I've been pretty busy of late with digital watermarking projects. The new release of DFI 4.0 (Digimarc for Images, with the Chroma upgrade) is going really well and I'll post a video comparing the Classic watermarking more to the new Chroma upgrade in the near future. Be sure to upgrade your plug-ins if you haven't already, there's even one for Elements users.

Our Mobile technology is keeping me on my toes. It generated a lot of interest at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and with so many inquires that it just may have to spring forth fully grown like Athena from Zeus' forehead. OK, the Athenian reference might have been a bit of a stretch, but our work in the mobile realm really is a gee-whiz experience that seems like magic at times. Hopefully you'll experience it in the near future.

Although I've been preoccupied pushing pixels within images, I have been reading some pretty interesting articles... so interesting in fact, that you should keep reading this post!

How many images can you scan in a day, a month, or even a year? Could you scan through one billion images in a year, how about two billion? Well, the Digimarc Search Service constantly crawls the Internet and scans over two billion images a year. That's about 200 million per month. Whenever a Digimarc digitally watermarked image is located, it reports back where and when it was found, along with a thumbnail preview.

All Digimarc for Images customers now have access to see search statistics. They can see numbers on how many images have been scanned and located for all customer images and their own images. You'll even be able to see the your three most recent images found. And if you're a subscriber of Digimarc Search, you'll be able to run unlimited reports about where and when your images were located.

Was getting access to Digimarc Search too expensive in the past? Check back on February 16, 2010; we're making it affordable for everyone.

I'm excited to say that the new website for Digimarc for Images just went live. You can download the new Chroma plug-ins and the free Digimarc Reader for Images now. Check here to see if your software version is supported. All Digimarc for Images customers can also sign In to their accounts and explore the new account management interface and experience the features I mentioned in my previous blog entry. 

Learn more about Digimarc for Images by going here. The redesign includes simple navigation and much more information. Not a customer yet? Email me for a discount coupon at ben.bounketh@digimarc.com. And don't forget, keep coming back to our blog as we'll be releasing details about all the additional new stuff coming to Digimarc for Images very soon.

Digimarc will be offering many new features to our Digimarc for Images customers very soon. I'm pleased to announce that we're integrating a brand new watermarking technology to our product line that will greatly improve the experience you have with digital watermarking. We call this breakthrough technology "Chroma" and you can learn about it now by clicking here. 

We've also completely redesigned the account management interface for all customers, making it easier to navigate and providing additional information, such as Digimarc Search Service statistics. There are a lot of updates taking place so we will be taking down the site for a few days. Check back on Friday, January 22, as all customers will then be able to sign in and experience the new system. Also, keep checking in on our blog as we'll release more great news about what's new with Digimarc for Images.

I had the chance to wander the floors of CES last week and attended a number of sessions. For the most part, I felt the show was a bit disappointing. Really not much new from last year, including many of the same discussions with regards to digital images. I attended the panel "Beyond Point and Shoot" moderated by someone from the Wall Street Journal. Here's a quick summary...

My last blog post contained links to a few products that you can buy online since I'm a huge fan of online commerce. Unfortunately, I was recently scammed by a "Web Loyalty "program and the merchant I purchased from.

Back in July I bought airline tickets on an online travel agency, and at the end of the process a pop-up window offered me some free coupons for my next purchase by joining what appeared to be their "Web Loyalty" program. By supplying them my email to opt-in I had authorized the "Loyalty Company," not the travel company, to retrieve the credit card info I provided the travel agency and charge me a $9.99 monthly membership fee.

I'm usually pretty good at reading fine print, but I have to admit I didn't give it a second thought since I assumed it was just a another freebie account and I was only providing them my email. Besides, the travel site claimed to be secure, so I didn't stop to think they'd be selling me out so cheaply.

The question comes up many times; is digital watermarking some sort of fingerprint? The quick answer is no and both technologies are quite different.

Last week I shared a link to website that has a lot of valuable information about copyright and content theft. The author of PlagiarismToday also wrote an article on this very topic. Digimarc also provides a link to an excellent case study on the same topic, which you can download here.

When you have great images and artwork, you need to get it into the public domain in multiple ways, including public Flickr PhotoStreams.

Check out some amazing work by Julie Everhart; who has an impressive 125,000 plus views on Flickr! Julie uses Digimarc for Images to protect her work.

Editor's Note:  To see more of Julie's artwork visit her on her Redbubble site.

I suspect a few of you have the same problem I have when buying gifts for the holidays. Do you end up giving yourself one or two as well? I've tried to limit this impulse to smaller ticket items, or at least to cool things that I wouldn't normally justify.

Here's a few items and sites of cool silly stuff I'm thinking of buying or doing to help stimulate the economy without breaking my budget.

The Photojojo store has some really cool toys. While the Diana lens is a little too retro for me, I'll probably blog a review of the Jelly phone filters sometime next year. Anyone crazy enough to record a video or photos while riding with the helmet digital camera mount, please please let me know! We might have to share...

If you want to impress the loved ones with your hands-on skills try out Make Magazine's blog, the crystalline Christmas ornaments will show you didn't sleep through high school chemistry after all.

Going green? Check out Lifehacker.com's cool use for those empty wine bottles. If you haven't already discovered Lifehacker, spend a couple of extra minutes exploring this really great site. Warning, it might be hours before you emerge.

FYI, I don't know anyone at these sites, receive anything from them or have any other reason to list them here except that I like them a lot.

Enjoy!

Oh, one last article to explain all this, maybe...

This year I've had the pleasure to meet a gentleman by the name of Jonathan Bailey. He has in-depth knowledge regarding copyright laws and how to protect your content. What's even better is his own website where he shares all sorts of valuable knowledge. Not only that, he also does his own research to inform you about what options are available out there and what's new in the market. Visit his site and learn more!