Despite the growth of legal online video and music services, piracy is still thriving. Alexander Cameron, managing director of IPTV technology firm Digital TX, argues that the ages of net neutrality and the ‘big boys’ controlling the content industry are about to come to an end.

The textbook says content is king, and that saying is something every telco and ISP worldwide is contemplating after realising that if they throw enough technical people at the IPTV infrastructure problem they can put a TV network together. But putting the wires in doesn’t make people flock to your service like broadband or telephony does. TV is not just a whole new ballgame but a massive leap of competence and faith. To attract customers, you need good content, and getting it is no afterthought – there are far too many IPTV projects alive in the world today where content is seconded or laughed off. It’s a very deadly mistake.

It’s often easy to forget the humble beginnings of content owners, but a good place to start is with ASCAP (American Society of Composers, Authors, and Publishers) and the BMI (Broadcast Music Incorporated), both created just under a century ago to protect the rights of musicians, similar to the UK’s PRS and MCPS. Before the 1920s, people didn’t pay for entertainment like we do today – radio stations broadcast performers live without paying them. Radio (or the “wireless”) changed everything.

During wartime ASCAP members (predominantly musicians) boycotted the radio as the industry had become motivated to have their assets protected and paid for. Slowly they came to rely on the new medium until it formed the very backbone of their industry, once they were able to be compensated for their work being played on it. History repeated itself with vinyl, cassette tapes and internet P2P piracy today.

But this time content’s kingdom is crumbling. Right before our very eyes, slowly and gently.

There is a war on its way between telecoms companies and content owners, coming about because of a fundamental lack of understanding between each others’ business models and operational concerns....