SEPTEMBER 2008
Five steps towards effective digital IP management
Mark Harding explains the issues that await all IP owners as they look to join the digital revolution, and offers five lessons from the music industry's experience
| One-minute read |
| Digital distribution is playing a growing role in all of our lives, presenting both a challenge and an opportunity for IP owners. New business models are available, driven by changes in consumers' and web users' behaviour, and these will lead to more types of intellectual property being distributed digitally. But IP owners need to pay attention to the lessons learnt from the music industry's experience. These include the difficulties of retaining control over the value chain; tracking your IP in the digital world; reporting digital activity and predicting revenue streams, as well as the ease of unauthorised distribution through file sharing. As the digital revolution continues, digital transactions will become more attractive for IP owners and the challenges will also change. This will lead to some loss of control, but the challenges can be reduced if IP owners take steps to address them now. |
There are not many certainties in life and even less in the complex and fast-evolving world of digital distribution. What is certain though is that digital distribution is here to stay and it is going to play an increasingly important role in the way in which we all live our lives. For all IP owners this presents both a challenge and an opportunity, which cannot and should not be ignored.
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