Attributor Corp., a Silicon Valley based startup, announced an agreement with
the Associated Press to monitor the Web for instances of the AP's content and
report on suspected misuses. Attributor's technology is in pre-release
mode. The AP is the largest newsgathering organization in the world.
Attributor's technology works for text content now with audio and image
support to be added in the near future. Similarly to an audio
fingerprinting solution like Audible Magic, Attributor computes numbers that
serve as "fingerprints" for content and searches the Web for matches. But
Attributor also considers the context for content, such as (we presume) adjacent
copyright attributions or presence on certain websites. It uses rules
describing that context to drive pattern matching, which helps it determine
whether content is being used according to a pre-existing licensing agreement,
being used to help sell advertising, being excerpted and thus potentially
covered under fair use law, or just being misused.
In the AP's case, it can benefit from knowing where and how its many
licensees are using its massive daily output of content, as well as where its
content is being used inappropriately. The AP is not a publisher per se
but a "wholesaler" of large amounts of news content on a daily basis to
newspapers, magazines, and broadcasters, many of which maintain websites with
news content that could legitimately include AP content. If the AP's
experiment with Attributor is successful, it ought to be very easy to adapt it
for other news publishers, such as the AP's owners and affiliates.
In addition, Attributor's rules-based technology could be useful as a means
of monitoring compliance with Creative Commons licensing terms, such as those
requiring attribution. Individuals and other small content owners could
also use the technology to monitor their content online and possibly get paid
for it without relying on encryption or on users identifying it through services
like del.icio.us and Digg. Attributor's literature (not to mention the
company's name) suggests that it intends to support both scenarios, not just
deals with major content providers.
Attributor has been in stealth mode until it closed a VC funding round late
last year. Now that it has a marquee reference customer, the company
should be well worth watching as it makes it way towards formal launch.
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