David Emery OnlineNinja Tune on Leaks
19 July 2011
It was with considerable disappointment that we learnt in the last week that two records we have been working on have been leaked, despite the use of watermarked CDs. Toddla T's Watch Me Dance (Ninja Tune) and another upcoming release were both leaked from copies sent to the journalist Benjamin Jager at the offices of Backspin magazine in Germany.
For my non-music industry readers, most releases these days are distributed to journalists, radio DJs and other folks that need the music before an album release either via watermarked CDs or digitally via watermarked downloads or streams.
Watermarking does actually work – it’s a pretty advanced technology, and you really can trace things back as shown by this Ninja Tune post. The thing is, though, is that it actually doesn’t do anything at all – technically speaking, at least – to prevent an album leaking; it’s not like the days of copy-protected CDs that would only play in certain CD players if you looked at them in the right way (on a Tuesday. When it’s sunny.). You can take a watermarked CD, rip it to MP3 and upload it anywhere you like unrestricted.
Watermarking is protection by fear.
Fear that if you did leak it the person who sent it to you would find out and there would be repercussions.
Figuring out what those repercussions actually are is pretty difficult, however. Obviously you stop sending them music, which is you’re a freelance journalist could be an issue I guess, but it’s hardly the end of the world. I have heard of people suing, but most of the time that’s going to be a bit of an extreme measure. So, naming and shaming as Ninja Tune have done seems like an effective solution – if they didn’t do anything, their social copy protection goes out the window.
Although as Darren from PIAS mentions on Twitter, they better be really sure they know who leaked it…
Visit ➔