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.

One of the blogs I've mentioned previously is Plagiarism Today, and they have a really great post called "5 Things that Can't be Copyrighted." It's a quick read and you get to discover such interesting tidbits such as fashion designs can't receive copyrights, along with a few other items. For what could be a pretty dry subject this site does a great job keeping it fresh and interesting.

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.

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!

Facebook. Twitter. Picasa. Flickr. Blog. What else did I miss?

If you're anything like me, you have a variety of sites where to post your images. I post some images for friends on Facebook, then throw a few to the family over on Picasa, and then every once in a while tweet a couple more onto my personal blog to reach former colleagues (and provide fodder for the stalkers).

I recently stumbled across a site called Posterous which makes it easy to post your images online - to multiple sources - all via email. Simply email text, images, audio and video and route to the sites of your choosing. 

Over the next few weeks I'll do some testing with Digimarc for Images and share my results here.

Do you post your family pictures to publicly available sites like Flickr, or do you create private photo albums?

I do both. And thanks to the Digimarc Search Service I can automatically track my digitally watermarked images on millions of sites across the public internet. 

Why track your images? If your images show up on another site, you should know about it to uncover misuse or licensing opportunities. And in my case, the last thing I want my wife to find out is that our images are appearing on sites like Akward Family Photos. Just because I wore a pink shirt and "MC Hammer Pants" doesn't mean everyone needs to know about it.

The first five people to email me can try out a new professional offering that includes the Digimarc Search Service. You can reach me via kevin.shields(at)digimarc(dot).com.