6.5 Content consumers
From a consumers perspective a successful DRM solution will enable the user to get content of the Internet while making sure that his identity and personal information is protected using a DRM solution. The user wants to make sure, when he purchases some content on the Internet, that the distributor is who he say he is and that payment is provided through the use of a secure mechanism. There has been some skepticism when purchasing on the Internet With a DRM solution that provides the necessary security there will probably be more user to join such a service. For distribution of movies on the Internet the customer will require fast delivery of content and most likely that it is cheaper to rent a movie on the internet then in the local rental store.
7: MPEG-21 59
7 MPEG-21
In this section we will look at MPEG-21 [70] which is a specification from the Mov-ing Picture Experts Group (MPEG). MPEG tries, with MPEG-21, to define an open standard for distribution and description of multimedia. MPEG-21 does not define a video format as for MPEG2 [71]. It is an addition to MPEG2, to describe the con-tent of the MPEG2 data, and can also be implemented for other digital concon-tent types than MPEG2. MPEG-21 enables manageable distribution of digital content. Distribu-tion of digital content is made transparent to both the users and the client applicaDistribu-tion.
MPEG-21 gives the ability for the content owner to have control of their data through the functionality provided. With this specification, MPEG suggest a solution to have an open market for distribution of digital content in a controlled environment. The key features of MPEG-21 are:
• Vision, Technologies and Strategy [72]. This defines the purpose of the specifi-cation.
• Digital Item Declaration [73] - A specification to describe a set of abstract terms and concepts to form a useful model for defining Digital Items. A Digital Item is a representation of ”a work”. The goal of this model is to be as flexible and general as possible.
• Digital Item Identification and Description [74]- The scope of the Digital Item Identification is outlined below.
– Uniquely identify Digital Items
– Uniquely identify Intellectual Property related to the Digital Item – Uniquely identify Description schemas
– Use of identifiers to link Digital Items with related information – Identify different types of Digital Items
Digital Item Identifiers should be a Uniform Resource Identifier [75].
• Intellectual Property Management and Protection [76] - To protect copyrights and ownership of Digital Items.
• Rights Expression Language [77] - This is a language that can declare rights and permissions using the terms defined in the Rights Data Dictionary.
• Rights Data Dictionary [78] - Defines a set of clear, consistent structured, inte-grated and uniquely identifies terms to support Rights Expression Language.
The main purpose of MPEG-21 is to define a digital item. A digital item can either be a MPEG movie or a set of movie clip can define one digital item. Another important part of MPEG-21 is to provide metadata about the digital item. This can be a different attribute on the digital item to define copyrights on the digital item, as well as water-marks. MPEG-21 tries to define an open standard for describing digital items. The IPMP (Intellectual Property Managing Protecting) defined by MPEG is MPEG’s spec-ification of Digital Rights Management (DRM). This is also included in the MPEG-21 specification. The MPEG-21 standard provides 17 parts; six of them are listed above.
Many of these documents are still in the requirements stage or still as a working draft, we will now look closer on part 1-6 as these are most relevant to our work.
7.1: Vision, technologies and strategy 60
7.1 Vision, technologies and strategy
Today, various elements are put together to provide for delivery and consumption of multimedia content, both protocols and applications. But there in not defined a overall definition of how these elements relate to each other. MPEG-21 aims to define a stan-dard of how these elements fit together. By doing so, vendors can provide protocols and application that can ”speak” together using the standards defined through MPEG-21.
The vision for MPEG-21 [70]:
”Provide a framework to enable transparent and augmented use of multi-media resources across a wide range of networks and devices to meet the needs of all users. Facilitates the integration of components and standards in order to harmonies technologies for the creation, management, ma-nipulation, transport, distribution and consumption of content. Provides a strategy for achieving a multimedia framework by the development of specifications and standards based on well-defined functional requirement through collaboration with other bodies.”
The MPEG-21 standard tries to define a standard for the entire delivery chain in multi-media distribution. This includes content creation, production, delivery and consump-tion. To support this the content has to be identified, described, managed and protected.
There are seven key, architectural, elements defined in this part of the MPEG-21 stan-dard:
1. Digital Item Declaration
2. Digital Item Identification and Description 3. Content Handling and Usage
4. Intellectual Property Management and Protection 5. Terminals and Networks
6. Content Representation 7. Event Reporting
Some of the bullet points above directly match parts of the standard and some are defined through several parts of the standard. The MPEG-21 specification defines a problem and solution statement:
7.1.1 Problem statement
As more users have increased their usage of digital content and access to this content has been enabled in new devices and platforms. These new devices are used in different locations and environments. Today, users are not given a single tool to handle these changes in usage patterns and have to use different tools on different devices. Due to this it is becoming more important to enable ”ease of use” for content in all of these new environments and also new content types.