BrandProtect and ImageSpan today announced that they have partnered to extend services that empower content owners to protect and expand their global brand, reach and revenues. ImageSpan’s LicenseStream will be combined with BrandProtect’s LinkWalker, which identifies where brands, company names, images, audio, video, and/or trademarks appear online. The addition of BrandProtect with LinkWalker – which visits about a billion Web pages per month – to the LicenseStream ecosystem extends the ability of users to track and respond to unauthorised uses of a full range of content. “LicenseStream and LinkWalker give customers from a range of industries both an enhanced layer of protection and the ability to move beyond content protection into monetising assets,” said Michael Kiefer, general manager, BrandProtect.

Press Release

ImageSpan and BrandProtect Partner to Deliver Services that Protect and Extend Content Owners’ Global Brand, Reach and Revenues

BrandProtect Joins LicenseStream Ecosystem, Empowering Subscribers to Track, Protect and Monetize a Full Range of Digital Content

SAUSALITO, CA and TORONTO, ON – March 11, 2010 — ImageSpan Inc., creator of LicenseStream, the market-leading licensing and royalty payment automation platform for all media, and BrandProtect, the leader in protecting brands online, today announced that they have partnered to extend services that empower content owners to protect and expand their global brand, reach and revenues.

ImageSpan’s LicenseStream will be combined with BrandProtect’s LinkWalker™, which identifies where brands, company names, images, audio, video, and/or trademarks appear online. LicenseStream empowers all types of media companies to extend their reach into the fast-growing marketplace for digital content by letting them publish their digital assets safely, efficiently and directly to the Web and global search engines so that anyone, anywhere in the world can find their search-optimized content and pay for it with a mouse click. The addition of BrandProtect with LinkWalker – which visits about a billion Web pages per month – to the LicenseStream ecosystem extends the ability of users to track and respond to unauthorized uses of a full range of content.

“The more content owners leverage LicenseStream to publish their content to the Web in a way that helps them monetize it, the more they also need a way to keep the value of their brand from being diluted by unauthorized uses,” said Iain Scholnick, chief executive officer, ImageSpan. “The combination of LicenseStream and BrandProtect’s LinkWalker offers content owners a holistic approach that protects their brand at the same time as it maximizes the value of their digital assets.”

The ecosystem of companies already working with LicenseStream includes Digimarc, whose Digimarc for Images provides an online search service for watermarked images. Digimarc for Images lets content owners add an imperceptible digital watermark to communicate copyright ownership and information on how to contact the owner wherever the image is found online. This solution begins searching content from the moment it is watermarked and published to the Web. 

BrandProtect extends this search capability to other types of media content using text and image-matching search capabilities, as well as digital fingerprinting. A digital fingerprint analyzes image content and then creates a unique image fingerprint. Very much as human fingerprints rely on the patterns of unique arches and swirls found on an individual’s thumb or forefinger, digital media fingerprints rely on a unique ID to track content across the Web. 

One of the largest SQL databases in the world, LinkWalker contains information on more than 70 billion links associated with more than 350 million domains and 12 billion Web pages. New links are added daily from newly registered domains. LinkWalker constantly scours the Web to uncover and mitigate unauthorized uses wherever the content appears. For example, on average it finds more than 300 million images per month in its searches. 

LicenseStream’s Content Tracker uses information provided by both Digimarc for Images and LinkWalker to provide regular reporting to LicenseStream users on where their content is found so they can respond appropriately. When unauthorized uses of content are discovered, LicenseStream empowers content owners to select from several automated remedies – e-mail offers to license the image, video or audio on the spot, request to provide attribution, a link back to the photographer’s gallery, initiate collections or take down the content.

LicenseStream also optimizes content for search engines before it is published to the Web. With a mouse click, buyers can then license that content with flexible pricing based on use. Since watermarks and fingerprints can be unique to various instances of the same content, media owners have the flexibility to set licensing terms depending on the specific usage and buyer. Tracking reports are automatically sent out each month. Alternatively, content owners can generate their own reports at any time. 

In cases where a website owner opts to continue with unauthorized usage of a media owner’s content, BrandProtect can move to inhibit further usage through its relationships with more than 4,000 internet service providers worldwide.

“LicenseStream and LinkWalker give customers from a range of industries both an enhanced layer of protection and the ability to move beyond content protection into monetizing assets,” said Michael Kiefer, general manager, BrandProtect. “Together, we can extend visibility for media owners into how and where their images, video and audio are being used so they can mitigate the threats that put their rights, revenue streams and reputation at risk. With more intelligence about how and where their content is being used across the Web, media owners can uncover new markets and make more intelligent choices about how to protect and maximize the value of their content, including choices about which partnerships and customers to pursue.”

About ImageSpan

ImageSpan is the creator of LicenseStream, the market-leading licensing and royalty payment automation platform. LicenseStream provides a cloud-based licensing solution for monetizing content via publication to search engines and content tracking. Both drive revenue-generating traffic back to content owners. LicenseStream makes content the storefront with defined ownership and rights embedded, enabling flexible pricing based on use. By making content the storefront, LicenseStream creates new efficiencies and frees resources to develop new distribution and marketing channels.  Customers adopting the ImageSpan platform include the Chicago Tribune, McEvoy Group (Publisher of SPIN magazine and Chronicle Books), and the Missouri History Museum. Founded in 2003 and based in Sausalito, California, ImageSpan is the exclusive provider of license registry services to the PLUS Coalition, the international, multi-industry standards body for image licensing. For more information, please go to www.imagespan.com or call (866) 240-8243.

About BrandProtect

As the leader in protecting brands online, BrandProtect empowers organizations to gain control over how they are represented on the Web by uncovering and mitigating the issues that put their reputation at risk and erode customer trust. BrandProtect’s Response Services help detect, uncover and mitigate brand and trademark infringement issues, phishing attacks, web traffic diversions, website integrity issues and defamatory discussions.  BrandProtect was the first company of its kind to be offered full membership by the Forum for Incident Response and Security Teams (FIRST). It also has relationships with more than 4,000 Internet Service Providers globally, accounting for more than 90 percent of the traffic flowing across the Internet. For more information visit: www.brandprotect.com

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