Grantastic Designs’ Blog

Last week, much of the technology media covered Google’s announcement of its anti-piracy filter for its YouTube site, a means of removing unauthorized copyrighted video clips. This proactive technology implementation appeared to have been spurred by the media giant Viacom suing Google for not previously taking proactive steps with the wide proliferation of its copyrighted video content appearing on YouTube.

Previously, YouTube already had manual copyright infringement notification guide for users to fill and and submit. Now, YouTube has also included a content verification program for reporting copyright infringement of multiple videos, or those expecting to have an ongoing need to remove potentially infringing content from YouTube).

My question to YouTube: how could this potentially affect video publishers using 3rd party content for “fair use” purposes? Could the filter make a distinction, or was video content to be automatically removed without first verifying the context of its use?

To that, I received the following statement from YouTube’s Director of Engineering, Jeremy Doig:

“We appreciate ideas from the various media companies on effective content identification technologies. We’re glad that they recognize the need to cooperate on these issues, and we’ll keep working with them to refine our industry-leading tools.”

OK, not exactly a direct response to my question. So I then did a follow up phone call with a YouTube spokesperson, who was very helpful with his explanation. How it works is like this: If you were to upload, as a 3rd party, some potentially infringing video content, you would receive a notification that your video content matched the original copyright owner’s in their database. You would then have the option of giving a counter-notification if you felt your content fell under fair use (or some other legitimate means, such as being an authorized provider). So just because the YouTube anti piracy filter might “ping” your content would not cause an automatic removal of said content.

YouTube’s spokesperson added that the anti-piracy actually isn’t in place just yet, and that their press release was just meant as an open-invitation for others to start signing up for the program. Right now, its simply a beta launch for YouTube to get their video catalogs and libraries up to date, and for them to recruit more companies than what they have for now.

In addition, YouTube’s spokesperon also mentioned that lot of media publishers are actually looking to use the technology just as a means of tracking their content online for advertising purposes (i.e., matching the video content with AdSense, overlay ads, or other ad opportunities ). According to YouTube’s spokesperson, many media publishers have said that they’re alright with leaving the content up there, since content owner has the option not just to block the content, but to leave it up there and monetize it through advertising.)

So if the anti-piracy filter work for YouTube as planned, 3rd party video content “posters” in YouTube that apply fair use practices to original copyright owner’s video should not have to be concerned with removal of such content.

So with that information, I guess my own video of Viacom’s Daily Show footage should stay up there after all. (I’m glad the thousand-plus viewers can appreciate it.)

A “news story” that has been repeatedly featured on Comedy Central’s “The Daily Show” including an updated piece last night, has host John Stewart reporting that U.S. Vice President Richard Cheney had Google remove his private residence (at the Naval Observatory on Massachusetts Avenue of the D.C. capital) from their Google Earth maps.

At the recent SMX Local Mobile Conference this month, I had already asked Michael Jones, Chief Technologist for Google Earth, Google Maps, and Google Local, about the story that’s been circulating on the internet that Comedy Central picked up as “fact.” Any truth to it?

“There’s absolutely no truth to the Cheney thing. Its surreal.” Says Michael.

So the fake news gets its own fake news wrong. Then again, should we really have any expectations for fake news? Or is that the easy excuse to fall back on when the satire loses it teeth? What I think will be especially ironic is if Comedy Central’s parent company, Viacom, has my YouTube video clip removed on grounds of copyright infringement. (Here’s my advance response in case that does happen: “So what, Lie-a-com, somehow its alright for you to have the Daily Show steal clips from everyone else and call it satire, but its not alright for me or others to exercise the same fair use of your clips to report REAL news?”)

At the SMX Local Mobile Keynote on October 1, Michael Jones, Chief Technologist for Google Maps, Earth, and Local Search, talked about the comparisons and contrasts between online local search and the concierge business.

Concierges have been a professional society since 1929 in Europe, and since the late 1970s in the U.S.

“There are some parallels between what a concierge might do and what computers could do.” Michael said, describing the qualities of a good concierge and how local search attempts to parallel that criteria (shown in the slide below in parenthesis).

Advantages of a professional concierge over Google’s Local search

While more seasoned travelers and users overall are flocking to local search for tips, Michael admits that Google is not nearly as good as the service a hotel’s professional concierge could provide.

“As an industry, both from the provider side, from the user-satisfaction side, and from the optimization side, we’re weak in a lot of these areas.” said Michael. By comparison to professional concierges, Michael characterizes the current state of local search along personalization and customization as “pretty poor.”

Human concierges get a feel for what you mean, over what a computer interface can only do minimally with spelling.

Some of those advantage of good concierges I would add of my own:

• They have good connections. A good concierge can make quality reservations on short notice.
• They have special tips and deals with other businesses – that can include unique restaurants, shops, attractions and events.
• They can create memorable total-trip experiences (not just individual components thrown together) that can instill brand loyalty, making guests want to return to the hotel or recommend it to others.Good concierges have connections
• They can fill areas that have a lack of user-generated content online.
• They can provide honest expertise over the noise of the online crowd. There have been many cases online of competitors giving false “bad reviews” to each other. (This is especially prevalent among the top Chicago restaurants, so I’ve found.) A concierge can provide much better reliability when the noise of user-generated content reviews gets to be too much, especially when its overidden with bad spam reviews.

This would make the arguement that local search isn’t always a proper substitute over a concieges’ own expertise and long-term industry experience, and “human empathy.” (Human empathy would be extremely difficult for a computer even with artificial intelligence to properly duplicate.) Concierges are trained at hospitality management schools, and know how to handle guests needs on an emotional level. The concierge can get something contextual and semantical with the request – and that goes well beyond what the digital keyboard can provide.

“As an industry, both from the provider side, from the user-satisfaction side, and from the optimization side, we’re weak in a lot of these areas.” concedes Michael.

The state of the concierge industry

Concidentally, the day after Michael’s keynote presentation, USA Today ran a front-page story on the concierge industry. Interviews with hospitality service experts suggested that the need for concierges is decreasing with the growth of local search.

Except at upscale hotels, the concierge “is going the way of the elevator operator,” says Chekitan Dev, a Cornell University hotel school professor. “Owners and operators of midmarket and down-market hotels can no longer justify offering the service of a concierge,” he says, because plenty of information is available on the Internet, and “good concierges are hard to find, hard to keep and expensive.”

David Cranage, a professor at Penn State’s hospitality management school, suggests that hotels’ new moves to deliver information without a concierge staff may be akin to banks, a quarter-century ago, adding ATMs and, in some cases, discouraging the use of tellers by charging fees.

However, the story’s author said that “Whether sophisticated information technology could ultimately lead to the demise of the traditional concierge position is a matter of some disagreement in the hospitality industry. Neither the government nor the industry tracks employment numbers.”

What does seem clear is that even if concierges are being better trained to utilize online local search, a quality concierge, or just any concierge, appears to be reserved more for your high-end brand of hotels (in the 4-star and 5-star range). Other hotels rely on guest services, which often has no ample experience with local search. (When I contacted my local Holiday Inn on a Sunday, they mentioned that their sales department handles guest’s local travel tips, which was only available on weekdays!)

My recommendation for all hotels: mandatory local search training

In this where more travelers are using local search as part of their trip plans, every hotel, no matter what the size or rate, should make local search accessible to their guests – either with a concierge or staff member who has at least basic training in local search, along with easy access for guest themselves to online local search. This can be done by the following means:

• Including online local search in hospitality training.
• Provide assistance for travelers on how to enter local information into their cell phones via SMS, including placing the hotel address.
• Include a virtual concierge system – online services that give guests 24-hour access to information normally provided by a concierge. This can appear right when people access the wifi of the hotel, and right on the desktop computers available to guests.
• Feature staff picks based on employees’ knowledge of the area. As the USA Today article reports, this is already being done by 20% of the Radisson hotels in their American chain.
• Poll guests on their experiences, and have their own “hyper local” reviews by their guests, right on their hotel website. (These reviews could also be accessible  when people at the hotel login everytime to wifi.)

There have been times when I’ve actually found myself assisting concierges on how to find certain locations, and the information they have to offer.

While I don’t forsee the demise of concierges anytime soon, whether a hotel or building has a concierge or guest services staff of any kind, they all need be better trained on local search.  Local search may not necessarily “kill” the concierge business, but the concierge business needs to have better familiarity with online local search if they are to maintain their own relevance.

At the SMX Local-Mobile keynote session on Oct 1st, I sat right in the front row, with co-hosts Greg Sterling and Chris Sherman alongside of me at the same table. Greg had turned his head my way and said, “I’m really looking forward to what you’ll have to say!”

I replied, confused, “what I have to say?”

To which Greg responded, “Oh no, I mean him.”

I looked to my immediately left, and that “him” he was referring to was Michael Jones, Chief Technologist for Google Maps, Google Earth, and Google Local, and the keynote speaker for the event. I had been talking with Michael minutes beforehand and he was oogling my super-small digital camcorder (a Sony Xacti VPC-CG65) I brought just for the purpose of testing out in the session. Kind of amusing that I wasn’t more aware of who the speaker was, but hey, he was a fill-in for the originally scheduled speaker. (According to Greg, IAC’s Peter Horan was slated to be the keynote but he had a family issue and had to withdraw.) It would be unfair to characterize Michael as a “replacement” because he was an excellent top draw, and seemed perfectly suited for the conference them. He even pulled double-daty and sat in on one of the other panels of the conference.

And I think Greg was still interested in what I had to say, anway.

Following up from my post yesterday, TurnHere’s spokesperson was considerate to contact me back and offer a clarification on their distribution model. TurnHere “straightforward distribution deal” with the search engines was just intended to mean that submit a great deal of video content to the same channels available to all others, including search marketers.

I thank TurnHere for providing assurance to search marketers that they are just using the same submission process as other search marketers have available.