Producer Rights Information System for
Audiovisual and Multimedia
PRISAM Contents
Page
1.
Scope and Objectives
3
2.
Consortium and Roles of Participants
4
3.
Service Developed and Work Carried Out
4
4.
Results
5
5.
Obstacles
6
6.
Dissemination of Results
7
7.
Plans for Commercial Exploitation
8
PRISAM Producer Rights Information System for Audiovisual and Multimedia
1.
Scope and Objectives
PRISAM (Producer Rights Information System for Audiovisual and Multimedia) was
created in the framework of the INFO 2000 programme of the European Commission,
and is one of the Multimedia Rights Clearance System (MMCRS), aiming at
“contributing to the enhancement of the current multimedia rights trading environment in
the Union, by increasing the effectiveness and efficiency of multimedia rights clearance
processes between rightholders and multimedia products developers.”
The current situation regarding intellectual property rights (IPR) and multimedia use or
exploitation of audiovisual works is mainly characterised by difficulties in identifying
audiovisual works and rightholders thereof, and in clearing these rights for multimedia
use, as there is a great diversity of rights involved:

In terms of nature of rights – moral rights, reproduction, communication,
distribution and synchronisation rights,

In terms of benefiting rightholders - producers, but also authors, performers,
broadcasters, and any rightholders thereof, whose rights derive from authors or
neighbouring rights.
This situation, which is not specific to multimedia, has led to two kinds of attitudes in
licensing relevant rights: individual licensing or collective rights management.
The PRISAM project itself will however not deal with rights licensing, leaving licensing
agreements to individual negotiations between the identified rightholders.
Therefore, the purpose of this project, in creating an information system between
producers’ collecting societies, will be to promote and facilitate the negotiations between
European producers / editors of multimedia products/ services and the rightholders,
through a “one stop information shop”, by:

Procuring and transmitting information about the copyrights and neighbouring
rights in and to audiovisual works (whatever their country of production) and the
owners thereof,

Establishing contacts, representation of interests and co-operation with other
foreign producer collecting societies or organisations with similar objectives.
It should however be noted that some of the current partners of the PRISAM project
have themselves entered into agreements with other right management companies
aiming at facilitating direct licensing at their national level : GWFF in Germany (with
CMMV) ; PROCIREP in France (with SACD).
This project is being carried out with a limited number of EUROCOPYA companies, all
founder members. The exploitation plan aims to enable other members of
EUROCOPYA and even non members to join PRISAM.
2.
Consortium and Roles of Participants
The PRISAM project is an initiative of EUROCOPYA (European Federation of Joint
Management Societies of Producers for Private Audiovisual Copying). These
organisations manage the film and television producer’s part on private copyrights at
their national level and are also dealing with cable retransmission rights.
Each participant of the consortium, GWFF of Munich, PROCIREP of Paris, SEKAM
Video of Amsterdam and PROCIBEL of Brussels, is a founding member of
EUROCOPYA.
Responsibility for project co-ordination is shared by the project co-ordinator, GWFF and
PROCIREP, as secretary general of EUROCOPYA.
The split of responsibilities during the realisation of the project has been based mainly
on the geographical basis, as far as information on national rightholders and expertise
on local legislation are concerned.
Regular meetings have been held with all participants, to ensure the project progression
and to avoid misunderstanding of the implementation of the database on the site.
SEKAM Video has supervised the consolidation of the local databases, at a technical
level. They have also supervised the definition of the technical format of the local
databases.
3.
Service Developed and Work Carried Out
The PRISAM project is concretised by a web site whose address is www.prisam.com.
The site aims at simplifying the rights clearing process, for any potential multimedia
product producer, and therefore enhance the development of the use of audiovisual
components within multimedia works.
The user needs to be pre-registered to use the database and make any kind of
research. He has to enter his name, address and an e-mail address, and he is sent a
user-id and a password to enter the research web page.
The site is organised with a thematic research based upon the following criteria: ISAN,
title, type, genre, producer/director, writer, actor, composer. The user must use a
minimum of two checkboxes and a maximum of three to launch the research.
In order to obtain the name and address of the rightholder(s) from which he might obtain
the authorisation and the master copy of the works he would like to use, the user has to
fill in an order form, confirm his name and address, pay the fee somewhere and he will
be sent a contact by e-mail, so that the multimedia user can get in touch with the
copyright owner.
In order to build this database, the four participants have brought their home databases
to a common information system; the implementation has been realised in four stages:


Analysis of the current situation
-
analysis of information available in each company’s registers of work and
rights
-
analysis of IT resources available in each company, and preliminary studies
of their compatibility
Definition of information exchange standards


4.
-
encoding procedures regarding works
-
encoding procedures regarding rights
-
rightholder information available for users
-
data transfer procedures
Creation of a test site
-
test database
-
data transfer
Overall evaluation of the project
-
strengths and weaknesses analysis
-
guidelines for further development
Results
The project is already successful regarding:

the co-operation between European private copy management societies

the quality of the information in the database.
The co-operation between the four participants has been reinforced and the possible
obstacles to a common database have been overcome. The definition of data transfer
process and the conception of the architecture of the site have been realised so that the
user can easily and rapidly access the database. The first tests on a sample of works on
the site show that the thematic research works and that the way the user can search is
very simple.
The prototype presented represents about 6000 feature films searchable via eight
criteria available with the thematic research. Following “debugging” of the database, the
number of works is theoretically unlimited. An extension of the system to handle all
kinds of audio-visual works has been prepared in the basic design.
Finally, we expect to extend the project to the EUROCOPYA members which was not
planned so quickly at the beginning of the project.
Having finished a first analysis of available sources, and securing the restrictions in the
way rightholders information could be made available to multimedia publishers, the next
stage of the PRISAM project involved gathering expertise on application design from
outside sources.
This stage started mid summer 1999 and was by difficulties in finding the right IT
partner, as detailed in section 5., below..
After the expiration of a next deadline, a three month delay and price tags exceeding all
reasonable expectations, a clear cut decision had to be made: With SEKAM Video
involved in copyright handling from within the trade it was felt that a system like PRISAM
could to be developed more or less in-house, using IT expertise already available from
some people within the audiovisual trade. Only the actual coding of the application
should be done by a software developing company.
SEKAM Video approached producer/website-editor Frits Oostvogel who took great
interest in the PRISAM project from the moment he first heard about it. Within weeks, a
preliminary sketch of the full system could be produced on paper, that could be
discussed with the PRISAM partners. In this preliminary sketch, the emphasis was on
data security within the online system. A next draft of the full system design was
presented to the EC at the very end of 1999. The problem of handling titles in different
versions and languages called for more research. An under construction website
announcing PRISAM was online from autumn 1999.
Meanwhile, AVD, a mid-size Dutch software company had impressed the PRISAM
design team with very knowledgeable advice on handling data in a secured (medical)
environments and with their expertise in very up-to-date application development
software. Their quote for consulting on the PRISAM system and its actual coding was
been quite reasonable, so they won the contract.
For the MILIA in Cannes a flyer on the PRISAM project was produced and put into all
the mailboxes of both press and exhibitors. It did not fail to be picked up by the MILIA
daily news report that carried an item on the PRISAM project.
With some sample data, sent to AVD by all PRISAM partners early summer, planning
and actual programming could take shape. Still, AVD could not start actual coding until
fuzzy logic search engine software, based on mnemonics had been implemented and
thoroughly tested for use in the PRISAM system. Their way of implementing could solve
the majority of problems arising from titles in different versions and languages.
Extensions of PRISAM with countries in more different languages is possible without
redefining the system itself.
In October 2000, after intensive talks between the partners, third draft of the table
structure for the full PRISAM system had been agreed upon, and a first online test was
shown mid November in a basic layout. This test called for both major and minor
adaptations on the system itself, and –more importantly, in the table structure.
The table-structure for the PRISAM information system wasn’t finalised until early
December, adhering still closer to major ISAN and AGICOA standards. The first data
sets were received shortly after and loaded into the actual application. As the last data
set wasn’t in until December 23, further minor adaptations may still be called for.
Both the look and feel and actual workings of the PRISAM information system’s first
prototype can hardly be final.
The actual use of the system will help to further define the need for refining and
extending the system’s services. As a basic service, providing direct, quick and reliable
information on copyrights of audiovisual material. On an international level, it links
multimedia producers with the original makers of content to be used, giving credit and
copyrights where both are due.
5.
Obstacles
There were difficulties in finding the right IT expertise, as mentioned earlier. Thear early
part of the project was characterised by some over-eager IT companies that after first
contact, put great effort in showing off their capabilities in handling data. However, these
companies hardly understood the way existing copyrights are handled within the
audiovisual trade and showed little regard for the confidentiality of the data with which a
copyright information system would be dealing.
We expected the project could reach the initial goals at the end of 2000. Unfortunately,
we had a four months delay at the beginning of the project that could not be caught up.
Moreover, the technical manager of PROCIREP in charge of the PRISAM project left
the company in April 2000, and the new manager only arrived in November 2000.
6.
Dissemination of Results
The dissemination actions undertaken for the PRISAM project have the following
purposes:

obtain information from the behaviour of multimedia editors concerning their use
of multimedia extracts

increase awareness of the project within MMRCS in the European multimedia
industry

prepare extension of PRISAM to all EUROCOPYA members.
The PRISAM participants have attended the MILIA market for the last two years, and
have tried to disseminate the PRISAM project by several means:

a mailing to various French and Belgian companies before the MILIA 1999,
presenting the PRISAM project.

Meetings with multimedia project managers or licence acquisition managers that
were present on the 1999 and 2000 MILIA markets.

Some articles have been written about the PRISAM project in the MILIA
newspaper.

A presence on the INFO 2000 stand on the exhibition (MILIA 2000) with
advertising and information about PRISAM (brochure explaining the project, and
providing contacts.

The PRISAM participants will also be present at the next MILIA (in Cannes in
February 2001). As the prototype of the site will be available, we will show an online presentation of the PRISAM site and provide a small brochure aimed at
explaining the way to get information on the site.
We are also in contact with other INFO 2000 MMCRS project groups, and are
periodically meeting to exchange views on the projects. For example, we had a
presentation of VERDI and ORS, and could discuss of the possible links between the
projects. Some links could thus be created between the sites and even between the
databases in the future.
We have some links with other international projects, such as the ISAN project, whose
aim is to provide an identification number to all works of many countries. A field has
been set up in the PRISAM database, in order to integer the ISAN number to the
database works.
We plan to enlarge the PRISAM project to the other members of EUROCOPYA, in order
that the site can be known and used by a growing number of multimedia producers and
that the EUROCOPYA members can bring their repertory to the PRISAM site, in order
to supply a wider database to potential users. This is the next essential development we
will undertake, and we are expecting a great impact on the dissemination of the project
with this enlargement.
7.
Plans for Commercial Exploitation
The PRISAM project is not commercially orientated. The site being developed rather
aims at helping multimedia producers to clear rights on the works they want to use. Our
copyright owners expect us to provide this service.
The actual site contains four countries’ databases. The very interest of that database is
to enlarge the database to other countries, in order that a user can have a wide choice
in his thematic research.
We intend to enlarge the database in two stages:

First, by including the other members of Eurocopya in the project and sharing their
databases (see dissemination actions § 8 supra);

Secondly, by examining the situation of the other producers’ rights management
companies, and then proposing them to bring their databases.
The key objective is to begin the extension in the fifth period (ending April 2001). We
would like this stage to be most engaged at the end of next April, but it will probably be
too short to enlarge the project to all the EUROCOPYA members.
The main point is to encourage all the potential members to sharing their repertory with
the PRISAM participants. The political problem of this aggregation of local databases is
the main and preliminary point, the financing budget will be decided later on.
In any event, the access to the database shall not be free of charge, in order to gather
the concentration of know-how included in the database and valorise the service given
to the users. The fee shall remain symbolic, as the PRISAM project has not been built to
be immediately profitable. Indeed, the involvement of the participants of PRISAM in the
rights clearance process is to be understood as a part of the defence of the producers’
rights.
We also want to preserve an easy access to the database and the ability for any
potential multimedia user to be put in connection with the holder of the master copy of
the works.
As for the business plan of the project, we do not expect huge human costs for the
following of the project. The ISAN project (as for a comparison) shall need one full-time
equivalent per year and member for the following of the project.
We will also need IT resources that will be further determined, depending on the number
of potential new members of the project that will join the database.