Full Size

Link to Google Doc

*Extension is out of date.

Definitions

Very quickly, I want to clarify the meaning of the elements in the chart and what they mean.

1. Cost: The cost of the service.
2. Types of Work: The kinds of files/content that can be uploaded. If a service allows “files” there is no separation between different content types.
3. Works Fingerprinted: Refers to creating a hash of a file that can be compared against later. This is often how works are verified or identified at a later date. It does not involve any visual mark on the work (watermarking) or additional tag. It’s just a unique hash of the file or work’s content that will match other copies of the work.
4. Works Stored: Are the works themselves stored on the service for backup and/or later viewing.
5. Certificate Provided: Whether or not the service provides a printable certificate for easy verification.
6. Barcode Provided: Refers to a machine-readable barcode, commonly used on physical objects.
7. Public Verification: Refers to the ability of someone unsure of the ownership of a work to submit a copy of it (or other known information about it) and see who owns or created the work.
8. Custom License/License to Individuals: A custom license is your ability to draft your own license or set new restrictions on use. The ability to license to individuals is the ability to give a person or company a license to use the work and track that license in the system.
9. Creative Commons Compatible: Whether or not users can select CC licenses.
10. Contact Author: A means to contact the author within the system, not just a profile used by the author.
11. Detection/Resolution Assistance: A Means to detect copies of the work and assistance in bringing about a resolution.
12. API Available: A means for programmers and other service providers to interact with the service, including submitting works. Some may be in private beta at this time.
13. Firefox/WordPress Extensions: Add-ons for the Firefox browser and WordPress blogging platform.
14. RSS Integration: The ability to read content from a site’s RSS and automatically register it, very useful for bloggers.

Beyond the Chart

Though the chart does an overall decent job at comparing the various features to one another, there are a few things that aren’t displayed on the chart that are worth mentioning.

1. Myows is a clear winner on the ease-of-use front, having designed a system that is both attractive and easy to use. Great for those who aren’t familiar with these kinds of services.
2. Safe Creative has a robust API and, through it, has partnered with music sharing site Jamendo to protect the works uploaded to the site.
3. Registered Commons is extremely difficult to use and is targeted mostly at creators of larger, more involved works, as the pricing strategy indicates. It also has a very powerful system for verifying author identities to provide further proof of ownership.

In the end, all of the services have their separate strengths and weaknesses. Myows, for example, is the only service to provide resolution assistance and has great handling of licenses. However, there is no public verification of works. Safe Creative is extremely feature-rich, having at least some capability on all fronts but can be confusing and intimidating to use.

Numly, on the other hand, focuses on speed and simplicity though some of its best features, its extensions, are dated and it does cost money to use it with an account large enough for most creators. MyFreeCopyright is the only one with RSS integration, which makes it invaluable for bloggers, but only has minimal licensing features and doesn’t provide certificates for content other than Web-based ones.

Finally, Registered Commons has a very robust hashing system and very powerful user identification service but all of it comes at a high cost and with a very difficult interface.

All in all, it seems every service has a great deal to offer users and a great deal to learn from others.

Bottom Line

So it all comes back to the question of which service should you use. The answer is obvious: It depends.

From where I’m sitting, both Myows and Safe Creative are clear leaders in this field. Myows is well-aimed at novices and those interested in copyright enforcement where Safe Creative is more aimed at veteran users and those who need public verification and in battling the orphan works problem.

However, I use MyFreeCopyright on this site due to its RSS integration (no reason not to) and have used Numly in the past through its WordPress plugin. Finally, Registered Commons would likely be best used by those creating works that may be considered valuable financially as their identity verification program and strong hashing may provide greater security, but at a price that isn’t practical for most.

On that front though, I am interested in your thoughts. Which do you think is the best and why?

Disclosure: Chris Matthieu, the owner of Numly, is a long-time friend and former co-host of the Copyright 2.0 Show.

That is one of the reasons that, on this site, I have tried very hard to cover content licensing as well as plagiarism and copyright infringement detection/cessation. My goal has always been to help Webmasters develop a balanced system for protecting and exploiting their work.

However, even as companies have risen to the challenge of helping bloggers detect and stop plagiarism and content theft, those that have attempted to make a business off helping bloggers license their content have, for the most part, fallen flat.

So where did these companies go wrong? What can be done to fix the problem? Is content licensing dead as a business model?

These are tough questions without easy answers.

The Problem Comes to Light

In late 2006, I hard written a post entitled Content Licensing: The Sensational Seven that detailed the best content licensing sites available at that time.

When I ran across the article a week ago, I realized that three of the services, Lisensa, Scoopt Words and Yepic had all either closed shop or had announced their closure.

But while three closures out of seven may be a good percentage, especially considering the failure rate of startups in general, it is important to note that two of the four remaining, Numly and Registered Commons, are non-repudiation services that allow bloggers to also affix license information and one of the two licensing services, Copyright.com, is a stalwart of the traditional media not targeted at bloggers.

Only one licensing service in the article, BlogBurst, was both targeted at bloggers and was still in business after a year and a half.

To the credit of those who closed, Lisensa was replaced by RightsAgent, which is still in operation but struggling to gain traction, Scoopt is continuing to offer their photography licensing service and Yepic, despite a promised closure date of June 8th, is still active (though various parts of the site seem to be in disarray).

It is clear that companies who try to make a living off of helping bloggers license their content for money are struggling but why is something of a mystery.

The answer, however, likely lies in the medium itself and the challenges that any company would face in trying to market free content for cash.

Not-So Happy Times

Theoretically, these should be good times for companies wanting to get in on licensing blog content. Creative Commons launched their CC+ initiative, which makes it possible to extend Creative Commons Licenses, making it easy to start such a business and build on the success off CC.

Most importantly though, largely thanks to Creative Commons, more bloggers than ever are aware of and thinking about content licensing. It is a popular topic for bloggers and becoming better understood every day.

The problem, however, is not a lack of bloggers. The problem is a lack of buyers. Though bloggers seem to be relatively easy to lure with promises of easy licensing and quick money, few seem to be willing to buy what they are selling.

The result is that most accounts make little, if any, money and the company stuggles to earn a profit off the few who do generate sales.

The reason for this is five fundamental flaws with licensing blog content for cash:

1. Quality: Though most blogs are good to the people who read them, very few are up to the standards of people who would want to pay money for content.
2. Content is Already Free: The content involved, in most cases, is already free on the Web and most bloggers will give permission for reuse with a simple letter and a promise of attribution. This also creates duplicate content issues and makes the purchaser second to publish the work, further reducing the work’s value to a potential buyer.
3. Limited Buyer Pool: Even if the work is seen to be of high value, there is a very small pool of potential buyers. Mainstream media outlets and blog networks are two obvious choices, but very few bloggers are going to pay for content they could easily write.
4. Paid Blogging: For most potential buyers, it is a better deal for them to contact a blogger and have them create custom content for their site at a rate likely comparable to purchasing the old, stale content from their blog.
5. Confusion: Licensing content is confusing to start with and the injection of a middle man, generally, does not help. It introduces a third party and, depending on the system, can make things much worse in this area.

The result of this is that the vast majority of blog content licensing services are destined to fail and it would seem that the industry is largely doomed before it begins.

However, there are ways companies an exploit this and turn what appears to the ultimate buyer’s market into a place where serious money can be made.

Gold from a Coal Mine

It is clear that profiting from blog licensing is going to require more than just having bloggers put a badge on their site and raking in the profits.

If a company is going to stay alive in the blog licensing field, they need to look at other options.

1. Be a Non-Profit: The first idea is to simply not worry about profit at all, be like Creative Commons and just offer tools and resources to help bloggers, as well as other Webmasters, and rely on donations and good will. Though CC seems to have a lock on this market, there may be room for other players if they can bring something new to the market.
2. Perform Quality Control: Blog Burst has remained successful in large part due to its quality control. Most blogs are not accepted into the service and this keeps the non-selling membership to a minimum.
3. Sell the Blogger: Rather than trying to sell the actual blog content, consider selling the blogger and making him or her available for custom writing jobs. In short, don’t be an agent for the words, be an agent for the person.
4. Offer an Additional Service: Registered Commons, My Free Copyright and Numly all offer licensing assistances as part of their service but primarily focus on being non-repudiation services. This keeps them from relying on the licensing element as a business model.
5. Profit from the Bloggers: Since bloggers will inevitably outnumber buyers, profiting from them makes sense. This can be done either through ad revenue or, if you can justify it, a fee for your services.
6. Premium Content: One can also skip the issue of trying to sell recycled content and focus on selling “premium” content by bloggers, something that Associated Content and Yepic both attempt to do.

The key is to not rely on the sale of regular blog content as your business model. Though many bloggers produce great work well worth the price they request for licensing it, the nature of blog content limits how much others will pay for it and how often they will buy.

Optimism. Or Something Like It

This is not to say that I am completely gloomy about the future of blog content licensing, just that I think the traditional business model of making money by selling already-available content is not likely to thrive, even though licensing companies can exploit the “long tail” and offer a wide variety of information to buyers.

Still, there are several blog licensing companies that I am optimistic about. Companies that have either proved themselves already or are exploring promising new models.

1. BlogBurst: Controversial it may have been at times, there is little doubt that Blog Burst has been around longer than just about anyone in this field. Their tight quality controls and strong partnerships with mainstream media have kept them going even as others have struggled to gain traction.
2. iCopyright Creators: Though the Creators service is new, iCopyright is not. It is a well-established and trusted name in content licensing, used by outlets such as the Associated Press and Reuters. Combined with a business model that takes no revenue from actual licensing deals, it has promise to be a major player in the future, if it can gain traction.
3. Associated Content: Another industry stalwart, Associated Content has an effective rating system that works to perform some quality control and a business model that combines sales and advertising revenue. Also, it’s focus on premium, unique content seems to help it attract both visitors and customers.

While other companies will likely still be around in a few years, especially the non-profits and those primarily offering other services, these are the content salesmen right now that seem to have the best position and the brightest future.

Of course, on the Web, that can change in a moment’s notice.

Note: Mentioning a company in this list is not necessarily approval for their service or their policies, just an observation that they appear to be in a good position to be in business years down the road. See other articles on the site for my opinions about the companies.

Conclusions

I think the problem with content licensing can be summarized by taking a quick look at my user page on RightsAgent.

Though I added the button to my site shortly after publishing my first article about them back in January, this site has only received six “credits”.

Since my content is licensed under a Creative Commons BY-SA license, meaning there is no fee for commercial use, there is no charge for these credits. RightsAgent has been offered for the convinience of the licensor (to aid in proper attribution) and the mutual protection of the two of us.

So far, by my math, no one has taken advantage of it. All six credits were given to myself by me during testing. This is despite the fact that dozens of sites have reused content on PT, with my blessing.

Though many may consider RightsAgent superfluous on this site, it is worrisome that no one was at least curious about the functionality it can provide.

The simple truth is that almost no one wants to go through a third party to license blog content and, while the business model can work, it is going to require more than simply being a passive salesman. It is about brokering deals, controlling quality and forging relationships.

In short, these companies need to function less like Web 2.0 services and more like traditional agents. Sometimes there is no substitute for a large personal network or a handshake agreement.

If blog licensing companies wish to succeed, they need to learn how to combine the traditional license dealmaking with new technologies.

If they can do that, then I suspect there is nothing stopping one from making a decent living helping bloggers license their works.

The judge’s order officially struck the pages from the record and removed the printouts from evidence.

This is, potentially, a major blow to n0n-repudiation services on the Web such as Numly, Registered Commons and Duly Noted. as this means that their primary function, providing proof of authorship, may be impractical for the court cases they are likely to be involved in.

What Happened

The case in question, Novak v. Tucows, revolves not around copyright issues, but on domain ownership. Novak was, and now again is, the owner of the domain “petswarehouse.com”. According to the Judge’s opinion (PDF), a legal dispute between Novak and a third party caused the domain to be transferred away from Novak’s control for a period of over a year between 2003 and 2004.

Novak then sued Tucows, his domain registrar, for allowing the transfer to take place saying that the lapse in control ruined his business and violated his trademark.

s part of the case, Novak, who is representing himself, submitted several print outs of pages from The Internet Archive in an attempt to show what various sites involved looked like on the days in question. Tucows, however, moved to strike that evidence and the judge granted that request saying that the printouts were inadmissible hearsay without “any authentication of plaintiff’s Internet printouts.”

Such authentication could take the form of either a sworn statement by anyone directly connected with the print outs, such as a staff member of the Internet Archive, or testimony from someone in such a position.

Though this is certainly a major development, it is very standard for evidence to have such a requirement in order to be admissible. It is not commentary on the Internet Archive, though some see it as such.

What it Means

First and foremost, this means that there must be a change in the way we, as Webmasters, look at non-repudiation services. Though these services can provide a great deal of value in the event of a copyright dispute, it is no longer a simple matter of taking printouts to the courtroom.

Getting such print outs admitted as evidence in an actual court case would involve either:

1. Getting a sworn statement from an employee of one of the sites hosting the page or
2. Having such a person testify in court about it.

Both of these processes can be expensive, especially when one looks at travel costs, and would be out of reach for most small claims copyright cases.

Even the certificates that many of the services, such as Registered Commons and Duly Noted, generate would not be considered primia facie evidence of authorship (meaning “on its face”) and would be equally inadmissible without some kind of corroborating testimony.

This isn’t the end of such services, they still have plenty of usefulness, but it will change the manner in which they are used.

How to Respond

Realistically, no one should have ever expected courts to accept the word of a non-repudiation service without at least some form of corroboration. Courts can not distinguish between good and bad services and would need at least some testimony in order to accept the output from such a service into evidence.

However, now that it is coming out more strongly in case law, it is time to consider taking steps to mitigate against this.

1. Register with the U.S. Copyright Office: A certificate from the U.S. Copyright Office (USCO)is considered prima facie evidence of authorship. There is no need to subpoena anyone from the Copyright Office, no need get a deposition. The official certificate with the government seal is considered more than enough.
2. Establish Relationships with Non-Repudiation Services: Using the Internet Archive is dangerous by itself because it can be very difficult to get someone from the organization to testify. If you know who is providing your service and how to get in contact with them, it would be much easier to get them to testify on your behalf.
3. Develop A Backup: Non-repudiation services can be useful, but it is important to develop a back up plan to prove authorship. A local timestamp service may not carry much weight, but at least it could be admitted as evidence.

The bottom line is that, unless a case is worth enough money to warrant deposing a third party, likely in another part of the country, electronic non-repudiation services may not be of much value. This is unfortunate, but but not entirely unexpected.

Conclusions

This ruling, as logical as it may be, creates tremendous headaches for copyright holders. Until the USCO finalizes its long-promised Internet registration system, there is no immediate way to time stamp and verify authorship of a work in a way that will be accepted in a courtroom.

Though, clearly, electronic non-repudiation can have a great benefit in cases where the money involved is high, those cases would likely also require a USCO registration. Unless the USCO registration came after the infringing material first went up, it would seem that the electronic service would be superfluous.

However, these electronic services are still very useful in the court of public opinion. Though it is unlikely that a court case would hinge upon the evidence that they provide, they, especially the Internet Archive, have been used to separate the plagiarists from the original authors thus acting more as a protector of reputation than of ones full legal rights.

Still, it would be nice to see electronic non-repudiation services offer an assurance that they will be available to stand by their product under oath. Even though the cost factor might continue to be an issue, it would be assuring to know that, should a big enough dispute arise, the service will be there in your corner.

It might not be much, but it would be something.

Hat Tips:

Technology Law Update
Bureau of National Affairs (pay)