Media-related companies such as Adobe MAX, Adobe, The New York Times Company and Twitter are working to create a system for digital content attribution, said Adobe News. According to Reclaim the Net, this industry-standard will function similar to the digital rights management (DRM).
Adobe News said that this new “industry standard” will “provide proper content attribution for creators and publishers.” This move was taken as companies and creators find it important to “ensure trust and transparency online.”
Adobe executive vice president and general counsel Dana Rao said that the abundance of digital content on different forms of media calls for an authentication process. Rao said that with the variety of media found on the internet “people want to know the content they’re seeing is authentic.”
Leading the project, Adobe works to create an “opt-in system” that will enable creators to “securely attached attribution data to media they choose to share.” This system will also allow originators to verify their work, which in turn allows them to receive the right attributions for their work.
As much as the DRM-like function benefits originators, it also serves consumers as it “[provides them] with an attribution trail.” This is expected to give the audience more security when it comes to the authenticity of the media they consume.
DRM-style Attribution for Memes
While the main intent of this feature is to protect creators and consumers, some parties are concerned that it can pose a variety of issues regarding copyright management. Reclaim the Net said that a source of this concern is the similarity of Adobe’s system with the much-criticized DRM.
According to the article, “once this system is in place, it could potentially be used by creators and publishers to take down content in the future” without discretion. This concern comes from the recent issue in which shared memes regarding popular personalities were taken down due to “questionable copyright claims.”
Aside from DRM, Youtube’s Content ID and the Digital Millennium Copyright Act (DMCA) were abused by malicious parties to “strategically take down content or get the accounts of their critics suspended.” These bad actors primarily aim to restrict the use of memes, reaction videos, and review which oppose their stances.
While The New York Times said that this new standard will be used to battle “misinformation,” Reclaim the Net questions who or what decides what can be considered misinformation.