Contracts Management Guide and Rights Summary Guide Available for Review

Alexandria, VA - IDEAlliance® is announcing the posting for public comment of two new specifications that address rights management: PRISM Contract Management Metadata Specification and PRISM Rights Summary Metadata Specification. The industry comment period for the specifications is now open and will close on January 15, 2015. Comments will be resolved during the IDEAlliance Technical Council Meeting in New York City on February 12, 2015.

Background
In 2004, the IDEAlliance PRISM Working Group began work on the original version of the PRISM Usage Rights Metadata Specification. During the time since then, many major magazine publishers have used this specification as the basis for implementing rights management systems. However, times have changed. . .

Today, the underlying assumption that usage rights are limited to the right to publish content domestically, in print, is unrealistically simple. Since 2004, publishing has undergone a radical transformation. Publishing across a wide number of media platforms is the norm, as is publishing both domestically and on a global scale. In addition, publishers have realized that they require an automated red-light/green-light right-to-use engine more than ever before. In May 2014, the eMedia21 Council crystalized publishers’ growing concerns about addressing rights management and in June 2014, IDEAlliance launched the Rights Task Force to move this technical agenda forward.

A Comprehensive Approach to Rights
The Rights Task Force began its work by examining how each member is tackling the rights management challenge. Based on this analysis, the group determined that three (3) distinct, yet highly interrelated sets of metadata are required to implement a comprehensive rights management solution. Those three domains are contract management, rights summary and asset management. With that understanding in place, the technical work began.

IDEAlliance highlighted the first draft of its two new rights management specifications at a workshop in New York City on October 30. The first specification is a new PRISM Contract Management Metadata Specification and the second specification is the PRISM Rights Summary Metadata Specification. Discussions at the workshop contributed to the development of a second draft to be posted for public comment.

The Public Comment Process
The Rights Management Draft Specification consists of four (4) documents and two (2) XML schemas. All can be downloaded for review and comment from www.prismstandard.org. Comments can be posted online HERE or sent by email to Dianne Kennedy.