• A new study carried out by the University of Rennes and focused on the illegal downloading of online music and video in France reveals that it grew by three per cent between September and December 2009 - despite the noisy and bad-tempered passing of a contentious law designed to outlaw the practice.
• The report shows that 30.3 per cent of all Web users in France illegally downloaded content over the quarter. Over the period 1 July to 30 September it was 29.5 per cent.
• What the Rennes University work throws into stark relief is the feebleness and structural shortcomings of an ill-conceived piece of legislation that was foisted on the government by intense lobbying by vested interests within the content industry. It was conceived in a panic and rushed through without any real analysis or understanding on the part of the legislators of the way the Internet actually works. That's because Hadopi 2 only targets P2P file sharing networks and completely ignores streaming sites. (My comment on access versus copy is here)
• However, the numbers of people who watch and/or download video, film and music via streaming is growing rapidly, while the numbers who do so via P2P networks is in equally rapid decline.
• The Rennes Report shows that the percentage of French Internet users who favor streaming sites rose from 12.4 to 15.8 between September and December last year. At the same time the percentage of those using P2P networks declined from 17.1 to 14.6 over the same period.
• Even more interestingly, the study also shows that those who routinely and frequently buy and download content legally also use illegal platforms. It also comes to the conclusion that the suspension or permanent removal of an individual's Internet connection will be  counterproductive as many who do pirate content also pay for stuff as well. Thus legal video and music sales would fall.  My comment: I think this is the most important point: disconnecting those that are looking for content, those that are fans and interested in music, is a ludicrous idea if you actually want to sell to them! Protection is in the business model not in technology or the law. Regulatory capitalism will fail (quoting James Boyle here).

Get my new iPhone & Android mobile apps, here.

via www.telecomtv.com

Mobile, social, real-time is where it's going; control fades as the top concern while trust becomes tantamount. Who owns the relationship with the fan and user fka 'the consumer' - the broadcaster or the football club...or the players, themselves? TV is completely converging with the Internet, and a lot of branding and advertising funds will shift towards digital, social, video and interactive in the next 2-3 years -so what does this mean for a the football ecosystem? Where is the new money? Why is selling the experience - in any and all its shapes, including augmented / virtual reality - more important than controlling the flow of 'copies' and raw content on the web? How to protect a club's intellectual property, content and media?

I will try to add this video to my YouTube channel as well but the 10-minute maximum rule really makes this a royal pain, so for now it's only available on my Blip.tv channel (you can subscribe to the free iTunes feed, here, in order to download all of my videos automatically) and as an audio-only version on my free iPhone and Android apps. Enjoy - and spread the word (use the options at the bottom of this post)

Gerd's Google Buzz Find me here:

The day after this event I was cruising down the German freeway and figured I should record a short audio comment on my iPhone audio recorder, and share it, see below and here:

Online Seminar : DimDim Review Gerd Leonhard

The bottom line is that while Alan gave a fabulous talk and the eventbrite registration and payment procedure as well as the DimDim webinar interface and basic screen-sharing procedure worked quite nicely, and the participants were really great and very supportive (calling in from San Diego to Japan, no less), the experience itself was seriously diminished by fairly significant technical problems that required constant fixing (e.g. participants re-booting the DimDim page etc). I am not at all sure whether many of these issues had a lot to do with DimDim's platform or servers, but having the presenter's audio drop out completely at several occasions, and for fairly long durations, is just totally unacceptable for the audience.

Never mind that the video feed from Alan and me was mostly not happening as planned, either, or that recording the whole session was a no-go - when I tried this option, the whole seminar came to a screeching halt. If that's all that DimDim can do then... I'm GoneGone.

I am also quite disappointed that - apart from various annoying sales calls on my mobile phone - DimDim's management has not seen it fit to communicate with us, before or after this pretty widely tweeted event, nor have they responded to my contact requests via LinkedIn. I mean, if anyone could possibly prove their business concept and the 'telepresence' idea, it would certainly include people like Alan and myself... would it not?

So, being the gluttons for punishment that we are, we will try this again, on March 23, 12 noon EST, this time using the Cisco / Webex platform, and employing the new 'pay what you think it's worth' model rather than charging up-front. And if you took part in the last session it's free, period. The topic will be 'Monetizing Social Media, Take 2' - details will be announced soon.  Join us (new eventbrite sign-up page)

2 weeks ago, I launched my free iPhone app, followed by the Android version just a few days ago, powered by MobileRoadie in LA. Now that I am very close to the first 1000 downloads I  wanted to share how I intend to 'charge' for the apps and the exclusive content that I plan to make available there. So here it goes.

As you may have noticed, almost all of my content is free, including this blog's full RSS feed,  65+ slideshows, 100+ videos, most of my books & PDFs, and, for now, the new iPhone and Android mobile apps. I make a living with speaking engagements, keynotes, think-tank events and seminars, advisory work, CEO coaching sessions, and various other, mostly fun things; and I am indeed very privileged to really enjoy my work and make a living at the same time (an usual combination, I hear).

I want to continue to provide you with lots of great and free content even though many (if not most) people have suggested that I should start charging upfront for my content. However, instead of going down the road of requiring you to 'pay before you get' my content, i.e. to pay for my apps via iTunes or the Android Market I have decided to deploy my own version of the often-cited 'Radiohead Model' (borrowed from the group's (in-)famous approach to selling their music for 'whatever you think it's worth'), i.e. you will continue to receive a lot of stuff for free but yes, you can indeed make a payment if you like what I do. And I would be delighted if you do.

So here, below, are 4 ways to return the favor, help me pay for my iPhone apps and to otherwise monetize (terrible word but appropriate):

1) You can go to my Lulu bookstore and either buy a dead-tree i.e. printed, packaged and shupped version of my books, such as Music 2.0 for $17.75 or Friction is Fiction for a whopping $60.40 (sorry for the price but it's a lot of pages, 4c,  the cheaper b/w  version is here), or any of the PDFs ranging from $2.50 to $7.50 (even if you already have it... that's OK, too).

 2) You can  go to Amazon and order my 'old' and first book "The Future of Music"which is still a great book (co-written with Dave Kusek); just keep in mind that since this book is owned and marketed by a publisher (Berklee Press) it is not really the most direct way to ship a few $ directly to me;) - but still very much appreciated. The audio version is here, btw. The self-published, Lulu-powered "Friction is Fiction" book mentioned above is also available via Amazon so I'd prefer you to buy that first, or ... just get both.

 3) If you want to 'pay with attention' and give me some social capital rather than real money, that's OK, too (I shall ask my landlord to accept facebook points, soon, as well - seriously;). 

To this end, I would suggest these mechanisms:

• A nice, juicy blog post about my work, my presentations or my videos, or books
• A series of tweets, or retweets
• A nice review of my books (Amazon or Lulu) or iPhone / Android apps (Apple App store is good)
• Nice comments on my slideshows or videos (incl. my Youtube channel)

 

• Giving fair and reasonable permission is a much better strategy than complaining about so-called digital piracy
• The problems of the music industry are way beyond Spotify, and won't be solved merely by open, free market mechanisms - we need a new, collective digital music license, asap
• Today, music fans want to listen first, and then pay - and the industry insists on the reverse (see WMG's recent 'No' on free streaming in the U.S.). Key question: do they prefer control over compensation??
• To waive a huge stick at the ISPs, and to try make them responsible for solving the music industry's issues, is a very bad idea, and won't put money into anyone's pockets
• The selling of mere 0s and 1s is not really a business anymore - it's no longer about distribution, it's about converting attention into 'new generatives'

To avoid any confusion, 1pm EST means:

• 10 am in San Francisco
• 1pm in New York
• 6pm in London / GMT
• 7pm in Central Europe / CET
• 8pm in Greece / Israel etc
• 11.30 pm in India
• 1 am (next day) in Jakarta

The event will take place on the new DimDim webinar platform which requires nothing but a good browser (e.g. Firefox;). The session will have Alan and myself on video, and audio, during the entire time, plus all participants can use the chat windows to ask questions throughout the entire session (approx. 90 minutes).  We will be recording the whole thing (if the technology keeps its promises) and shall make the video available to all participants, afterward.

For more information click here: Online seminar with Gerd Leonhard & Alan Moore: thriving commercially in social media and the networked society